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Here joints maps of the area : |
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Intercative map Biafo glacier (85 ko) |
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Unnamed Big Walls -~c6,000m-: |
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A
big wall is 1000m of high rock spur is a minimum 80° steep. These
spurs have a semi-official name: Hassan Peak or Gum peaks. It's approximatively
1500 meters high.
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Hispar pass -c5,151m-: |
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On left bank of Hispar glacier, the pass was always difficult and dangerous: the Hispar glacier is crevassed, and the upstream reservoir of Biafo too vast. In the medium of XIXième century, a band of plunderers lost themself in a storm between Nagar and Askole. |
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Sokha pass (Sokha La): |
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The
existence of a glacier without emissary on the other side of Sokha pass
had been constant with insistence by Fanny Bullock-Workman against W.M.Conway.
H.W.Tilman, disillusioned, finished the myth in 1937 when he crossed
the pass and walked on the glacier and, two days later, bathed in the
hot and sulfurous springs of Bisil in the Basha valley.
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Biafo & Hispar glaciers : |
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Respectively
58 and 68 kms long, Biafo & Hispar glaciers cut an big way in the
heart of central Karakoram and constitutes one of the longest extent
icy place out of the polar areas. H.Godwin Austen map the Shigar glaciers
in 1861 and went up Biafo glacier but this super glacial motorway remained
largely ignored before the arrival of Martin Conway 31 years later.
Conway was the first to cross Hispar pass the 18th of July 1892. This
mission and the description of the places attracted the Workman Bullock
which remain forever associated with the first explorations of this
area. Biafo and Hispar were attended for a long time by Askole and Nagar
local people: they however imposed 120 kilometers of hard walk on the
glacier, complicated, painful and dangerous. Until the middle of the
last century, Nagaris and Hunzakuts people have to cross Nushiq La,
the western pass from Hispar to Arandu and down the valley of Basha
towards Shigar, Skardu and beyond. Baintha Brakk dominates, one of the
great bivouacs to the left bank called Baintha (Brakk means in Balti
" the rock mountain"). The glacier of Biafo is moving at the
200m speed per year. The Hispar glacier run down the foot of a the highest
group of mountains in Asia, the Hispar Range. Its movements of rise
and erosion be the more active of world.
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Solu & Sokha glaciers : |
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A small and primarily female group of British mountaineers planned
to spend the second half of July 2000 exploring the Hucho Alchori Glacier
north of Arandu. Base Camp was reached but as a result of the previous
lean winter and almost continuous rain while they were in the region,
feasible lines on accessible peaks were incomplete and threatened either
by stonefall or avalanche. No climbs were completed but the team did
find evidence of a camp, which they surmise must have originated from
the Bullock- Workman expedition in the early 1900s. This glacier system
was also visited in 1959 by Tony Streather's British Army expedition,
which climbed a peak (provisionally named Gloster Peak) on the Hispar
watershed.
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Snow Lake (Lukpe Lawo/Lukpe Balto) -c5,000m-: |
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The
highest section of the Biafo glacier is create by two other glaciers,
almost flat: Lukpe Lawo, in the North and Sim Gang, the East. Martin
Conway christened this vast snow-covered place which it discovered from
Hispar pass "Snow Lake". It's 45 km2 makes a very impressive
Arctic there. In 1937 B Tilman with his faithful E Shipton noticed the
traces steps of possible yeti. They were approximately 20 centimeters
wide and were spaced by about 50 centimetres, were round without trace
of foot or of heel, 3 or 4 days old and were steep approximately 30
centimeters. Baltis porters affirmed that it was the smallest yeti,
which eat human, the other nourishing rather yaks. Tilman perhaps was
unaware of that these steps could come from bears steps which there
remains only in the North of the Biafo and Hispar glaciers, on the Panmah
glacier and around. It is possible to see vultures, ibexs and bharals
on the accesses of the Biafo and Hispar glaciers, a little downwards.
Baltis name of this Arctic place is "Lukpe Lawo" or "Lukpe
Balto". Snow Lake, far from the crowded Baltoro is very wild, expeditions
are still rare to see, even the less intrepid trekkers, when he sit
down to admire sunset at Baintha camp or on the bank of Snow Lake, it
can feel as a a true worthy follower of Conway, Shipton, Bullock or
Duke of Abruzzi.
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Unnamed summits -~c6,000m-: |
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There is still innumerable mountains without name in the area and whose summits remains still virgins. These summits separating the glacier of Biafo and Hoh Lungma valley in the South-East Sosbun Brakk : they do not reach 6000m, the rock is generally poor, but they are very impressive, powerful attraction of the unknown of virgin summits in a secret area. |
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Baintha group (Ogre's group) -c6960m/c7,285m- : |
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Up
to the beginning of 2001 almost 20 expeditions, many involving world-class
mountaineers, had tried the Ogre by various routes, most concentrating
on either the elegant South or South East Pillars. Few had come within
300m of the summit and no one other than the first ascensionists had
managed to stand on the highest point.
