Sheer beauty.
Bistaarai jaanos!
(Go slowly)
Nepali good wish
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Sheer beauty.
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January is a good time to visit the Khumbu region of Nepal: hordes of tourists going to the Everest base camp are mostly gone, animals and birds come down to lower altitudes and can be seen around the hiking trails, the weather is sunny, and the mountains as beautiful as ever.
Ice climbs are of great quality, located in an amazing setting and are uncrowded, to say the least. A highlight of the area is Losar, super-long ice line right in front of Namche Bazar. Another highlight, in my opinion, is the climb 'Sultans of swing' in the remote Kusum Kunguru area, a magnificent ice flow surrounded by glittering six-thousand meter peaks. A lot of ice flows in the region have not been climbed and the opportunities for further exploration abound.
View of Everest and Lhotse on the way to ice climbing.
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Unlike mountaineering, ice climbing in Nepal does not require special permits etc. and can be done in a small group with a minimal logistical effort. All one needs is enough money to pay for air travel and enough time - to enjoy traveling in these mountains instead of struggling with the altitude sickness.
These notes resulted from two consecutive ice climbing seasons in the region in 2008-2010. I’m grateful to Dave Custer, Susan Ruff, Pasang Chhutin, Pavel Gorelik and Michael Tselman for the great experience of climbing with good friends. Dave, Susan and Pavel also contributed many photographs, route descriptions, etc. to this website. Ian Osteyee also contributed route descriptions and a photograph. The bulk of these notes was written in Kathmandu and formatted in the most primitive HTML - please accept my apologies!
A little ice climb in the shadow of Kangtega.
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The names of the climbs used here have been given by climbers and are by no means official, the only well established name (and the established grade) being that of Losar. The length of climbs in meters is an estimated distance along the climbed line. These and other numerical estimates (such as difficulty grades and approach times) may be highly inaccurate. I hope that many inaccuracies and deficiencies encountered on these pages will eventually be corrected with the help of grateful readers :)
Musk deer in a rododendron forest.
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