Photos courtesy of Louis-Philippe Ménard - Content courtesy of mugsstumpaward.com
Photos courtesy of Louis-Philippe Ménard.
A Mugs Stump Award Trip Report of Louis-Philippe Ménard and Maxime Turgeon's expedition to the unclimbed North Face of K6, Charakusa, Pakistan. August 20 — October 4, 2007.
"Chaque pas que l’on fait efface le précédent. La vie ne serait-elle qu'une série de gestes dont le prochain sera la négation de celui que l'on vient de poser?"English translation: "Each step which one takes erases the precedent. Would the life be only one series of gestures whose next one will be the negation of that one has just posed?" — Crystal Pite, Lost Action
Photos courtesy of Louis-Philippe Ménard.
All five toes look like small carrots growing out of my inflatable doll-like right foot. This footstep (I should say footmiss…) I will remember. The one that ‘denied’ all the previous ones and drastically put an end to my expedition and any chances to be able to finally climb K6.
K6. K6 is such a little name for this huge peak in the Charakusa valley of northern Pakistan that still remains unclimbed. It's north face is almost 3000 meters long, a vertical cocktail of rock, ice, snow and serac. For the second year in a row Maxime Turgeonme and I applied for a permit to attempt an alpine style ascent of this face.
Photos courtesy of Louis-Philippe Ménard.
It is still very unclear to me how climbing permits are granted, but I’m starting to think there’s some sort of Poker game implied into the process… For 20 years the valley had been closed to climbing and tourism, but in 2000 it fortunately has been reopened to climbers. However, to get a permit for K6 and K7, the biggest mountains of the region, is still quite a challenge. In 2006 we were not able to get a permit for the Charakusa, so we headed to the Choktoi for a try on Latok I. While we failed on Latok I, we climbed on a few nearby peaks and learned much about climbing in the Karakoram Range. So, this year, again we applied for K6, but not without putting pressure on the ministry of tourism on our way into Islamabad.
Photos courtesy of Louis-Philippe Ménard.
One of the things we learned from our previous Himalayan experiencewas to plan with with more friends in order to split cost. Indeed, Kelly Cordes and Scott Decapio had similar schedules and were interested in K7, so we were all happy to be travelling together. Well, ‘General K6’, for once, must have dealt a Royal Flush that beat ‘Sergeant K7’s’ usual Full House because we had the go for K6 but learned, shortly before departing, that we were refused access to K7. Juggling with several ideas, we pushed on with the initial plan, worst case; we would all climb on the same peak. We wouldn’t miss our chance to finally be able to climb K6. The future would prove that no one would get to climb this majestic peak in the season.
Photos courtesy of Louis-Philippe Ménard.
The Charakusa valley has climbing objectives from boulders to 7000m peaks. If that's not enough there are lots of bugaboo-like granite spires, but to top it off, you can establish base camp on a grassy meadow with running streams of crystal clear water. After the usual headaches had passed in base camp, we started acclimatizing on surrounding peaks. Objectives were plentiful and after a first trek up to 5000m, we saw all four summits of Farol peak (ca. 6350m) and scoped a new line up its central peak.
Located relatively far from our established base camp, we left in the afternoon of August 31st with all of our climbing gear, food for a day and a tent with the plan of hiking to the base of the peak, setting camp and climbing our proposed route in a single push. We started climbing around 4h30 am, simul and solo climbing rapidly up to 5700m at which point we were bummed to see fixed ropes on the headwall in front of us! Adding to our disturbed moral, the rising sun was now intensely cooking us. I took the lead, resolved to continue our ascent, and wanting to free climb the headwall. I carefully climb around the artefacts that soil the beautiful orange granite. Further up, after a long and strenuous ice pitch, Max takes the lead into a broken and loose corner. About 20ft up over a single piece of pro, he breaks loose and falls and is caught by his ‘spring-leash’, a homemade keeper leash attached to the spike of his ice axe. He gets over it and resumes the pitch, and in our deficient acclimatized state, we reach an altitude of 6000m. At around 4h30 pm, without any bivy gear or stove, slowed down by a complex saw-teeth like rock arête (and not too cheerful to go thru an open bivy to reach the summit of an already established route), we decide to bail in the nearby exit gully, even though we know it leads to a serac-threatened col.
