1. Below the bushes lay a ledge and then a sheer rock face plunging forty feet to the clay-reddened lake. 2. Moais lie horizontally, vertically, even base over apex to make optimum use of the rock face. 3. Steve had to fix a belay around a boulder while the porters lowered barrels, bags and sacks down the rock face. 4. The body in its shroud of ice stayed fixed to the rock face. 5. The footpath is now pointing due south and the panorama is magnificent, with rock faces rising almost vertically from the lake. 6. The path down to the beach was a precarious one, tiny steps hewn out of the sheer rock face. 7. Everywhere, on rock faces and in crevices, exotic flowers bloomed in profusion like weeds -- mimosa, antirrhinum, hydrangeas. 8. As I wormed my way higher and higher up the rock face, the grade meant less and less, and my fear meant more and more. 9. As my belayer feeds the rope back out I walk backward down the rock face. 10. Both were built early in this century, and employ extraordinary stone steps and iron ladders to get hikers up the demanding rock faces. |