Over the Hills and Far Away

by Rob Collister

  Climatically, the town lies in the rain shadow of Dhaulagiri: its flat roofs and the small area under cultivation are symptoms of the dryness of the climate. In contrast to the luxuriant, semi-tropical forests further south, here even the pines and junipers are beginning to thin out and by Marpha, less than two hours’ walk beyond, trees have all but disappeared. All the year round, strong winds blow up and down the valley, banging shutters and rattling doors, and raising clouds of dust which make travel uncomfortable. Culturally, the Chorten gateway on the north side of the town – a typical feature of nearly every Buddhist village – is the first to be met as one travels up from the south. Passing beneath the frescoes, albeit faded and cracked, painted on the inside of the archway, one is not just leaving the town but leaving behind an Indian-orientated Hinduism and entering the sphere of Tibetan Buddhism. Although the division, be it between climates or cultures, is obviously far from clear-cut, the Chorten gateway of Tukche is nevertheless a significant symbol for travellers like ourselves.

  We reached it in the middle of October My wife, Netti, and I had flown to Kathmandu where David Gundry, an old climbing friend, was waiting for us. A bus journey to Pokhara, eighty miles west of Kathmandu, and six days walking northwards through spectacular mountain scenery brought us, together with four porters and sufficient food for a month, to Tukche. Our immediate objective was the Dhampus Pass, 5,000 metres, and the so-called Hidden Valley to which it gives access. This name is not entirely fanciful, since the existence of the valley was not even suspected until the French mountaineering expedition of 1950, investigating the approaches to Dhaulagiri, stumbled upon it. The Dhampus Pass is the only easy way into it. Once inside, we hoped to explore the valley and climb any peaks that were within our scope. Others had visited the Hidden Valley before us, but as we knew next to nothing about their activities, and only the most rudimentary of maps are obtainable in Nepal, a sense of exploration could be maintained.

  The first day of the long haul from Tukche up to the Pass took us through pine-forests and over the pastures beyond, on a path strewn with gentians, forget-me-nots, and a myriad flowers whose names we did not know. Briefly, as we emerged on to the uplands, we could gaze northwards over the wide desert landscape of Mustang, startling in its impression of limitless space after the confines of the Kali Gandaki. Subtle variations in pink, yellow and ochre magically enlivened a theme of dusty brown, and beyond it, like a layer of cloud, stretched the snow-capped plateau of Tibet. All too quickly the view disappeared as we were enfolded by the mountains, but there were compensations in the beautifully fluted ice of Tukche Peak’s north face, and in our first encounter with yaks. Larger and shaggier editions of Highland Cattle, a herd was still grazing at 4,000 metres despite the lateness of the year, and would not be brought down until the winter snows arrived in earnest.

  At this stage we were not alone. A group of Frenchmen, four of them professional guides on holiday with three Sherpas, twelve porters, and two hundredweight of specially imported French sausage and cheese, set off from Tukche on the same morning as ourselves. By mistake three of them, instead of following the normal yak-herders path, took a more circuitous and difficult route which only brought them to the pastures as night fell. Unfortunately our porters, following the wrong set of sahibs, went with them. They eventually spent the night huddled under a boulder at the French camp; tentless, Netti and I slept in a tiny yak-herds’ shelter an hour away, saved from going all day without food only by the generosity of the French; while David, choosing to go exploring on a particularly dark night, lost the path amidst a maze of yak-trails and repented at leisure on the cold hillside. Rather shamefaced and to the only partly concealed amusement of the French, we rejoined forces the following morning. Our solitary tent, when it was finally pitched, came in for some slightly superior glances, too. Apparently it was not a ‘tente isothermique’, whatever that may be. We were secretly pleased, therefore, despite their kindness to us, when, after an uncomfortable night above the snow line and without reaching the col, they decided that their equipment was inadequate and beat a retreat.

