A Sufferfest of Solitude

So there I sat on the summit ridge exhausted, a bit scared, and daunted by the realization that I would have another three or four hours of climbing ahead of me to reach the summit.  The day did not start out as a planned summit day, but after climbing through some pretty scary terrain for the last four hours I thought I would be pushing my luck to climb through it again for a summit bid which would also require down climbing that same terrain.  On top of that, the summit ridge didn't exactly look like a walk in the park, the day was heating up which meant rockfall would be starting to ramp up in the couloir I had to downclimb, and there were some tiny, baby clouds just forming on the other side of the ridge.

The summit ridge

Fluffy clouds!

The choice for the day was an easy one.  Within an hour or two those little clouds would build into dense fog and snow, and warming temperatures would mean increased rockfall in an already narrow and technical couloir.  Time to head down.  Should I make another attempt after a rest day?  That was the question eating at me.  I eventually answered, "No."  The terrain was sketchy, but what it really came down to was that I would have to spend another day in my tent by myself... The past several days had taught me that I am not as good sitting in absolute solitude as I had imagined, and the previous ten days or so had taught me a fair amount about ego and pride.

Flashback to 400 or 500 days out of the last two years.  This is probably the number of times I have been able to see the gorgeous Dhaulagiri mountain range to the north.  The range is obviously dominated by Dhaulagiri, but the other peaks in the area are equally beautiful.  I have been staring at those peaks for the last two years always yearning to explore them which is easier said than done.  I have been looking at one peak in particular for a potential climbing peak: Jirbang Himal.

The mountain stands 6062m tall and has a pretty imposing southern façade.  A quick look through binoculars (or a nice zoom lens) from my house will show serrated knife ridges interspersed with large cliffs which would be a technical nightmare if climbed from the south.  After looking at some topos and Google Earth I thought that a climb might be possible from the west side and decided to go check in out last March.  I spent a few days wandering along some of the paths of the Dhaulagiri Circuit trekking route and briefly spied a ridge through binoculars that looked climbable to the summit via a steep couloir.  Now all I had to do was wait for climbing season.

I spent a little time and effort attempting to get a climbing partner, but as climbing season drew closer I thought it would be quite a challenge to attempt the peak solo and unsupported.  "Well that would be quite an accomplishment," I thought.  I could find no information online or anywhere else about the peak which made planning that much more difficult and the idea of the climb that much more of an adventure.  Not only would I be attempting to climb a 6,000m peak alone, I would also have to find a route up!  Boy, perhaps I was getting in over my head...  Nah!

I decided I would give myself about two weeks to climb with a couple days on either end for the approach.  I set out one morning in early October on my motorcycle loaded down with a 35 kilogram pack.  I rode to a place called Sibang (see map below) which involved pushing the bike through some very steep and loose landslide areas and riding across a old wooden footbridge.  From Sibang the sufferfest really got started.

The route

The upper route

Feeling good at the beginning.  This feeling lasted about 4 minutes of walking.

That first day I hiked for an hour or two down to Phaliyagaun and was already feeling the weight in the pack.  I stayed the night with a nice family, and the next day headed out planning to get to Bogara.  I was told this would be fairly easy in one long day.  As it turned out I was on the main trekking route which winds back and forth and up and down to get more views.  This is nice, but it just meant my approach was longer and with my pack I was already moving incredibly slowly.  By the end of the day I had only reached Naura which was still a solid two or three hours from Bogara.

The first night in Phaliyagaun the guy I was staying with found a little forest crab.

I think they add the vegetation to the bridge to get cattle across.

I seem to have a lot of pictures of bridges...

The next day I made my way to Bogara (very slowly).  It took me four hours for what should have been three hours maximum.

The path on the way to Bogara is just etched into the cliff.  Jirbang looms in the background.

A very pretty waterfall

The first good view of Jirbang.  I would eventually climb the furthest left couloir.

