Shipton's Lost Valley

by Martin Moran

Part 6: Shipton's Peak

But first Brede and I wanted to go back up and climb the shapely summit, Pt 5758, which lay immediately to the south-east of the col, from where we could properly ascertain the lie of the land. So on the following morning while Ben, John Harvey, and Sobat moved camp down to the very brink of the icefall and inspected the options for its descent, we took a chance which we knew we might later regret if the going got tough and food or strength ran out down in the jungle. We climbed a steep snow slope to gain the south ridge of the peak from where we could look across the ice plateau of the upper Panpatia glacier. With its surrounding peaks looking like Arctic nunataks we could imagine ourselves on Spitzbergen or the Norwegian ice-caps rather than the Himalaya. According to our knowledge every one of the assemblage of 5500m peaks was unclimbed, and despite an attempt the previous year the upper glacier had never been reached.

Our ridge was largely composed of piled blocks, one of which shifted its position under the weight of my arms and trapped me in a little chimney. Unable to shift the offending store by my own strength, I required Bredes assistance to escape the prospect of permanent impalement on the mountain. Wher3e the rock strata steepened and smoothed near the top we traversed out to steep snow runnels and gained the summit ridge at a fortuitous break, on an ice cornice. As expected, the summit bore no signs of previous visitors and the name Shiptons Peak was immediately assigned to our conquest. We descended down the north face back to the col on 50 degree slopes of neve mind the high Himalaya.

The tables of fortune quickly turned. After our stolen morning, thick clouds boiled up on the glacier and we tasted something of the conditions encountered by the 1934 party in groping our way down through the fog to join the others, their line of marker wands giving invaluable guidance. Once reunited, an air of tension took hold of our party. How could we get down the icefall which Eric Shipton had described in souch repellant language...

"We gazed down upon the head of a second and very formidable icefall. It was appallingly steep and for a long time we could not see any way of tackling it which offered the slightest hope of success."