The members of the “Young Alpinist Group” from Great Britain and Ireland are actually only supposed to gain initial experience in the world’s great mountains. However, two of them have now achieved a real mountaineering coup in northern Pakistan.
At the end of October, Briton James Price and Irishman George Ponsonby opened a difficult 3,000-meter route in alpine style on the 6,673-meter-high Aikache Chhok via the previously unclimbed Northwest Ridge and then descended via the also virgin Southwest Face.
Lots of improvisation
The six-thousander is located in a remote area of the Batura massif in the Hunza District, in the far west of the Karakoram. It has other names, depending on which side you look at it from. From the south, it is called Sia Chhish. Three Italians made the first ascent of the mountain from this side in 1983, also in alpine style. It was the only documented ascent of this six-thousander to date.
The north side of the mountain was uncharted territory for climbers. “The face is 3000 meters high and we hadn’t any information of it. We had just been on Google Earth and found what looked like a nice route,” James tells me on the phone after his return from Pakistan. “Each day and each pitch was a question mark. We had to adapt the strategy. There was a lot of uncertainty the whole way through.”
Bare ice and bad weather
Price and Ponsonby had to contend with bare ice in some sections of their ascent. “Casualties included two partially broken ice screws and a chipped pick from the rock-solid glacial ice,” James and George write in their expedition report for the Young Alpinist Group.
When they finally reached the summit ridge after seven days, the weather also took a turn for the worse. “Completely unwilling to do any more climbing, battered by the winds and with terrible visibility, we quickly threw up the bivy tent and jumped inside it to wait out the bad weather overnight. James fixed a pitch up the summit cornice that evening,” writes George.
The next morning, the weather had calmed down. The two climbers ascended to the highest point, their altimeter reading 6,673 meters. The descent via the Southwest Face, which had also never been climbed before, was challenging too. Price and Ponsonby had to abseil down seracs or steep rock passages in more than 20 places. After nine days, they finally reached base camp again, tired but happy.
“It feels like a world away“
“Me and George had to dig deep to get to the top and to come back down as well. So we had a lot of technical problem solving, some suffering, all this kind of rich moments that goes along with it,” James tells me. “Now we’re back to normal life and normal work. It feels kind of a world away. I’m happy that we had a great expedition and it will stay with me for a long time.”
The 28-year-old Price and Ponsonby, who is one year older, had only climbed together once before: in winter on the Grandes Jorasses in the French Alps. They worked well together there – as they did now in the Karakoram. “(We have) the same decision-making process, very similar motivations,” says James. “Both of us are very chilled and relaxed in the mountains. So it makes a good team.”
They named their route, which they rated M7, AI5, A2+, “Secrets, Shepherds, Sex & Serendipity.” The idea came to them when they were at base camp with the other expedition members during bad weather and came up with a joke screenplay.
In addition to James and George, three female mountaineers from the Young Alpinist Group, Sinead Thin, Gemma Robertson, and Anna Soligo, were part of the expedition team. Thin, Robertson, and Soligo abandoned their attempt to make the first ascent of the 5,900-meter-high Munocho Peak, also located in the valley, at 5,600 meters.
Mentor Tom Livingstone
The Young Alpinist Club provides young, ambitious mountaineers with three years of alpine-style training and financial support. The program is funded by the British Alpine Club, the British Mountaineering Council, the Mount Everest Foundation, and three companies from the mountain equipment industry. Those who have completed the Young Alpinist Club program take on the role of mentors for the next cadre.
Former graduate Tom Livingstone was the mentor for the current group that went on expedition to the Karakoram. At the beginning of December, Tom and Slovenian Ales Cesen will be honored with the Piolet d’Or, the “Oscar of Mountaineering,” for their first ascent of the West Ridge of the 7,952-meter-high Gasherbrum III in the Karakoram in fall 2024.
James Price and George Ponsonby are hot contenders for next year’s award with their first ascent on Aikache Chhok. For Price, it was his fifth expedition to the mountains of Pakistan. “This was definitely the hardest route I’ve climbed in the Karakoram,” James sums up. “I would say it was the most impactful climb. It feels like everything has been leading up to this climb until now.”