As I ate lunch I was able to reach my girlfriend, Tara, on the phone.  I was so tired, and moving so slowly.  She recommended I find somebody to help carry my load.  Initially, I was against this, but as I was eating the idea became more and more intriguing.  I started asking around and eventually found an older man who was heading to his herding shelter called a ghot. He said he would take some of my things to a point an hour or two down the trail and then return back a bit and head up the hill towards his ghot.  On the way we started talking and I learned that his ghot was in the general direction that I wanted to go, and on top of that there was a bridge crossing the river which other people had assured me did not exist.  I asked him if I could come to his ghot with him and he was very happy to have me.  He said, "Just my wife and I will be there, and from there I can lead you higher up the mountain."  This was working out perfectly!  Not only did I have someone to help me carry my things, but he could also show me the path through the jungle.  Without this guy it is likely I would have not even reached the base of the climb.  It seemed the only thing I had proven by carrying everything myself is that I know how to damage my knees.

A nice waterfall on the way up to the ghot.

The bridge that doesn't exist- hard to believe they take the buffaloes over this thing

The ghot and some of the water buffaloes

At the ghot they treated me well, fed me rice and some wild mushrooms, and gave me a place to sleep under their shelter.  This was very kind, but we also shared the shelter with 4 goats, some chickens, and three baby water buffalo.  I was given the side of the fire closest to the water buffalo which put me pretty close to everything when those things had to take a dump.  The plopping of shit about 2 feet from one's head is not the most wonderful sound to wake up to.  Also, the mother came to the ghot at about three AM and very noisily announced that it was time for her to feed her baby.  The man's wife got up and released the baby to be fed and then had to tie it back up again after the feeding.  Needless to say the sleep could have been a bit better.

The next morning my new friend and I set out to head to what he called a wardar which I learned later was basically an overhanging rock that people use as a shelter in the subalpine.  That morning I realized I had forgotten to turn in a report to my office which could definitely lead to some trouble for me if I didn't take care of it.  The man said that from a higher summer ghot there was phone reception, so we initially headed up there with plans to go to the wardar.  Well, we couldn't get reception and so rather than get booted from Peace Corps with just a month to go, I decided to cancel the trip and head down to the valley where I could get a phone and from there head home to my computer.  We did just that.  We descended all the way back to Bogara arriving at 9PM.  The phone towers don't work at night out there (perhaps solar powered with no battery backup?), so I planned on making some calls in the morning.  My friend invited me to stay with him in his house, which I gladly accepted.

At his house we walked out of the night and straight into hell.  It was holiday time which means family was visiting.  There were at least 700 small, crying and screaming children in that tiny three room house with only maybe 10 adults to control them all.  They kindly made us some rice and dried meat, and I realized just how hard off this guy was.  He had ten children, and the older ones all had children of their own (all of whom seemed to be trying to out temper tantrum each other).  The children were all filthy and had chronic coughs (from open woodfire cooking stoves in their homes or perhaps just had perpetual colds).  They didn't even have daal (lentils) which is a staple for every Nepali.  Everyday they just had rice and some sort of "vegetable."  This time of year the vegetable was dried goat meat, but they still used the word for vegetable when talking about it.  However, this man was a true Nepali which means he treats his guests with honor which is more rare in a trekking hotel.  He gave me the only bed and slept on the floor, and he didn't ask for a single rupee for the food or lodging.  Even though he had so little, he shared what he had with me.  That night was again a tough night's sleep due to the crying children (one woke up with night terrors), but things looked up in the morning.

I made phone contact with a good friend who said that she could easily write a little something up and send in my report.  All I had to do was tell her what to write.  Amazing!!  Now I didn't have to go all the way back home.  I could continue my climb!!  I told the guy the good news, and he agreed to go back up the mountain with me.  Due to the festivities he left quite a bit later than me.  I pushed on to the upper ghot because I wanted to sleep over 3,000m for acclimatization purposes.  He met me up there the next morning, and we continued on to the wardar.  Along the way he pointed out edible mushrooms, and medicinal plants.  Part of his income is collecting medicinal herbs and selling them.  His most popular herb is a painkiller, but he also collects one that is very deadly.  He said that just touching it can kill you which seems unlikely, but is certainly possible.  I asked what people use that for, and he said he didn't know but he gets orders for it from Kathmandu.  He showed it to me on the hike up, and it turns out it is Aconitum aka monkshood, or wolf's bane.  A pretty flower, but extremely deadly.

