Tilicho Peak Expedition (7134m)

(click on pictures to see larger images)

Tilicho is a very serious objective as it is 7134m high and not an easy mountain to climb. We went to attempt Tilicho in October 2000. A short mountain flight from Pokara brought us to the dry and dusty hill town of Jomosom, which many trekkers doing the round Annarpurna trek will visit. Jomosom is already 2700m or thereabouts. From here we proceed East and North to cross the high and very difficult Mesokanto Pass at an altitude of 5300m. At the top of the pass we managed to locate some marine fossils (shells) which testify to the fact that the Himalayas was once beneath the sea.

At the top of the pass, we had a breathtaking view of Tilicho Peak and the azure and peaceful Tilicho lake below. It is a glacial lake and devoid of any life. 

Basecamp is situated near the bottom of the lake you see in the picture above. Tilicho looms majestically above the camp which is on moraine. It took us several days to acclimatize to the altitude of basecamp which was at 4800m. . As you can see from the picture below (left), Camp I at 5800m is a long way up the ridge.

It took us several attempts before we even managed to climb up to Camp I. The close-up picture of the peak (right) shows just how steep and difficult the terrain is. We also encountered soft snow which made the climbing even more difficult. Much of the route requires rope to be fixed for safe climbing as can be seen in the picture (left) below.

Finally, some of us managed to get to Camp I to spend the night there. Next morning, we were rewarded with a panoramic view of Tilicho lake almost a thousand meters below us. (picture on right)

This is as far as we managed to climb on this expedition. Although we did not succeed, we continued to gain much climbing experience which put us in good stead in 2002 when we were successful on Marble Wall in Kazakhstan.

Return to Homepage