View from the top of the Nun Kun Plateau, Ladakh, Himalayas, looking south into the Indian Himalayas. (PAM)

Nun Kun, Ladakh, Indian Himalayas, 1980. After ascending three icefalls, we crested onto an ice plateau at well over 18,000 feet punctuated by mountains rising yet another 3,000 feet. The journey into this site took many weeks and was filled with intrigue and adventure. More adventure - and a new way to understand climate - was still to come. (PAM)

A ski-equipped C-130 Hercules flies over the Transantarctic Mountains en route to McMurdo from the South Pole. (MCM)

Icebergs, the size of city blocks and larger, calving (discharging) from the edge of the vast Ross Ice Shelf (mid-picture) with Mt. Erebus in the background, the continent's only active volcano. (PAM)

Winds and salts combine to etch bizarre, sculptured rocks like this vone that is nearly 10 feet high in the Dry Valleys. (PAM)

Our snowmobile shakedown trip destination - Captain Robert Falcon Scott's hut at Cape Evans, erected for the 1910-13 British (Terra Nova) Antarctic Expedition. (PAM)

Scott tents in drifting snow during a strong wind. (PAM)

The Rennick Glacier in Northern Victoria Land, with our snowmobiles and sleds in the foreground. (PAM)

Sergei Abakumov (then a Soviet exchange scientist) and John Attig (then a University of Maine graduate student) having lunch next to the threadbare tent. (PAM)

Punjabi children at a roadside rest stop on our way into the Himalayas. (PAM)

Locals cleaning clothes in Dal Lake, Srinagar, Kashmir, seen during our transit into the Himalayas. (PAM)

Several of the 40 villagers who helped us get our equipment onto Nun Kun. (PAM)

A list of names of the Tongul villagers who helped us with our expedition. (PAM)

Approaching the Nun Kun icefalls that we ascended to reach the plateau. (PAM)

Ice coring on the Nun Kun Plateau was a slow process. With less than half of the oxygen at sea level at this coring site, raising the heavy stainless drill system was a challenge. Our camp is seen below. (PAM)

An ice core from Nun Kun showing the spring season dust bands we used to determine annual layers needed to date the core. (PAM)

A C-130 aircraft delivering supplies to the Greenland Ice Sheet. (MCM)

Evening drilling in southern Greenland. (PAM)

Our camp at the head of the Beardmore Glacier in Antarctica. (PAM)

Processing ice cores on the Beardmore Glacier, Antarctica. Clean suits ensure that we do not contaminate the core. Photo by a team member.

View of South Pole station from the cockpit of a C-130. (MCM)

Paul Mayewski riding one of the sleds as we left South Pole Station. We stopped every quarter mile to place a bamboo flag marking our route. (MCM)

By digging two snowpits next to each other and leaving just a thin wall between them, we could cover the top of one and observe the snow layers with sunlight coming through from the other. This photo shows the beautiful blue light we experience in these studies, as well as the annual layers used to interpret the age of the snow. (PAM)

The first tents at the GISP2 drilling site. Scott tents, like these, and other tents were used as living quarters for most of the field team. (MCM)

The massive GISP2 ice coring system inside the drill dome. (PAM)

Evening approaches, marking the close of the Greenland ice core drilling field season. (MCM)

Driving toward the Mongolian border. (PAM)

Taking a break from carrying loads into the Annapurna region on one of our ice coring expeditions. (PAM)

Looking across one of the Tupungatito craters toward the Tupungatito Glacier where we drilled an ice core. (MCM)