The deadly wolf's bane

The wardar

We stayed the night there and the next morning he agreed to take me up to ridge which was a long grassy slope.  We crossed the ridge at 4,300m and finally I could really see where I needed to go.  We dropped into the valley on the other side and he took me as far as my camp at 4,330m.  He even helped me dig out a tent platform in the dirt and then headed back down to his ghot.  That evening I shuttled some of my gear up to a point at 4,600m and returned to camp.  That night I discovered that my air mattress had acquired a tiny leak that made it deflate every four hours.

Climbing towards the grassy ridge

The east face of Gurja Himal poking through the building clouds

The first good view I got of the intimidating summit ridge

The guy, Min, who helped me so much on this trip approaching camp.

The first good view of the couloir I would climb



Evening and fog rolls into Camp I.

The next morning I took the rest of my gear up onto the glacier and made camp II at 4,650m.  I had to build a little sleeping platform out of the flattest pieces of glacial till that cover the ice.  Then I went back for my other gear.  Now began the true solitude and the waiting game.  Everyday after 11 AM above 4,000m the weather would just sock in and it would be cold and dreary with some spitting snow.  This snow would be a bit more intense higher up which would result in large sloughs coming out of the couloirs that interspersed the headwall.

Approaching the glacier

This platform was extremely comfortable...ahem.  It took an hour and half to build

Day 2 at camp was a rest day so I slept in and climbed a little ways up the couloir in mid-morning.  I found that the beginning of the couloir involved some pretty serious ice-climbing.  It was fairly tense getting through that 100ft or so, and I decided on my way down to check out the loose fourth class rock surrounding the couloir.  This turned out to be a better descent than downclimbing the ice, so I figured the next day I would use the rock to get up and down on my way up to the ridge.  That afternoon was cold and very lonely.  I was really struggling with being alone up there.  The dreary weather led to scary thoughts about HAPE and falling in that terrain, and just really got me down.  That night it snowed quite a bit.

Camp II

A little ways up the couloir (5030m)

Camp

I woke up early for an ascent up to the ridge.  I approached the fourth class rocks I was planning on going up and down and discovered that they were very slick with four inches of new snow and ice covering them.  That meant the ice climb up the couloir.  There was still a fair amount of slough coming down from the snow, not enough to be particularly dangerous but just enough to really get down the back of my jacket.  As the sun rose I was treated to some delightful views.  I was not sure about snow conditions further up the couloir so as soon as I could I traversed out onto a small ridge on the side.  Of course this meant some mixed climbing, but around 10:30AM I reached the summit ridge, and began deliberating my options.

Reaching the top of the iceclimb



I really tried to take some photos of the iceclimb, but wasn't really successful

 

 

The Dhaulagiri range (part of it)

 

The Icefall on the west side of Jirbang

I decided to do a full retreat.  I just wasn't up for another day in my tent followed by the sketchy climb back up to the ridge.  If I had gone with a partner then ropes would have been a very wise option.  I really learned what the value of fixed lines would be.  Rappelling through the ice section would have been much less scary. 

The intimidating ice section

Anyways, I packed up camp and started heading down the mountain just as fog moved in.  I found the talus much more difficult to navigate with a full pack and with the nice covering of snow that had collected.  I also found the grassy slopes pretty treacherous for the same reasons. 

The usual post 11 AM fog, and a talus field.  Navigating out of the valley became extremely difficult in this

I wanted to get down to the upper ghot, and I arrived at the wardar a little before dark.  I had eaten little all day and was running low on water so I stopped to pump some water at the little stream.  Well, my pump decided to give out at this time, so I only was able to pump a small amount of water.  It would take just an hour to reach the ghot and I immediately took a wrong turn in the bushes.  I realized I was way off track just around dark.  At this point I made a typical decision that someone would make after walking for half an hour the wrong direction and being very tired.  A shortcut!!!

