📷 The Land of High Mountains: Pakistan. Day 5. The road to Mount Rakaposhi - Base Camp

Well, since we decided to go to the base camp of Rakaposhi today, it's time to go. So we moved forward after some rest at about 14:00. There is still a lot of time, and the sun is still high, although it hid behind light clouds.

But now more solid clouds have come up, it became cool, and I seem to have a second breath.

The trail goes up almost all the time, but now my breathing does not go astray, I move my legs, look up and under my feet and listen to the croaking of crows.

So we climb this path for about an hour and a half, up and up, without stopping. And Dima's weighty incentive occasionally whistles from behind over our heads, urging us on.

The animals we sometimes meet, even young cocky bulls, do not really want to deal with him either, so they just follow us with their eyes.

It was only necessary to overcome this long ascent, and we received as a reward some great emotions: we went to the edge of the mountain slope and for the first time saw the Minapin glacier from above!

Here we can already take a break, admire the views and just enjoy the unexpected change in our environment.

Well, and all of us really want to take pictures here — it's a very picturesque place.

Several trees growing on the very edge above the glacier add special charm. Their trunks and branches, whimsically bent from the wind and other unfavorable conditions, nevertheless, hospitably call under their shade, to sit down and rest.

In some places, the texture of the glacier that we see resembles noble marble in the pattern of lines and color. Visually very beautiful texture.

And greenery looks especially lively against such a background.

Minapin Glacier is not the largest in length, it is about 18 km. It flows northwestward through the northern part of the Rakaposhi-Haramosh Mountains.

Looking at this panorama, you can try to understand the scale. Although the glacier is not the greatest, it is still grandiose!

From above, we can see that the ice is cut everywhere by short, but rather deep and dangerous-looking cracks.

It is pleasant to see not only the dark, dirty, half-buried layers, but also quite clean, white areas from the center of the glacial stream.

And all this ice snake wraps around the mountain ledge, bending around it with seeming ease from above.

In the south, the glacier is bounded by a ridge that connects Mount Diran in the east with Mount Rakaposhi in the west, and ends just about 1.5 km south of the Khunza River, near the village of Minapin Nagar.

Well, the photo stop is over. Even though this place is wonderful, this is not the end of our journey. Spending the night in the wind, at the edge of a cliff high above the glacier, would not be a good idea. Dima says that a more comfortable place awaits us — we move on. It seems that we are even going down slightly, bypassing the mountainside along the edge? Suddenly!

Indeed, the path turns behind the rock and continues to descend a little. It is rather offensive to lose the gained meters. I wonder, will we go up again later?

This is the first time I've seen such a method of transportation :) And that's right, it's easier to go like this. It seems that our guide is also a little tired.

Bright flowers, sometimes growing directly from the rocks, seem to cheer us up along the way. We are especially encouraged by their sharp, unpleasant thorns, which are quite easy to stumble upon.

At the same time, they cover their neighbors like a shield. I wonder who they are so fiercely defending themselves against with these thorns?

Finally, we almost came to our marvelous meadows at the foot of Rakaposhi! Now we can almost see the final place of our path — and this is, indeed, a very cozy valley, hidden from the wind and glacier behind the moraine ridge and covered with lush green grass. It is quite long, stretches further, beyond the turn of the ridge — we are going just there.

This valley is located almost at the foot of the 7788 meters high peak. Yes, Rakaposhi is not an eight-thousander, but it is still not a simple mountain.

As it is said, after climbing all eight-thousanders, there are still many mighty mountains, with the slopes and ridges promise more difficulties than the routes leading to the peaks of the greatest mountains.

On the way to the camp we are met by such a fashion model, reclining on a stone heated by the sun. Nothing to say, she is pretty!

And here is another beauty. Which of them would have won a fashion model competition?

We arrived at 16:50. It is good that we did not stay lower, it is more beautiful here than at the supposed place of our overnight stay - Hakapun, where we got to lunch, and besides, we still have time to put up tents and prepare for the sunset, and the next day there is no need to pack our things and move on.

And here are the first signs of housing, in addition to cows and goats. But there are only a couple of such houses here, and they now look uninhabited.

It's funny, almost at the camp we are met by an elderly Pakistani, whom we saw somewhere at the beginning of the ascent. It seems that he overtook us a lot — well, we still did not compete in speed, and they are still more accustomed to their mountains. At least we will console ourselves with this.

This is how Rakaposhi base camp looks like. In the foreground there are two tents of the hosts of the camp. In one of them, the local guys live, who prepare for us breakfasts and dinners, and the other is allocated for the dining room. The barbed wire fence and mini-moats around these dwellings look very strange and inhospitable. We learned about their purpose later. On the right is a place for a tent camp, and on the left (behind the tents, at the foot of the hill) there is a two-story double throne without a roof — at night it is very convenient to look at the stars from it :)

We set up tents, and I went with our guide Haider to get some water, as the water in the stream flowing through the camp is bad. Well, more precisely, not that it is very bad itself, but animals walk on it, drink from there and often piss right there too. And the streamlet is very small.

After a little searching, we find a funny well, lined with stones, about 25 centimeters deep. Nearby lies a plastic container made from a 1.5-liter bottle, and it seems that 3-4 such glasses — and all the water will end, but no: the level does not go down, no matter how much we we take.