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Baintha Brakk I (Ogre I) -c7,285m-, south face : |
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Four
attempts had already been made on the formidable Ogre, the highest mountain
in the Biafo Glacier region, when Doug Scott gained a permit for 1977.
The assault was initially a two-pronged affair, with Paul 'Tut' Braithwaite
and Scott aiming for an Alpine style ascent of the elegant rock prow
forming the South Pillar, while Mo Anthoine, Chris Bonington, Nick Estcourt
and Clive Rowland concentrated on a more conventional fixed roped ascent
of the Southwest Face. After climbing a relatively safe icy rib through
the avalanche threatened Southwest Face, Bonington and Estcourt took
off for a very bold attempt at the lengthy traverse towards the Main
Summit. Four days later they returned unsuccessful, though as a consolation
they had managed to bag the lower West Top.
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Baintha Brakk I (Ogre I) -c7,285m-, South pillar : |
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The South Pillar was first climbed to the upper snowfields in 1983 by the French, Michel Fauquet and Vincent Fine. This pair continued up towards the summit, reaching an altitude of 7000m (a height that until last year had never been equalled on this line) before bad weather forced them down. The 6,400m top of the South Pillar had been reached three times since, in 1990, '95 and 97 and some near misses achieved in other years, but only the Germans, Lentrodt and Wittmann, in 1990 appear to have continued above with a serious attempt on the summit. After some aid low down on the crest (A2) the pillar gives free climbing with difficulties variously rated from 6a/6b to 7a depending on the quantity of aid used. The well-known Huber brothers from Germany tried the route in 1999, failing to get above 6,000m but reportedly climbing the pillar free to that point. |
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Baintha Brakk I (Ogre I) -c7,285m-, Southwest face : |
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In year 2002, Japanese mountaineers almost succeeded in a new and dangerous route up the South Face but after a bold push on the upper slopes, they were thwarted within a handshake of the top, unable to climb the final 10-15m to the highest point. Since then the Southwest Face has become much more dangerous due to serac activity and, therefore, rarely attempted. |
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Baintha Brakk I (l'Ogre) -c7,285m-, North face : |
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These big North face that we can see well from the Snow Lake is stil a big problem for climbers (still virgin). |
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Baintha Brakk I (Ogre I) -c7,285m-, East summit (c7,150m) : |
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This
is a route that has been attempted on numerous occasions from the Choktoi
Glacier, the best effort coming in 1991 from the Americans Mike Colombo,
Tom Nonis, Steve Potter, Mimi Stone and Brinton Young, who climbed the
initial rock pillar at 5.9 and two points of aid, then reached a point
c30m below the East Summit before being forced down by a bad storm,
which subsequently continued for six days. The route has an objectively
dangerous approach to the c5,650m col at its base but once on the pillar
the climbing is relatively safe and on sound granite to a large snowfield
at around half-height. Above, lies more snow, ice and finally difficult
mixed climbing on the south flank.
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Baintha Brakk I (Ogre I) -c7,285m-, South-East ridge : |
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The
South East Ridge of the Ogre leading to its unclimbed East Summit has
been attempted on a number of occasions by various nationalities, with
perhaps the best effort coming from the American team of Buhler, Crecelius
and MacMillan in 1993 :
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Baintha Brakk II (Ogre II) -6800m-: |
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In 1981, a three-man Japanese team comprising Noritoshi Isayama, Taihei
Kato and Yukio Toji, attempted the South East Pillar. This 800m very
steep narrow rock ridge was reached by a 1,000m long icy couloir on
the South Flank. It leads to the West Summit, from which the Japanese
planned a lengthy traverse of the connecting ridge to the Main Top.
Climbing on the pillar in rock boots, they reached c6,400m before retreating.
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Baintha Brakk II (Ogre II) -c6,960m-, "Death Alley" route: |
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The approached used by the 1978 Japanese attempt on the Ogre and by the British who attempted Ogre II in 1982 and by the Koreans who eventually climbed the latter in 1983. |
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Baintha Brakk III (Ogre III) -c6,960m- : |
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Maurizio Giordani's five-member team of high standard Italian rock-climbers
was defeated by a combination of high technical difficulties, lack of
time and bad weather on the South East Ridge of what they refer to as
the unclimbed Ogre III. This is the name given by the Italians to the
West Summit of Ogre II (6,960m), which in their opinion is a distinct
top separated by two or three days' climbing from the Main or Central
Summit ascended in 1983 from the northwest by a Korean expedition. The
South East Ridge had previously been attempted in 1981 by a three-man
Japanese team, that climbed an icy gully on the South Face to reach
the steep upper buttress of the ridge. Climbing in rock boots on the
upper pillar they reached c6,400m before retreating.
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