  In the meantime, a short second day had taken us to the snow line at 4,400 metres. The strongest porter was persuaded to stay on an extra day, proving himself a natural with axe and crampons and helping us carry heavy loads to just below the col. Thereafter we were our own porters and two more days’ hard work, ferrying loads through deep snow, saw us comfortably ensconced on a rock platform the far side of the Dhampus Pass. The only intruders on our privacy were a pair of hungry ravens with a weakness for sugar. Otherwise, we were gloriously alone in a silent, empty mountain world.

  The weather was excellent, apart from a bitter ever-present breeze, but unfortunately we had to cope with snow knee-deep or worse. The higher we went, the deeper the snow. Nor was it simply soft snow, for a thin crust had formed over it that became the bane of our existence. Never quite firm enough to bear one’s weight for more than a step or two – and then the second person was bound to break through instead – it yet forced one to step up before it collapsed. A more exhausting surface would be hard to imagine. The wind added the finishing touch to our plight by ensuring that the steps we made were quickly filled in by drifting snow. We succeeded in climbing two easy peaks on either side of the Dhampus Pass but, faced with the prospect of struggling up nearly 2,000 metres under such conditions, an attempt on Tukche Peak fizzled out almost before it had started. The sun continued to shine but our enthusiasm began to wane. On ski, moving about the valley would have been both easy and enjoyable. On foot it was purgatory.

  Consequently, after only a week inside the Hidden Valley and with plenty of food left, we found ourselves wondering what to do next. David was keen to stay in the valley using a tiny one-man bivouac tent but Netti and I preferred to go exploring so we agreed to split forces. Netti and I were to continue down the Hidden Valley into the Keha Lungpa valley, which would eventually bring us back to the Kali Gandaki and so to Tukche, thus completing a large circle. David decided to attempt a small but spectacular rock spire on the western rim of the Hidden Valley. In the event, discretion proved the better part of valour, and a combination of crevasses and snow conditions thwarted him when he tried to cross the ridge into a neighbouring valley system. Savouring the experience of real solitude, he made his way back in leisurely stages and rejoined us at Tukche after a week on his own.

  In the meantime, Netti and I had had a more exciting and taxing time than we had bargained for. It transpires that the route we embarked upon so lightheartedly had been tried at least once before, without success. But, ‘fools rush in where angels fear to tread’ and we set off fully expecting to be out of the valley the same evening. Apart from indicating that a river flowed down the Hidden Valley, the contourless trekking map gave no useful information whatsoever, but even from the Dhampus Pass we had been able to see that, lower down, the valley narrowed to a gorge. We naively believed that this gorge would debouch almost immediately into the Keha Lungpa, and that it would be obvious whether or not we could pass through it.

  In the first two hours, we covered less than a mile thanks to the snow, despite going steadily downhill. The river, already broad and swift-flowing, though only just released from the ice, was chuckling cheerfully on our left. Animal tracks were everywhere and we could see two herds of mountain sheep browsing on islands of rock and grass protruding from the snow. All at once, with little or no transition, the crust was thick enough to bear our weight. For the first time in two weeks we walked on a firm surface, effortlessly it seemed, and soon we were approaching the gorge.

  Our pleasure was short-lived. The rock portals we had seen from the Pass proved to be no obstacle but, far from opening out into the Keha Lungpa as we had hoped, the gorge merely twisted round to the left out of sight. The sun was obviously a rare visitor, for the snow had remained powdery and unconsolidated, treacherously concealing a boulder bed over which we slid, slipped, stumbled and fell, every lurch and painful recovery made a
panting effort by the altitude and the weight on our backs. Only where frozen avalanche debris had been spewed out by side gullies was the going any easier, so we were thankful to reach a point where a huge avalanche had flowed right down the gorge, completely obliterating the river Here the gorge was perhaps 200 feet wide, its rock walls, almost vertical, towering up on either side. For several hundred yards we followed its twists and turns, scrambling over a contorted surface like a bowl of whipped meringue suddenly frozen solid. But it was firm to the foot, and we were far from grumbling. Temporarily the river re-emerged in a swirling pool, but a gangway of ice leading to a cavity behind a huge boulder, enabled us to creep between sheer rock and the water. Beyond, the river was once more smothered and we continued to pick our way round spires and over ramparts of dirty ice. The gorge was becoming narrower and narrower. As we rounded each new bend we still half expected to find ourselves entering the main valley, but with every step the fear grew that we should find the river filling the gorge and the way impassable.

