The Turquoise Goddess – Cho Oyu Part 1
Many PMC members will have read or seen news articles about the shooting of Tibetan refugees at the Nangpa La pass outside ABC on Cho Oyu last year. I was one of those climbers who witnessed this unfortunate and distressing scene. Much has been written about this atrocity in the mountaineering press. This article however concentrates on the expedition.
At 8,201 metres Cho Oyu falls within the fourteen 8,000m peaks and is the sixth highest mountain in the world. It is said to be one of the most attainable of the fourteen but not for me. From crossing the Friendship Bridge from Nepal into Tibet, the team members arrived in Nylam, quite possibly the most sordid and filthiest place I’ve ever been. After a dismal two night stay in the Snow Land ‘hotel’, braving toilets that made me dry heave and rats running around the beds at night we arrived at Tingri a town high on the Tibetan plateau, (a marginal improvement on Nylam) for another two night stay. Where breathing in dust in the air which could contain human faecal matter is best avoided. We were warned about the semi wild dogs in the town and on leaving the hotel, everyone armed themselves with stones, to throw at them, Tom an American team member got bitten by one. He wasn’t quick enough with his stones. However Tom, did manage to find the best tea house in this town, where we whiled away the evenings drinking Jasmine tea. Leaving Tingri by way of Land Cruiser 4x4’s the team arrived at Chinese Base Camp and we set up our camp for a night. Here we were given a safety talk on using a Gammo bag, injecting Dexamethezone and using bottled oxygen, the latter wasn’t applicable to me or my fellow Brits because our summit attempt was without oxygen.
Intermediate camp was a further 10 km or so higher up and whilst we were walking on a dirt road it was surprisingly tiring, the altitude was beginning to take effect. Making Intermediate camp, at about 5,200 metres I was surprised how the altitude had affected me, I was very tired from the walk in. Yet again, we found a tea house and the Jasmine tea was very refreshing. The next day we had another 10 km to reach Advanced Base Camp, at an altitude of around 5,600 metres, the ground was undulating and uneven and it became clear that the path followed a lateral moraine.
As often is the case the climbers get spread out and you go at your own pace. I didn’t walk with my two fellow Brits Steve and Steve, rather on my own lost in my own thoughts and consumed with the effort of getting to ABC. Around a corner ABC appeared as a hotchpotch of many coloured tents and prayer flags stretching for a few hundred yards from the top of the moraine right down to near bare ice of the glacier. I sat down at the edge of ABC to rest, take in such a sight; and wonder where on earth was our camp in amongst all this lot! I took a vague winding path through the camp and eventually spied our mess tent. Right above ABC is the mountain of Cho Oyu itself, it’s height and bulk dwarfing the surrounding satellite mountains. ABC is full of activity with parties coming and going, arriving and departing, celebrating and commiserating.
Amongst the people in base camp, I recognised Dr Mike Stroud, who was on a MedEx expedition. Mike of course, traversed Antarctica with Ranulph Fiennes amongst other things. I was also on the look out for an old pal Stuart Peacock who as leading an Adventure Peaks team, but he was already on the mountain. I later met Vic Saunders who strangely knew a neighbour of mine – a slightly surreal conversation considering where we were.
ABC was fairly comfortable and after a few days of rest to acclimatise, we took our first load carry and acclimatisation walk to Camp I, it took about two hours along a winding path on the moraine to reach the foot of the infamous scree slope. It didn’t look that big to me, but as I ascended the difficult switchback path I realised that from below I had been looking at a false summit. As I got to the false summit I looked and realised I had as much to do again, I would estimate the scree slope to be 1,500-2,000 feet long. Finally after going through snow and over a rise beneath me was Camp I at 6,400 m. Our camp was close by and Steve and Steve were already there. I left my load carry things, ate a bit and turned round and began the descent first through snow and then onto the scree again. It took a few hours on the meandering moraine path back to ABC.
We rested for a few days and then determined which team members would be in the first and second teams for the summit. One Steve was up for the first team whilst I was a bit more relaxed about getting there and went into the second team, so did the other Steve. After the first team had departed to spend a night at Camp I, later that day we got the distressing radio call at ABC that Steve had pulmonary oedema. He was to return tomorrow as it was too late to bring him down that night. This was a real blow for the Brits. Tomorrow came and as I was picking my way up the moraine path towards Camp I, I saw a figure in the distance bent over walking poles it was Steve. As I approached, I was shocked at how weak and pale he looked, he was like a ghost. I gave him some encouragement and some kind words, told Philipe a French climber in our group who was looking after him to, look after him even more! I struck out for Camp II. The other Steve being a trained paramedic decided to stay at ABC and wait for Steve.
