But the normal route on Dhaulagiri wallows in waist-deep snow, forcing back the two women and two men attempting an independent climb.
Peter Hamor, Horia Colibasanu, and Marius Gane are progressing quickly up their high-difficulty route on Dhaulagiri’s Northwest Ridge.
Great weather allowed the climbers to reach Camp 2 yesterday. No word from them yet today, but they should have reached Camp 3, which is already on the summit ridge. Check out some footage from their climb here.
Climbers on Dhaulagiri’s Northwest Ridge. Frame from a video by Horia Colibasanu
The good weather follows a short but intense snowy spell. The very steep NW spur and ridge sluffed it off, but the lower part of the normal route on Dhaulagiri now wallows in fresh snow. Carla Pérez, Topo Mena, Jonatan García, and Stefi Troguet, working as a team, went up hoping to reach the summit. The deep snow forced them back.
Esteban Mena and Carla Pérez on a breezy Dhaulagiri.
“The last storm brought way more snow than we can manage on a summit bid,” said Esteban Mena. “Waist-deep pow made our progress unbearably slow. [We] had to leave a cache at our high point at 5,600m and came down. Summit attempt will have to wait for May, if we get another window.”
“We had crazy hard conditions, almost no one here is been moving,” Stefi Troguet added. “We’ll try to reach Camp 1 tomorrow before the new big snowfall comes. Let’s see if we can find & dig out our tents & gear in C1 and hopefully in C2.”
Troguet also reported dangerous wind slabs around 6,700m.
Jonatan García, EstebanMena, Carla Pérez, and Stefi Troguet on Dhaulagiri’s normal route. Photo: Stefi Troguet