  Finally the ice did come to an end and the river came noisily foaming out from beneath it. The right bank was still feasible, however, and we floundered on, among snow-covered boulders again, until the cliffs dropped abruptly into the water. The left bank looked more hopeful, but first we had to cross the river. There was only one place where it looked possible. Two boulders in midstream supported growths of ice which, if they were solid, would provide stepping, or rather, jumping stones. The stream was swift and deep, however, and weighted with a heavy pack a slip could be fatal. We roped up and put on crampons and I lassoed a spike of rock upstream as a belay. Netti went first, leaving her rucksack behind. The first ice mushroom held but when she landed on the second, it slid away entire from its base. As it did so, Netti managed to topple over sideways so that she fell into the water upstream of the boulder, thus saving herself from being swept away. Regaining her feet, she made a lurching plunge for the far side and, embedding the pick of her axe into apparently solid ice, attempted to pull herself up. She was almost out when the whole slab of ice, several square feet in area, broke away from the rock beneath and she was left scraping frantically with her axe for a purchase. Luckily she found something and a few seconds later she was sprawled, gasping on the rock.

  When she had recovered, she hauled the sack across and I followed, crampons scratching on the bared rocks, like fingernails down a blackboard. ‘This has to be the end of the gorge,’ I said reassuringly. ‘We’ll camp as soon as we’re out of it.’ Hopefully, we rounded the next corner, only to be confronted by another cliff falling straight into the water. There was no option but to recross the river. Luckily it had widened and was shallow enough to ford, but we managed to wet more than just our legs, nonetheless. Leaping across a deep channel on to a platform of rotten ice, I fell in up to the waist. The cold took my breath away. Further across, Netti lost her footing and fell on hands and knees in the water, her sack shooting over her head making it impossible to stand up again without help. Rather than plough through the soft snow on the bank, we waded now by choice along the shallows at the river edge until it became necessary to cross over yet again.

  Immediately in front, the gorge narrowed to a defile a mere forty feet wide but helpfully plugged with snow. On both sides, rock walls rose compact and sheer for over 300 metres, though so foreshortened that it was difficult to judge the height. In a recess of the left wall was a huge slit similar to Ossian’s Cave in Glencoe. On the bank beneath this cave was a strip of flat crusted snow, the perfect site for a tent. I pointed it out to Netti. ‘Let’s go on a bit,’ she answered. ‘I’d much rather get out of the valley before stopping. I don’t like this place at all.’ I knew what she meant.

  Dark and enclosed, it was not a friendly spot, and we should sleep better for knowing, one way or the other, whether we were going to get through the gorge. But there was no indication that we were anywhere near the end of it, and there was only half an hour to dark. This was the first potential campsite we had come across since entering the gorge and there might not be another. Tired out and shivering violently, we set up the tent and crawled inside. As things turned out, it was just as well we did stop. But I, for one, slept badly, disturbed by troubled dreams.

  Next morning, we climbed over the jumbled ice blocking the defile and scrambled along a shelf about fifty feet above the river. Then a rope became necessary. It had to be the second rope as the first, after its wetting the previous day, had frozen into a solid lump. The problem was stepping across a narrow zawn which bit deeply into the slope. Poised over it, one foot on each wall, and water seething and gurgling below, was more unnerving than difficult, but the traverse which followed, down and across a rock wall to reach the river bank again, was genuinely hard. The rock was steep conglomerate which was liable to flake away in large chunks, and I was forced to take my rucksack off to climb it. Once down, we fastened the rope at each end so that it could be used as a handrail, albeit a flexible one. When Netti had come across, I went back and forth fetching the sacks, extremely glad of the rope as the weight threatened to pull me over backwards.

