I9I2] 
ON THE BOOMERANG GLACIER 
117 
At the first possible place my party left the glacier, 
and, after about an hour's climb, came out on a snow 
field, where we roped up and ploughed through deep 
snow lying over ice, along the foot of a steep slope, which 
we attempted to climb by cutting steps in order to reach 
a rocky spur several hundred feet above us. Half-way 
up, however, we had to retrace our steps, the snow being 
inclined to avalanche, and continue our way along the 
foot of the slope for about an hour, when we were able 
to get on another rocky spur and climb. 
Some of the granite boulders were hollowed out in 
a wonderful way by the action of sand-carrying wind. 
We crawled right inside some, and found room for five 
or six men. 
The view from where we were was very fine in every 
direction but N.W., where a higher ridge bounded our 
horizon. Looking down on the Mt. Melbourne neck 
we had first proposed crossing, I saw, to my surprise, 
that the flat ice on top of the neck was heavily crevassed. 
We got back to camp about 6.30, and found the 
others had not yet arrived. They turned up a little 
before 9, all very tired. Priestley reported very heavy 
going, soft snow up to their thighs, which completely 
hid the crevasses, and they dropped down a good many. 
They reached a height of 3680 feet above the camp, 
but could not see whether the glacier would form a good 
route over into Wood Bay. 
As far as they went it would be possible to get sledges, 
but progress would be very slow indeed, so considering 
our limited time we decided to work along more to the 
