Following the first trip to Suru, it became my routine to visit the area almost every year. Sometimes twice or thrice. It was mostly for mountaineering purposes. The two places in Ladakh which I visited the most have been Leh and Suru valley. The most fascinating spot in the valley is the saddle between Panikhar and Parkachik. It is a short climb from Parkachik and affords some of the most dramatic views of mountain scenery. Once a proposal for establishing a power project by tunnelling this saddle was mooted by the Power Department. It would have given massive power to the entire area. It is not known why this project was shelved? Till 1975 only a couple of expeditions visited the area for climbing peaks in the Nun Kun massif. Mostly Japanese came.

These were followed by French and Germans. There were also a couple of American expedition. In one of the American Expeditions, an American NASA Scientist, Dr.Thomas Mutch disappeared near the summit of Nun. It created a lot of media speculation. It was even reported that the scientist had been kidnapped by KGB! This gave some publicity to Nun peak. However, the major exposure of Suru area especially the possibilities of mountaineering and other adventure got highlighted worldwide by the famous Swiss born French Skier, Sylvain Saudan. He is the person actually responsible for putting Nun on the global mountaineering map. Sylvain Saudan is a man with an indomitable spirit and a tremendous love for adventure. He is over 72 year old Swiss born skier who lives in Chamonix, France and is considered to be the father of extreme skiing that has given him the name of impossible skier. He has the most difficult 18 descents to his credit. In mountains people are usually known for first ascent of high and difficult peaks but he is famous for first descents. He has skied down Mount McKinley, the highest mountain in North America; Mont Blanc, the highest mountain in Europe; Nun peak in Kargil; and a number of other peaks in Nepal and Karakorum. He has three entries in the Guinness book of records to his credit. Getting into and getting out of dangerous situations is the daily life style of Sylvain Saudan. He came to Kashmir first time in 1976, more than 34 years back. I had the privilege of bringing him to Kashmir and that too was an interesting coincidence. In 1975 I had been invited to Chamonix in France by its mayor, Maurice Herzog, the most famous French climber who had made the first ascent of Annapurna.

During my visit he introduced me to Sylvain Saudan as the most famous and crazy extreme skier of France. Sylvain was at that time looking for 7,000 metre peak in the Himalaya to ski down as he had already skied down the 6,000 metre Mount McKinley. I offered him 7,135 metre high Nun peak in the Suru valley of Kargil. Sylvain came to Srinagar in 1976 with a small team to climb and ski down Nun. However, he had under estimated Nun and had to turn back half way. There was extensive media coverage in Paris claiming that the impossible skier had been beaten for the first time by Nun peak. It gave worldwide publicity to Nun which has became one of the most well known peaks of Himalaya and has been frequented by a large number of foreign expeditions every year. In his press conference in Paris on return from Nun after his first failure, Sylvain declared that Nun is a challenge to him and he will not rest until he climbs and skis down the mountain. He came again in 1977 but this time he was well prepared and determined. I accompanied him to Tangole in Suru valley and spent two nights with his team. Surjit Singh Bhalla was his liaison officer from the Department as well as from the Indian Mountaineering Foundation. We stayed for first night in a camp on a plateau in Tangole. Bashir Bhat my college mate who had been working as an engineer in Kargil had accompanied me. Next morning we went up to advance base camp. It was a tough climb. We took a short route through a gulley but it involved steep climb on a snowfield. We spent couple of hours with Sylvain till he established his camp and then descended back to Tangole for a second night. This time we came down to Panikhar to stay in the Dak Bungalow. On this trip Sylvain successfully climbed and skied down the mountain. Bhalla had seen him clearly from the snow plateau skiing down Nun summit ridge and then on the face right down to the advance camp. It was a remarkable feat. His success on Nun gave worldwide publicity to the mountain and there was a beeline of climbers to attempt it. We had to allow at least three to four expeditions from different routes to accommodate the rush. Almost a dozen expeditions came for Nun Kun massif every season.

It became the most easily accessible 7000 metre high peak in the Himalaya. The total climb could be completed in less than three weeks. Interestingly, Sylvain had faced the same problem with porters which Fanny Bullock Workman had faced almost a century back! The porters would leave the loads halfway and run away. It was a difficult job to tame them. There was another interesting aspect to the behaviour of porters which only shows how tough the Suru valley people are. They are virtually born mountaineers except that they lack the technical skills. Due to the failure of first attempt caused by shortage of food, Sylvain in the second trip had brought a large amount of rations and equipment. In fact, the baggage came in 35 parcels on the airline from Delhi. After his successful expedition he left most of it on the mountain as he was keen to rush back to Paris to celebrate his victory. There were hundreds of food packets, chocolates in dozens, batteries, pitons, karabiners, ropes, and many other items left in the higher camps. I was told that most of the Tangole porters had gone up and brought all these things down.

In subsequent years we held a number of training camps for these porters especially the educated ones and perfected their mountaineering skills. They virtually became the Sherpas of Suru valley and accompanied many foreign expeditions. In recent times, the Tourist Office in Kargil has been continuing these adventures and training programmes among the local youth. Kargil war gave a big set back to the climbing in the area as it was closed for all foreigners. However, it was again opened only after two years and foreign teams have started going to the area once again. Apart from the peaks in Nun Kun massif, other peaks in the Zanskar range especially the ones near Pensi la on the Durung Drung Glacier have become very popular with foreign climbers. There were many other activities which we undertook in this beautiful mountain area. I will describe these in the next episode.

(To be continued)