  Until the next bend the going was relatively easy, but far above the sun had reached the top of the cliffs and stones loosened from their casing of ice, were now humming and whining about us. Hastily we dug out helmets which, until now, had never been worn. Almost immediately a pebble bounced off my head.

  Round the bend our troubles began in earnest. Here, as we had been dreading, the river completely filled the gorge. A deep, fiercely racing torrent, there could be no question of wading it; nor was there anywhere to wade to, for the far side was uncompromisingly steep and draped with ice. For fifty feet on our side there was a scoop of smooth water-polished rock, only just above the rushing water and roofed by rock a few feet overhead. Then the cliff dropped vertically into the river and as the gorge wriggled round in one of its innumerable situations, we could see no more. Packs off, rope on. The climbing was delicate, the rock slippery-smooth. I was very much aware that if I fell in, rope or no rope, I would not get out again – the holdless rock and the pressure of the water would see to that.

  At the end of the scoop I discovered that if I could climb up twenty foot, it would be possible to continue along another horizontal fault at a higher level. Those twenty feet were hard. The start was overhanging and though the angle eased above, the difficulty did not. Precariously, I tiptoed up a holdless, snow-covered slab relying entirely on ‘faith and friction’ – without much of either. The traverse was on the same smooth, crackless rock as before, the roof overhead squeezing hands and feet closer and closer together until I was bent double. And then I came face to face with a vertical column of ice spilling down the rock. My heart sank. The ice jutted out like the prow of a ship completely obscuring the view so that, until we could round it, there was still no knowing whether we were going to escape from the gorge; and by this time, we really were thinking in terms of escape. But if the ice continued at the same angle – as it did on the other side of the river, great sheets of it, like washing hung up to dry – it would be unclimbable, and we should have to retrace our footsteps back up the valley. It was a prospect that did not bear thinking about.

  But before I could go on, I needed crampons and the other rope. Netti was out of sight and could not possibly hear me above the roaring of water, so, tying off the rope, I climbed back the way I had come. I found Netti looking cold and anxious, still holding the rope and wondering why it had stopped moving. Hers was the unenviable task.

  We shared a bar of chocolate and then I set off again, fixing the rope at several points to enable Netti to follow. When I reached the ice she was still some way behind, but, impatient to see what lay beyond, I put on my crampons, tied on to the second rope–wire-like, but at least uncoilable now–and attacked the problem. Having hacked a large step high in the ice for my right foot, I heaved on an icicle and stood up. Leaning out on the icicle as far as I dared, I peered round the ice-prow and saw, to my unspeakabl
e relief, that it was only a small frozen watercourse and not continuous. Cautiously I changed feet and, putting my trust in the embedded pick of my ice axe, stretched across until I could place my right foot on rock. The next few feet, across a steep rock wall blotched with ice, proved to be the hardest of all and would have been graded Very Severe at home. With only side-pulls for the fingers to keep me in balance, I progressed by carefully placing individual crampon points on tiny knobs of rock or sticking the front two ‘lobster claws’ into lumps of ice. Although I was tied to the rope, it could do me little good if no one was holding it, and I was breathing heavily, not just with the altitude, by the time I reached easier ground. Thankfully, I sat down in a small cave to rest.

  At last, the gorge was widening and the difficulties seemed to be almost over. Beyond the cave was another steep wall, but at the foot of it was an icy catwalk just above the river. I drove in an ice-piton, attached the rope to it, and slid down. Leaving the rope, I picked my way downstream for fifty yards or so, cramponing up and down little walls and stepping across frothing inlets. An appropriate sting in the tail, forty foot of loose, ice-scaled rock demanding great care, and I was on top of a knoll from where I could see for certain that we were through the gorge. Ahead, it widened out into a proper valley and though I found it puzzling that there was still no sign of the Keha Lungpa, there was clearly nothing insuperable before us. Elated, I returned to tell Netti the good news.