| <P><BR>Will the true summit of Yutu ever be reached? It defenitely will some day, but I find it interesting how elusive this peak is . The rabbit keeps hopping away. Yutu proved to be steep and compliCATed. On summit day we thought we could simply climb to the ridge and following it to the glacier which would lead to some easy rock towards the summit. How wrong we were. <BR> <BR>On "summit" day we left at a little past 6AM and eASIly reached the ridge by 8AM. This section of the ridge proved to be un-climbable. (Well, no ridge is truly un-climbable, but some are so distorted and ugly that climbing along them is impractical, risky, and a huge waste of time). We abandoned this plan and traversed out onto Yutu's face. We did not know what the face had to offer, but to our relief found it very climbable. We were able to link-up class 4 snow and rock ramps. At one point a 20 meter high rock band of loose and vertical rock split these ramps. Liu Yong efficiently surmounted this obstacle and we continued following the ramps up the face to a slightly overhanging snow cornice. I dug my way through the cornice which led onto the glacier. <BR> <BR>During the morning we had lost 2 hours lower down attempting the ridge and by having to find a new way up the face, but were confident we had made up time as we moved onto the glacier. The glacier was of very hard ice and of low angle. Good protection was essential since the glacier ended not far below us and the mountain dropped away for a 1,000 meters. Exciting exposure! Soon the glacier ended and we were in front of a rock dome. It was 4PM. This was no easy dome. We estimate this last section to be only 20-30 meters high, but it was class 5 rock and would take around two hours. It was anything but the easy rock we had anticipated. Our GPS read 5566 meters, a mere 10 meters below the supposedly 5576 meter summit. It was clear that Yutu's true height is around 5600 meters.<BR> <BR>We stood below a clear line up the rock dome but due to the late hour decided not to climb it. Thus, we started our de scent a little before 5PM and reached below the glacier by dark. We rappelled the rest of the way in the cold night air. Just below the last rappel Liu Yong's headlamp ran out of battery power and my crampon came loose (a part had fAllen off). I used thin rope to temporarily fasten my crampon back on my boot and the two of us slowly continued back to the tent, Liu Yong using what little of the moonlight he could to feel his way. We arrived back at the tent by 10PM and soon after a storm picked up. Given the weather, a dysfunctional crampon, and running low on fuel, we were unable to make a second attempt at the summit. </P> <P>We had linked together a beautiful route up Yutu, found a line to the top. We had stood upon the rabbit's head, but its ears were erect, not relAXEd as we hoped . We will call it a First Ascent - almost. The Yutu saga continues and when its ears will finally be scaled nobody knows.<BR> <BR>会不会有人站在玉兔峰的最高点？我想肯定会有一那天，但是很有意思是玉兔的顶峰是那么难以捉摸的,"兔子"跳跃不定，玉兔确实很陡峭和复杂。登顶那天我们以为可以直接顺山脊走到冰川，从冰川会到比较容易攀登的石头，然后就到顶了,结果是我们完全估算错了。 <BR> <BR>"登顶"那天我们早上6点过一点从帐篷出发了，8点钟很顺利地到了山脊下面。这段山脊没法攀登（实际上没有什么山脊攀登不了，但是有的山脊那么 扭歪的，那么丑陋的，危险，和耗费时间巨多，攀登确实不切实际）。我们放弃了山脊往玉兔的正面横切。我们根本不知道正面的路线怎么样，但是过去了以后发现它有希望，能连接4级雪和石头的坡道，顺这些坡道往上爬,其间有一段20米高的很长的岩壁,刘勇有效地超越了这个障碍 物，然后我们继续顺正面的坡道到了雪檐，我通过挖掘雪檐就到了后面的冰川。 <BR> <BR>早上我们浪费了两个小时尝试攀登山脊及寻找新的路线，但是一见到冰川我们又有了自信，失去的时间可以在这儿补回来了。冰川非常坚硬而且坡度不大。不过，我们下面这段冰川不长，下面就是1000米的陡坡，作好保护至关重要。非常令人兴奋的视野！一会儿冰川就消失了，出现在我们眼前的是一块圆形的石头屋顶。已经下午四点钟，而且这个圆屋顶看起来不容易。估计最后这一点儿石头不超过30米高，但是是5级攀岩，需要两个小时左右攀登。这块石头什么都是，就不是我们原来预期的容易。在这个位置我们的GPS已经表示海拔5566米高，比地图表的顶峰才低十米。很明显玉兔峰的实际海拔大概在5600米。 <BR> <BR>我们找到了一条可以攀上去石头的路线，但是因为时间比较晚，决定不上去了。已经快下午五点钟我们才开始下山，天黑了才到冰川下面一点儿，其他的时间我们在凉快的夜空气里慢慢地下降。下降的最后一段时间里,刘勇的头灯没电了和我的冰爪从鞋脱离（一个配件掉了）。只好用了附绳临时把冰爪绑上去，我们俩又开始慢慢地走回帐篷，刘勇在微弱的月亮下摸回去。我们大概晚上十点钟到了帐篷，不久暴风雪就来了。由于天气转坏，性能不良的冰爪，缺少高山燃气和食品，我们无法试试第二次登顶。 <BR> <BR>我们连通了一条美丽的攀登路线，找到了一条登顶的路线。我们曾经站在兔子的头上，但是她的耳朵警觉的竖立着，不是我们原来希望的那么温顺。我们把这次攀登称为首登-几乎完全登顶。实际上玉兔峰传奇还没有结束，没有人会知道她的耳朵什么时候会有人站上去。</P> [ 本帖最后由 gore刃脊登山队 于 2007-11-6 13:21 编辑 ] |
国外号码请输入国家代码，收不到验证码，联系管理员微信:zhb7171608