We went to explore the surroundings. The camp site is separated from the glacier by a long moraine ridge, which we saw a little earlier from above. When we descend from it down to the camp, there is no wind at all, it is quiet and warm. Ahead is the triangular peak of Mount Diran, 7266 meters high, but so far its peak is covered by clouds. I hope it will be clear by evening.

Diran is a dangerous mountain, it is called the third killer mountain in Pakistan, because its snowy slopes are very avalanche and have already led to dozens of deaths. For the first time, three Austrians climbed the top of Diran in 1968: Rainer Goeschl, Rudolph Pischinger and Hanns Schell. Earlier attempts by the German expedition were unsuccessful.

Between Diran Peak and Rakaposhi Peak, in the middle of the glacier, you can see a small picturesque waterfall. Drone view of the waterfall:

I decided to take a closer look at the camera with a telephoto lens — indeed, a pretty waterfall.

We stand on a moraine ridge, below the glacier crackles and periodically thumps, a waterfall rustles in the distance. The view opens up wonderful, and in general, all the sensations match it: we are breathing easily and freely.

This is how the camp looks from the height of the drone flight. It is located at an altitude of 3470 meters above sea level, according to our altimeter. Wow, it turns out that we climbed about 1.5 kilometers in a day!

Periodically, small avalanches break down from the peaks. We can hear them quite well, and at first it was a little scary, but they are still far from us.

We have neighbors in the camp — an Englishman and a Japanese woman. Alas, not climbers, but also hikers. The Englishman has an upset stomach, for some reason he drank antibiotics, but, as expected, it did not help him. Dima gave him a simple enterosorbent, and we are all waiting for improvement. Some of our group have also joined this "English club", but they know what to do themselves.

And in the camp at this time, a cow pulled out my trekking stick from under the tent and insolently chews the loop strap. Apparently, during use, it was soaked in sweat and became salty. And with salt here, most likely, it is not very good, there is definitely a shortage of it in water, because all the streams are glacial.

As evening approaches, it starts to get colder. Someone has already taken out warm jackets and hats, someone still feels that it's enough fleeces, hats and hoods. But the sun hasn't even set yet!

We finish flying around the surroundings. How good it is here! It would be nice to have luck with the sunset, and the mountains would be clearly visible.

The weather is improving, clouds are gradually leaving the sky. I'm glad.

Finally, the peak of Diran is almost open. Come on, just a little more!

Small but difficult to access pass. I wish I could be there! But for this it would be necessary to cross the glacier.

What is the name of this mountain, I do not know, but, in any case, the cloud caught on its top is very beautiful. A bit like smoke over the mouth of a volcano.

Evening comes, and the sky is getting more interesting. It will definitely be very beautiful here tonight!

The peak of Rakaposhi is not as visible from here as Diran. The main feature of this mountain, one of the most difficult to access in the world, is that the vertical distance from the valley of the Hunza River to the summit is 5800 meters at 11.5 km. horizontally. For comparison, from the Khumbu glacier to the top of Mount Everest, is only 3600 meters vertically.

Hooray! The top of Mount Diran is completely open, and the setting sun has painted it gold! And later it became even more beautiful (I have already shown the later sunset panorama separately — you can see it here).

Our vegetarian (again!) dinner took place in the tent on the right. It consisted of rice and a gravy of carrots, potatoes and tomatoes and it was delicious! But I still want meat, especially remembering the sumptuous meal the night before.

After dinner, everyone went to the tents. Donkeys roar from time to time, I wonder if they will do that all night?

I'm waiting for everyone to fall asleep, because I have one more important thing to do — I just need to steal from Dima and hide that big white incentive with which he intimidates us :))

Summing up the results of the day: today we have done much more than planned, reached the base camp, saw a wonderful sunset, and tomorrow we will go for a walk on the glacier Minapin. Great perspective!

To be continued...

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Parts of the journey:

1. The Land of High Mountains: Pakistan. Day 1. Arrival and Transfer to the Mountains
2. The Land of High Mountains: Pakistan. Day 1. Trekking to Fairy Meadows
3. The Land of High Mountains: Pakistan. Day 2. Acclimatization
4. The Land of High Mountains: Pakistan. Day 3. Trekking to Nanga Parbat Base Camp - Start
5. The Land of High Mountains: Pakistan. Day 3. Trekking to Nanga Parbat Base Camp - Finish
6. The Land of High Mountains: Pakistan. Day 4. From the Himalayas to the Karakoram
7. The Land of High Mountains: Pakistan. Day 5. The road to Mount Rakaposhi - Hakapun or further?
8. The Land of High Mountains: Pakistan. Day 5. The road to Mount Rakaposhi - Base Camp
9. The Land of High Mountains: Pakistan. Day 6. Minapin Glacier and Ice Bridge
10. The Land of High Mountains: Pakistan. Day 7. How to Get to the Eagle's Nest?
11. The Land of High Mountains: Pakistan. Day 8. Hike to Ladyfinger Peak
12. The Land of High Mountains: Pakistan. Day 8. Walk in Karimabad to Altit and Baltit Forts
13. The Land of High Mountains: Pakistan. Day 9. Karimabad and the Sacred Rocks of Hunza
14. The Land of High Mountains: Pakistan. Day 9. Attabad Lake, Hussaini Bridge and Passu Cathedral
15. The Land of High Mountains: Pakistan. Day 10. Crossing the Batura Glacier: the Beginning
16. The Land of High Mountains: Pakistan. Day 10. Crossing the Batura Glacier: Finish

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Camera: OLYMPUS E-M1 Mark II and DJI Mavic 2 Pro

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