At Camp II, I busied myself to boiling water, and eating my boil in the bag dinner, darkness soon came. After a pretty good nights sleep which wasn’t too cold. Myself and Australian team member Dave, radioed ABC and said rather than come back down to ABC we would go onto Camp II at 7,200m. We walked out of Camp I up steep snowy slopes on fixed lines towards the first of two large ice walls. It was hard going in the rarefied air of the higher altitude, and it began to get very hot in the sun. We approached the first ice wall. There was a choice ascend directly up a fixed line or traverse around.
Directly up, looked extremely difficult and lung busting. Also it was used as a rappel line for descent from higher up. We looked at each other and mutually nodded into the direction of the traverse words being precious, as it used air to speak!. I went first and locked my jumar into the fixed line. The path was compacted snow and ice, not much wider than a boot. Above was the high ice wall which we were traversing around, and below a drop of many thousand feet into, I’m not sure where but probably Nepal. As I traversed round and up, there was a bit of ice climbing to do, but there were sort of pigeon hole steps for feet, and hands just found places here and there, and of course the ice axe always found purchase in the snow. I rounded the edge and we were on top of the first ice wall. Above the first ice wall we sat on our packs and drank and eat. Here we bumped into Kenton Cool and his party who were attempting to ski down the mountain after their ascent of the summit. Rested, we pressed on to the next ice wall, over snow bridges and crevasses. There was less of an approach to this was but it was steeper and more demanding. It took a bit of fiddling around connecting the jumar from one fixed line to the other, (gloves on, gloves off – don’t drop a glove!). After getting quite tired getting over this ice wall, there was a long winding snow traverse. Though it was tempting not to clip into the fixed line, the drop over the snowy edge to my right convinced me to do so. It was now I realised how tired I was, I looked at my watch and we had been going for seven hours. We walked slowly step after step around the traverse. I think quietly we were both suffering with tiredness and the lack of oxygen, but kept cracking jokes and encouraged each other on. Slowly the tops of some tents came into view. They were a few hundred yards away and boy, was it tough walking into camp; my legs were like lead. At the tents which our sherpas set up previously, we found an empty one and collapsed into it. I was exhausted.
After about half an hour of lying there, I got the strength to get some water on the boil and make some soup. Dave and I slept well, then next day refreshed, we arranged the kit and equipment we were leaving at Camp II in the storage tent and after a few cereal bars, made the long descent back to Camp I. Things were uneventful until the first ice wall, which wasn’t a case of down climbing, more a sort of ‘let gravity take you’ down climb with powder snow to slow you down. I didn’t like it, and the physical effort made me a bit nauseous. Over the crevasses via snow bridges we got to the first ice wall. Here was the choice descend around the way we had came up or down the fixed rappel lines. We chose to rappel. I fixed my figure of eight onto the line and was edging towards the lip, when the rope started moving, it quickly dawned on me the someone was coming up the rope. I unclipped quickly and after a few minutes, was greeted by a smiling Korean who appeared oblivious to what Dave and I were trying to do. I clipped in once again and rapped down, crampons biting into the snow face and the rope burning through my mittens!
The descent was a good 100 foot and at the bottom we were just able to see Camp I. It took a while to get to Camp I, where we rested in the relatively luxury of lower altitude at 5,600m. I began to fall asleep with the heat of the sun coming through the tent. Dave said ‘Let’s get to ABC’ in his broad Australian accent and I was half inclined to agree, the other half of me wanted to stay here and rest. Off we went down the laborious, infamous scree slope, slipping here and sliding there, until we reached the bottom. At the bottom we became energised, probably due to the thought of being with our team mates in the mess tent with food and flasks of tea at ABC. It took some hours along the moraine until we finally got to ABC.
Our team mates were pleased to see us and we pleased to be back. I was pleased to see Steve seemed a lot better and appeared to have recovered from the oedema. The other Steve have been kept busy with various ailments, cuts, bruises and even stitches from the other team members’ mishaps and looked a bit ragged and tired. That night it began to snow…
End of Part 1