Now the adventure for the evening really begins.  I began to work my way down a gully that led straight to the upper ghot.  I could see the tarps that make up the roof before it got dark, and this gully would lead me right there.  The entire time I was going down I was expecting something to go wrong as shortcuts rarely work the way they are supposed to, and this shortcut did not disappoint.  I worked my way down some small cliffs, and around 7PM was less than a quarter mile (.09 miles to be exact) away from the ghot.  Then I found the cliff I had been dreading all along.  I had slipped my down the slick, steep gully using bamboo to keep from sliding over the edge, and sure enough there was no way down from this cliff.  I struggled my way out of the gully, fought a thicket of bamboo and thorns, and got into the gully just to the west.  Another cliff.  At this point I couldn't climb back up the slick gully with my backpack so I ditched the backpack and went to look for a way down.  Moving through the thick vegetation was easier without the pack, and soon enough I found a way down… Now I just had to go find my pack again. Shit!  Luckily I had my GPS on or I probably would not have found my way back.  Eventually I did, figured out a way to haul my pack up through the steep mud, and then worked my way back to the ghot using a waypoint I had marked on my way up.  Again, I would not have found it in the dark without the GPS which is not a position I like to be in.  Technology is fun, but relying on it in the wilderness seems like a really good way to end up one of the stories about the idiot who went into the woods knowing only how to use a GPS and then ended up dead.  Anyways, on the way down my thirst got the best of me, and I just could not wait to drink anymore. I came across some running water and enjoyed for a good ten minutes.  I still haven’t gotten giardia, but there is still time.

I got to the ghot at 9 PM after spending four hours wandering around the bamboo forest.  I felt very ill.  I got some water boiled, drank some, felt like vomiting, and then heated some dinner and ate it.  I haven't felt that bad in quite a while.  I clearly needed food, but just wasn't hungry.  I needed sleep, but wasn't sleepy.  But finally I slept...

The next day I worked my way down to Bogara around lunch time.  I ate some food, and was originally planning on blasting out to Sibang that afternoon- I had been told it could be reached in five hours-after eating though, I was so tired, and there was a nice group of trekkers I met so I decided to stay and socialize.  That night we discussed how some trekking guides use poor judgment, and push their clients in bad situations.  I related to them the story of the blizzard last year in Gokyo.  That evening some high level moisture entered the Annapurna region.  Some of the 7,000m peaks had cap clouds, and I said to the group, "You know, I wouldn't be surprised if there is some serious weather in the next 48 hours. I've seen this pattern before, almost the exact same time last year."

The next day the high level clouds built a bit more, which made hiking a nice (ish) temperature.  We set out a little late, and my friend who I had again hired to help carry my stuff to Sibang also decided to carry his own load of medicinal herbs to sell.  Despite his assurances that he could still move quickly, he moved very slowly.  We skipped lunch and still the five hour day turned into 9 hours, and I finally left Sibang a little after 5 PM on my bike.  I reached the landslide area just as it got dark, and could not get my bike through by myself.  On my first solo attempt I almost put the bike over a 50 foot drop into the river.  I ran to the next town and asked for a hand pushing my bike through the landslides.  Two nice gentlemen helped me, and I set off for Mallaj in the dark just as first raindrops started to fall.

Jirbang with the high clouds

Myagdi Matha (6273m)

Gurja Himal just a few hours before the rain/snow started

The rain quickly turned into a downpour, and after a long battle/ride in which my loose chain kept popping off I finally reached Mallaj around 10 PM very cold and wet.  It rained all night, the next day, and the next night.  This equated to snow in the higher areas where some solo trekkers, and some guided groups decided to try to cross Thorung-La (a pass at 5400m) in the blizzard with much the same attitude I saw near Gokyo last year.  Like last year, almost 2 meters of snow fell, but this year the consequences were much greater.  The body count is currently at 48 with around 100 people still missing in various alpine areas in Nepal.  Some were caught in avalanches, while others succumbed to exposure while attempting a high alpine pass crossing in a whiteout.

Sad news, and I got out just in time. I'm fairly confident I would have had made good decisions (i.e. stayed at camp) if I had been stuck in the blizzard, but I'm glad I wasn't faced with that decision.