UKC

Bold new route on Nuptse South

© nicholas Barrowclough
Although complete details are still not available, one of the highlights of the post-monsoon season in Nepal is likely to be the new route, climbed Alpine-style, by Frenchmen Stéphane Benoist and Patrice Glairon-Rappaz on the South Face of Nuptse. Unfortunately, although the top of the face was reached, the pair was forced to turn back below the summit.

Nuptse (7,864m), which lies just south of Everest, was first climbed in 1961 by a British-Nepali expedition under Joe Walmsley. It was a classic siege, following a tricky rightward-slanting central ridge on the South Face to a large snowfield, then a long leftward traverse along these snow slopes and over a difficult rock barrier to reach a couloir breaking through the upper rock walls to the summit arête. After establishing eight camps, the first summit party, Dennis Davis and Tashi Sherpa, reached the top on the 16th May. A day later Chris Bonington, Les Brown, Jim Swallow and Pemba Sherpa followed in their footsteps. To date, no other party has reached the main top from the south, and the original route is considered one of the first technical 'big walls' climbed in the Himalaya.

Read the full report by Lindsay Griffin on the BMC Website


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