Another Pole is skiing down two more 8,000m peaks this spring. After doing Manaslu in 2021 and Broad Peak last year, Anna Tybor is now aiming for Dhaulagiri. Then in June, when the season switches from Nepal to Pakistan, she’ll try Nanga Parbat.
No woman has ever skied either Dhaulagiri or Nanga Parbat before. Tybor’s Broad Peak descent was also a female first. (Other women may have preceded her on Manaslu.) On both mountains, she went without supplementary oxygen.
Anna Tybor on Manaslu in 2021. Photo: Anna Tybor/Instagram
Dream lines
Tybor is an elite skimo racer with the Polish team. In the last few years, after the European competition season ends, she has turned to a series of high-altitude challenges that she calls her “Dream Line” project.
She will not be alone on Dhaulagiri. As on Broad Peak in 2022, she has teamed up with Tom Lafaille of France. The pair is already in Nepal and are about to start their approach trek to Dhaulagiri.
Ziemski and Pereira to Makalu
David Fojtik made the first ski descent of Dhaulagiri in 2009, but he took his skis off during a difficult section midway, according to rmf24.pl. So the first complete descent only happened last year, when Poland’s Bartek Ziemski skied the entire mountain.
Ziemski is also in Nepal to ski two more 8,000’ers of his own, Kangchenjunga and Makalu. His original plan was to do Kangchenjunga first, but logistical reasons prompted him and partner Oswald Rodrigo Pereira to start with Makalu. Here, the route to the summit is already fixed, and conditions are good. Pereira will climb but then descend on foot. The two are currently trekking to Base Camp.
Bartek Ziemski. Photo: Oswald Rodrigo Pereira
