The Unclimbed China Expedition

After sobbing in our green tea for a few days, we decided that rather than head home with nothing to show for 12 months of effort, we'd rather try and go somewhere new and unheard of. A new plan was called for, and with no information about anywhere in China, we knew it was guaranteed to be a giant adventure. Days of convoluted negotiation later, we were told that it might be possible to visit the Daxue Shan Mountains in the Ganzi Tibetan Autonomous Region, where several peaks were possibly unclimbed. "Might be possible?" "Possibly unclimbed!" Some serious wining and dining ensued, and soon enough we had permits to climb two virgin peaks we’d never heard of, in a range that we hadn't known existed. We hadn't even seen photos of these peaks, so we had absolutely no idea what we were letting ourselves in for.

On the September 30, 2004, we began the two-day drive southwest to the small village of Laoyulian via the historic trading town of Kanding. Here began our interaction with the wonderful locals, the Khampa Tibetans. Staying with one of the village headmen, Dorje, we planned well into the night, and at dawn the next day pack horses and their drovers miraculously appeared in the courtyard. Our long, straggling pack train headed off shortly afterward with 17 horses, five horsemen, our wonderful cook and "guide" (required by the Chinese Mountaineering Association), two slightly shell-shocked climbers, and a long-suffering wife.