C’est reparti pour Louis Rousseau

TEAM
Louis Rousseau (Canada)
Adam Bielecki (Poland)
Rick Allen (Scotland)
Felix Berg (Germany)

Cho Oyu is the sixth highest mountain in the world at 8201m. It is located on the border of Tibet (China) and Nepal about 20 km to the west of Mount Everest. The name Cho Oyu means “Turquoise Goddess” in Tibetan. It is recognized as the easiest 8000 meter peak. On the normal route, there are no really technical sections and the objective dangers are almost non-existent. However, if one’s willing to venture into the unknown beyond the normal route, there’s a wealth of high-altitude adventure to be found on Cho Oyu.

There are many difficult and unrepeated routes on Cho Oyu, especially on the Southeast face. Just think of the Reincarnation route forge by Boris Dedeshko and Denis Urubko in 2009 on the Southeast Face. Our goal in spring 2017 will be to attempt a new technical line on the north face of Cho Oyu. The proposed route will start from the base of the north wall and will go directly up an untouched section in the center. In our opinion, the north face of Cho Oyu is an amazing objective. Four kilometers wide and more than 2000 meters high, the wall is steep and almost unexplored; it is really exceptional for an 8000m mountain.

The only route on this side was made by Slovenians, with Iztok Tomazin reaching the Cho Oyu summit on November 2, 1988. He descended on the normal route, the first crossing of Cho Oyu. Viki Groselj and Joze Rozman reached the Cho Oyu summit on November 5, Rado Nadvesnik and Marko Prezelj on November 8, and Blaz Jereb and the leader of the expedition, Roman Robas, on November 9. This is the expedition report in the AAJ

As described by Marko Prezelj, the north wall is steep and the highly technical character of the north face of Cho Oyu offer good opportunities for a major new alpine style ascent. The main disadvantage might be the northern aspect of the face. It can be a very cold place without much sun on it. Base camp can be put higher on the glacier, away from the main crowd going to the normal route. From there it is a one day approach to the glacier at the bottom of the face.

It would be presumptuous to say that we hope to reclaim this mountain for alpinism with our 2017 project, but we do hope to contribute to the tradition of lightweight climbing on the world’s highest peaks. That’s why we will climb in a clean self-supported tactic.

Stay tune! We will reveal more details about our project this week before departure.

I have to say big thank you to our family, our supporters, sponsors and partners!