THE GANGOTRI EXPEDITION

DOUG SCOTT AND MERVYN ENGLISH

ON 7 MAY 1081 ten of us, from various parts of the world, met up in Delhi enroute for the Gangotri mountains. We were Georges Bettem- bourg (France), Greg Child (Australia), Mervyn English (New Zealand), Rick White (Australia), Stephen Sustad (U.S.A.) and Colin Downer, Doug Scott, Don Whillans, all from Britain.

We stayed at the Indian Mountaineering Foundation complex conveniently situated near the airport where we met up with Balwant Sandhu and Ratan Singh, who would join in the climbing.

We took a bus to Uttarkashi, where Balwant is the Principal and Ratan the Instructor at the Nehru Institute of Mountaineering (N.I.M.). They would be organizing a camp of 20 young Indian mountaineers at our base camp. We planned to share some of our time with these people imparting concepts of alpine climbing and techniques to them.

From Uttarkashi we travelled by various buses and used local porters to bridge the gaps in the bus route where the road had been washed away, to reach the holy settlement of Gangotri. In one day we walked to the ice-cave known as Gaumukh, the cow's mouth, where the Ganges begins its 1678 mile journey to the Bay of Bengal. The path is well made, being of strategic importance to the Indian Army and offering us and the numerous pilgrims of all shapes and sizes, all ages, of both sexes and from many parts of the world and from all over India, an easy walk to the snout of the Gangotri glacier.

From there an easy day's walk brought us and our 45 porters and their loads to base camp at Tapovan (4500 m). From the flat, grassy base camp site we had views of the remarkable buttresses and faces of the Bhagirathi peaks and others surrounding the Gangotri glacier. The highest peak in the area, Satopanth (7075 m), was hidden away behind Bhagirathi I. Shivling was in our back garden, rising nearly 7000 ft above us with its fluted ice-faces, steep granite buttresses and ice cap at 6543 m.

Acclimatization 18-31 May. This period was spent bouldering and crag climbing on the excellent granite within two miles of base camp. Several routes of two to three pitches up 5.9 cracks were ascended with members of the N.I.M. course who arrived at base camp three days after ourselves. The whole camp split up into three groups to trek up the Chaturangi, Gangotri and Meru glaciers during this time of melting spring snow and the greening of base camp.

The Climbing

Shivling via The East Pillar (New Route): A camp was established at the foot of the Pillar (17,500 ft) on 31 May. However, four inches of snow fell and the camp was left for base camp — an easy two hours aown snow and grass.

Shivling (6543 m — 21,466 ft) above Gangotri glacier. The route of 1978 Indian first ascent was by the west ridge (right skyline ridge). The 1980 Japanese ascent by the west and north ridge (centre). They climbed the west ridge and traversed under the summit snowfield to climb the north ridge. The 1981 British climb was via the east ridge.

Shivling (6543 m — 21,466 ft) above Gangotri glacier. The route of 1978 Indian first ascent was by the west ridge (right skyline ridge). The 1980 Japanese ascent by the west and north ridge (centre). They climbed the west ridge and traversed under the summit snowfield to climb the north ridge. The 1981 British climb was via the east ridge.
(left skyline). (Sketch: Rajul Mehto)

On 3 June, Greg, Georges, Hick and Doug returned to the camp with ten days food. Thirteen days later, on the 15th we came up over the summit and traversed down the original north side route. The beautiful dawn and our elation were rewards of sorts for the hard climbing and much hauling of food and gear up steep walls of granite, broken mixed rock and snow and traversing around and over gendarmes on long exposed ridges. Although vertical height was only 4000 ft, we climbed sixty rope-lengths in all. A third of these were along very exposed and sometimes dangerous aretes of snowed-up rock linking the steep buttresses of this varied route. The nature of the ground called for big wall tackle, alpine gear and full Himalayan clothing — in other words, a lot of weight which slowed down our progress, as did considerable falls of snow on most days of the climb. It is debatable whether or not this type of route is worth all the pack-hauling involved, as only four or five pitches of climbing could be achieved each day. There was, in our favour, reasonable bivouac sites for our two Salewa bivvy tents, though we rarely managed to find a platform where both could fit and in fact they were always in part drooping down where the ground-sheets overhung the drops below.

Our route of descent was speeded up by finding fixed rope left by previous Indian and Japanese parties and by more recent additions placed by a party from our own camp. We used seven 150-foot ropes on the cant pillar, four for climbing, two for hauling and one spare all of which were brought off.

On returning to base camp, we were too emaciated to do any more climbing, so we walked out in bad weather on 19 June, mistaking this for the onset of the monsoon, which arrived a week later.

Doug Scott

Shivling North Side (Original Route): On 1 June, Downer, Sustad, Whillans, Sandhu and Singh left base camp for the Meru glacier. On the 2nd, a camp was established at 18,800 ft. It had been intended to push, light-weight, for the summit from this point, but sickness and fresh snow prevented this. A small amount of rope was fixed and further snowfalls dictated a retreat to base camp, where the team heard of an accident to a party of Indian climbers on Bhagirathi II. English, Sustad and Singh set off immediately and were involved in the rescue and recovery of two dead climbers.1 Several days later the team went back to their camp at 18,800 ft on Shivling. The remainder of the rock ridge on the north side was climbed and the next day it was intended to attempt the ice-cliff about 500 ft below the col between the main summit and the unclimbed west summit of Shivling.

Unfortunately, extremely high winds blew in during the night which destroyed the tent Downer and English were in. They all returned to 18,800 ft. Two days later, on the 14th, the ice-cliff was climbed to a point about 300 ft below the summit. Due to high winds, these last few feet were not taken.

Mervyn English

Footnote

  1. See the article 'Living with an angry mountain' in this issue.—Ed.

 

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Shivling and Shivling West.

Shivling and Shivling West.

Shivling (left) and Bhrigupanth.

Shivling (left) and Bhrigupanth.

Route on Shivling via East Pillar.

Route on Shivling via East Pillar.

 

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