원정 개요

The two-man team approached the mountain from the west via the Rolwaling Khola to Beding and spent three weeks acclimatizing by ice climbing along the south side of the khola between the villages of Nyimare and Na (which are on the north side).

On 4 March they moved from Na to the south side of the Tsho Rolpa lake to their BC, which they made on 6 March at 4750m on the Trakarding Glacier, a "dirty" glacier of rocks strewn atop the ice, south of Takargo.

They had originally thought they might climb the mountain via a west rib, and on the 7th they bivouacked on the glacier between Chobutse and Takargo to have a look at the west side of Takargo. But they didn't like that side's bare unstable rock and rockfall.

They returned to BC on the 8th, and the next day they went around to the east side of Takargo and bivouacked east of the mountain at 5400m on the Drolamba Glacier. They decided to climb the East Face of mixed rock and snow.

On the 10th they bivouacked at 5740m on a glacier coming away from the East Face, and on the 11th they made their next bivouac 6400m on top of a large hanging glacier against the East Face.

Finally on 12 March, they left this last bivouac at 7:30 am for the summit. They climbed up the mildly steep East Face just north of a widely rounded kind of ridge to its top, point 6756m (on the Schneider Rolwaling map). There they turned north and ascended the summit ridge, the South Ridge of Takargo's main summit; this ridge was covered by a continuous series of sharp cornices. Despite the lightly falling snow on a very cold day with winds blowing moderately (at 15-25 mph), they made their way along the cornices to the three highest of them, about 100m apart, to make sure they stood on the very highest.

They had made the first ascent of Takargo. They were there at around 2:30 pm and returned to their highest bivouac at 5:30 pm in gentle snowfall that added two inches of new snow.

At 7:30 am on the 13th they left their last bivouac at 6400m and descended all the way to BC at 4750m, where they arrived at 7:00 pm. They were very tired, but they managed to pack up everything and leave BC on the 14th with heavy loads to return to Kathmandu. They were back in their modest Kathmandu hotel on the 21st.