Alex Txikon and the Nepali team flew back to Kathmandu today after summiting Manaslu. While we wait for Txikon himself to share details of the climb with ExplorersWeb, Chhepal Sherpa, a member of the summit team, confirmed to us that all the Nepalis used supplementary O2. Only Txikon climbed without bottled gas, Chhepal told ExplorersWeb.
Chhepal Sherpa, 39, has joined Alex Txikon on the Basque climber’s latest winter attempts on Manaslu, K2, and Everest. Together with Txikon, he stood on Ama Dablam’s summit in the winter of 2019-20.
Cho Oyu team not on Cho Oyu
Cho Oyu team has not updated their status, but Seven Summit Treks’ CEO Chhang Dawa Sherpa published a group photo with the team on Saturday night — in Kathmandu.
The climbers and SST personnel went to dinner at the Norwegian embassy. It is unclear whether the team is back in town to buy gear to replace what they lost in Camp 1 two weeks ago — or if they have called off the expedition.
Group photo at Kathmandu’s Norwegian embassy on Saturday evening, showing SST’s Thaneswar Guragai (left) and Chhang Dawa Sherpa (right, blue T-shirt), and some embassy personnel. Adriana Brownlee and Gelje Sherpa kneel in front, Kristin Harila stands behind them. Photo: Chhang Dawa Sherpa/Instagram
Dhaulagiri report
Currently, only David Goettler and Herve Barmasse are sleeping at the base of a winter 8,000’er. The Dhaulagiri alpine-style tea spent the day checking snow conditions on skis. They assessed the snow as “questionable” — in other words, far from good.
Instagram story posted Jan. 7 by David Goettler.
