원정 개요

Paul Schweizer:

Attempted new route on North Face of Kangchung:

On 15 October 2016, Simon Yates and I descended from Renjo Pass and arrived in Gokyo. The place was fully packed with guided trekking groups, and there was a non-stop, rescue-insurance-fuelled helicopter shuttle to Lukla, continuously evacuating stricken tourists. We spent a day in Gokyo getting organized, and on 17 October left with our porters up the valley to a point midway between the 3rd and 4th lakes, then dropped down the steep rubble slope onto the undulating and maze-like moraines of the Ngozumba Glacier. We crossed the loose wreckage of surrounding mountains that buried the glacier, and set up BC in a high and pleasant ablation valley on a point of land on the north side of the junction of the Ngozumba and Gaunara glaciers, at 5000m. The BC offered excellent side-on views of the highly inspirational twin peaks of Cholo (6043m) and Kangchung (6063m).

Our objective was the 1000m unclimbed North Face of Kangchung. Simon had been in the area a number of years back, and our current expedition was motivated by some striking photos he’d taken of the unbroken ice lines that draped the North Face. However, it had been a very dry season, and we were quite disappointed when initial recon up the valley revealed that the north face was exceedingly lean compared to Simon’s photos. The bottom 3rd was completely melted out, and the ice lines in the upper two thirds were discontinuous. So after some debate we decided to change our original plan and attempt an indirect couloir line on the right side of the North Face to gain the col between Cholo and Kangchung, and then proceed up the NW Ridge. We did a final recon and acclimatization trip on 21-22 October. On 24 October we bivvied in the rather inhospitable moraine rubble on the Gaunara glacier below the North Face. We set out early the next morning (25th of October) and ascended a zigzagging line to the base of the couloir. There was a house-sized chockstone blocking midway progress, which required some Scottish V mixed climbing to negotiate. As we got higher the gully widened, but what we thought from afar would be enjoyable neve turned out to be just a thin, brittle crust over deep, unconsolidated sugar-snow. This considerably slowed our rate of progress. We reached the col in the afternoon and established high camp on the NW Ridge.

On the morning of 26 October we set out on what we hoped would be our summit day. However, progress was again frustratingly sluggish due to the poor snow conditions. We had brought 5 ice screws in anticipation of an ice and neve line, but never placed any, and just sought occasional rock gear instead. By late afternoon we reached a notch in the NW ridge at about 5820m. There was still a fair distance of ridgeline to go, and since we had no bivy gear we decided to turn back and started rappelling and downclimbing to our high camp, which we reached just as daylight was fading.