Photos courtesy of Louis-Philippe Ménard.
A few rappels later, we start downclimbing (a bit hastily!) the steep glacier with nasty 100m high overhanging seracs over our heads. Max was under me and we were still tied together without any pro between the two of us. I placed my foot on a step formed by a small crevasse in the middle of the face and everything collapsed causing my tools rip out of their placements. I plunge head first, letting go of an ice axe to grab the other one with both hands and do my best to try and self arrest. My pick just couldn't catch anything in the hard serac snow that I was now plummeting down. I felt a sudden painful tweak in my right ankle; I tried harder to plunge my ice axe and eventually the freefall ended, a few meters before tugging onto Max’s rope end, with a sudden stop, my foot jerking on small ledge that breaks my talus bone.
Photos courtesy of Louis-Philippe Ménard.
Photos courtesy of Louis-Philippe Ménard.
The first thing that goes thru my mind is a bad feeling that I will not be able to climb K6 this trip. Furthermore, I screwed up the ankle so badly that It'll be hard just getting back to base camp, not mentioning how far it is back to Hushe, the nearest village two days walk away…
A mix of butt-sliding, four-legged crawling, one-foot humping and lots of pain get me back to base camp. Even more painful though is actually leaving base camp, Max, Kelly and Scott and everything that surrounds the Charakusa valley (a decision I take after 5 rest days nursing my injury). I manage the trek back to Hushe with the help of homemade crutches and porters. The possibility of hooking up with Steve House, Marko Prezelj or Vince Anderson (that are also in the valley) and a solo project convince Max to stay in base camp. The rest of the trip is better reported by Max himself:
Photos courtesy of Louis-Philippe Ménard.
“I decided to stay with the others and see what the weather would bring us. On the 11th, after my third Cypro pill (the joys of traveling in Asia) I find my way back to the tent I left over a week before, at the base of Farol, for an attempt on a narrow ice line (spotted on our epic climb) that leads to the unclimbed 6350m East summit. Extreme heat from the sun slowed my progress on the South-West oriented route and I had to bivy as soon as I reached the summit ridge. Saved by an early start, I was standing on my personal highest summit ever by noon the next day, alone in the middle of the Karakoram under a perfectly clear sky. Over 1300m above the surface of the glacier, with only 50 meters of 6mm cord to go down; there wasn’t any time to loose. At 9h pm, soaked wet due to an extended session of canyoneering and with barely half the rope left, (it was so frozen it could stand straight by itself) I was back to the security of my tent.
Photos courtesy of Louis-Philippe Ménard.
On the 17th, a day before the porters came, Marko Prezelj felt like he still had some energy to burn. So I joined him to recon what the south face of K7 West had to offer. Without previously scoping the face for a particular line, we turned our attention to a shallow dihedral and crack system that split the south face of the farther east pillar.
Photos courtesy of Louis-Philippe Ménard.
At 7h30 am we threw our rock shoes on. We climbed pitch after pitch of perfect overhanging hand cracks and steep dihedrals… mostly in the 5.10, 5.10+ range. At 5h pm the summit was still a few rope lengths ahead, but it seemed so close that there was no way either of us would bail. Finish by head lamp it’ll be!!! At 8h30 pm, 3 pitches and a few meters of aid later put us on the top of the buttress. An accomplishment can be all too relative. We hadn’t reached any real summit; the formation that we’d just climbed didn’t even have a name. But we left in the morning with a vision and the goal of reaching the top of that 900m pillar with only a single light pack between the two of us and we attained a goal and this was as good as having reached any other summit in the Charakusa or any other valley. 13 raps, in a really compact rock gully, and 4 hours later we were back to our packs at the base of the route.
Photos courtesy of Louis-Philippe Ménard.
That night was the end of the last Scotch bottle and the end of the trip for Steve, Vince and Marko. For me, I still had almost 2 weeks left and lots of projects in mind, but the following events proved that it was the end for me as well, climbing wise. Despite the events, it was once again a wonderful experience, in an extremely wild and powerful environment, with really great friends.”
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