Photographs fron the 1977 British Speleological Expedition to the Zagros Mts, Iran. - Back to index - foward to next image -
..far from the delights of the springs at Palangan - though tantalisingly close - was our first water supply at the top of the ridge. The Kurds existed all summer on this stuff - melted ice ...
...cont below.
from the winters snows in the cave shafts out of reach of the direct sun. The taste of this will haunt all those who drank it. Almost palatable when just melted and cool, but within the hour would change to a horrific pale brown fluid - I wouldn't call it water. We tried to douse it with purification tablets and dried grapefruit powder bu this seened to just make it even worse. Maybe they knew the sevret of which bits to melt, or their wet kid-skin water bags kept it cool, or they just were used to it ! The whole trip nearly collapsed early through this stuff - fortunately we were to find a tiny fresh spring further up - our saviour.