Dan Mazur's Kangchenjunga Spring 2002

Dispatch March 18th, 2002: A few of us awoke early at 4am and set off to explore the route and to locate camp 2. We were Dimitri Koutsogiorgas, Richard Fullerton, Pemba, and Pinso. We jugged the lines up a 400 meter, 20 to 47 degree rock, snow, and ice slope, then ducked around the cornice, and popped out onto the upper plateau of the mountain. The fixed lines looked well placed, and solid. The route to the cornice seemed exciting and safe. We felt very lucky to be here at a time when there is no snow, and everything is blown clean. The cornice itself, which had looked like a massive and towering battleship from basecamp, was actually, in reality, only about three to five meters high. We rounded the corner and began walking a gentle 18 degree slope up a small hill, which we knew was the 6700 meter Togolung. The going was excruciatingly slow, as we were relatively unacclimatized, though all of us had been quite high on the ropes previously. Finally, reaching the top of Togulung, we took in the top of Nojin Kansa, which is really an amazing array of seven peaks, cresting on the edge of a vast-great undulating bowl of glacier, perhaps three kilometers across, all sloping and dropping away into the Kara-La glaciers, which empties itself onto the rock walls just above our basecamp, becoming a series of harmless ice deltas with watercourses flowing out beneath, and past our basecamp. After taking in the incredible view from up here on Togolung at 6700 meters, we looked across a small valley to the north, and there, on a ridge, about 50 meters above us, and a bout 500 meters distant, we  spotted Pemba and Pinso, with shovels flying, snow hurtling through the air, digging in camp 2 at 6775 meters. It looked so far away, but, we were able to walk over there in 40 minutes, by hiking down a small valley, and then up the ridge. There we found Pemba and Pinso, beavering away, having completed a smooth platform large enough for 7 tents. Richard was across the valley, still on the slopes of Togolung, shouting into the wind that Dimitri was waiting down below the summit, ready to descend, but not wanting to do it alone. We quickly packed up, secured the stoves and tents and rope and gas that Pemba and Pinso had hauled up, then made for our descent, roped together to protect for the one small crevasse that bisected camp 2 from the summit of Togolung. We stowed the rope on the summit, then proceeded back down toward the top of the cornice, where we found Dimitri waiting patiently in the wind, bundled up in his duvet-down jacket. We worked our way back down the ropes, checking one-another's safety back-ups and techniques, as we abseiled and lowered ourselves and walked down the 400 meters of ice, snow, and rock, in the wind. Finally, at the bottom, we refixed all of the new rope, and finalized the preparation of the route for our next forays upward. At about 6pm, we all made it back to camp one and collapsed gratefully into our tents, rolled in our sleeping bags, and brewed up our evening drinks and meals. As soon as we were in our sleeping bags, we noticed Antonis, who had rested that day, complaining of a sour stomach, packing his pack. He stated that his digested track was bothering him, and had been for three days, and had not responded to treatment from a variety of medicines, including antibiotics. Antonis said he was going down to basecamp, but it became obvious that he was going much further than that, as he strapped multiple pairs of boots and ice axes on his pack. We confronted him with the incongruity between the contents of his pack, and the statement that he was "going to basecamp". He did admit that he was giving up on the expedition, and that Dimitri, his friend, would probably go with him. We said we were sorry, especially now that the weather was improving and progress on the route was moving forward rapidly. He said: "no", and that many things in his life were calling him back to Greece, and that his mind couldn't be changed. We all said we were sorry and gave him a hug, and then he dropped down into the easy scree slope, and shuffled quickly down to basecamp.

Thank you very much. Cheers for now. Yours
Sincerely, Daniel Mazur from http://www.SummitClimb.com

Dispatches