June 2019: The ability to be self-sufficient on a himalayan climb can open many doors for the climbing enthusiast. Removing the safety net of an adventure operator can be highly rewarding to a mountaineer’s sense of self-confidence and his/her ability to improvise with the limited available resources.
The lure of this independence has been far greater for me than any desire to climb higher.
Its for that reason that I chose the Friendship Peak. At approximately 5300 meters, the Friendship Peak is lower than most other better-known himalayan climbs, but offers all the elements of a 6000 meter peak!
My friend, Dinesh Thakur, a resident of Solang village and a mountain guide by profession and a skier friend Anant joined me on this expedition.
May 31: We boarded the evening bus from New Delhi (Mandi house). There were lots of tourists, mostly families looking to holiday in the hills. The journey took much longer than anticipated. We reached at around 10:30 am the next morning. Thats almost 16 hours!
June 01: Trek to Bakar Thatch
In Manali we rented equipment for Anant from Kapil Negi, who owns a bookstore and an equipment rental shop on the Old-Manali road. Dinesh came to pick us up from Solan. Stocked up on ration; Instant soup, MTR packets, dal (lentils), rice, oil, tomatoes, onions, hakka noodles, butter, tinned cheese etc. There were huge traffic jams enroute solang valley. Hordes of tourists were heading up to Rohtang pass and Solang. We reached late in the evening thinking it took us almost 24 hours to make it from Delhi to Solang.
On the way to Bakar Thatch 
Snow accumulation on Solang Nallah
June 02: Trek Dhundi to Bakar Thatch
Next morning we started trekking around 11am. It was a short day so we weren’t worried. We drove to Dhundi which is the trailhead and started walking from there. Our backpacks weighed almost 22kgs per person. No complaints, it was alpine style and we are all used to the weight anyway! We followed the Solang nallah upstream on a left-bank.
There was a lot snow accumulated on the river bed throughout the way to Bakarthatch so we had to go up and down several ridges and cross many side streams on the way. After a couple of hours and a few pauses, we reached the Bakar Thatch basin at about 3400 meters (11,000 ft). A few people had camped here and there were gaddis (nomadic shepherds), with what seemed to be a thousand-strong herd of sheep and goat! We set up camp and made some chai followed by paranthas that we had packed at a dhaba in Solang.
June 03: Trek to Lady Leg (Base Camp)
The Trek to Lady Leg Lady Leg is not far from Bakar Thatch but approximately 500 meters higher in altitude (3800 meters, 12500 ft). This makes it an important step in the acclimatization process. The trek took us approximately 2 hours. Lady Leg was full of snow. In summer, the thatch (meadow) extends here and the whole area is occupied by gaddis (nomadic shepherds). But here, even in beginning of June, snow was everywhere and so much of it! The 2019 summer really seemed like the middle of winter! After setting up our tent we rested a bit and then made pulao! In the afternoon we got into our climbing gear; mountaineering boots, crampons, ice axe etc and went to explore the area. We practiced some self-arrest techniques and the Plunge Step as we knew these would come in handy during the climb.
We spoke to a few people who were camping here and although this was peak climbing season, no team had yet summited Mount Friendship!
That night there was fresh snowfall and we had to wake up several times trying to dislodge the snow that accumulated on the tent.
June 04: Advance Base Camp
After an early brunch we set up an Advanced Base Camp just 2 hundred meters above Lady Leg. The idea was to reduce the distance to the summit, as we assumed that progress in so much fresh snow would be much slower, By camping higher we would give us the best chance to summit. When we arrived in the afternoon, the weather was about to take a turn for the worse. Moisture from the snow-covered peaks started to accumulate as soon as the sun rose every morning and by early afternoon, usually led to a shower or snow/hail storm. This is a pattern familiar to most people who know these mountains. By 6pm we had had dinner (hakka noodles and Chicken TIkka Masala MTRs) and locked the tent down to get as much rest as we could.
June 05: Summit Day
We woke up at midnight and gave ourselves a couple of hours to prepare a meal and melt enough snow to carry water during the climb. By 0230 hrs we were ready to leave. For the first couple of hours we went through comparatively harder patches of snow which were easier to walk on. We made quick progress and soon came to a section with a gradient of approximately 50-60 percent. Here progress slowed considerably and I could see that my friend had started to get further and further behind. As we hit daybreak, we were standing at the base of the col which we negotiated slowly and steadily. Closer to the top I saw that Anant had decided to turn back. I could tell that he had had too much. But did I mention that he had already summited the Friendship Peak during his Advance Mountaineering Course at ABVIMAS a year ago?
At the Col I called my wife, letting her know that things were okay. It was cold and we need to drink and water and eat to be able to carry on! Muesli mixed with cornflakes and nuts helped us to regain the energy for the rest of the climb. It was here that Dinesh informed me that we still had approximately 5 hours of climbing ahead of us! My world tumbled infront of me when I heard these words. I thought we had done better than that!
The next section was a traverse followed by another ascent to a second, much smaller col. The snow was harder here, so we put on our crampons, Front-Pointing and Flat-Footing our way up. From here it took us another couple of hours to reach the top. Here the snow got harder and the slope steeper. The very top of friendship peak had a section of bare rock, but barely any place to walk around. Towards the east of the summit was a cornice which could be dangerous, so we did not venture there although it seemed like a good vantage point to see the Lahaul valley below. We enjoyed the nonetheless spectacular views here for another 20 minutes before we started our descent.
To begin with, we employed the side-stepping technique followed by the plunge step as the gradient became less steep. As we were tired by then, Dinesh assessed the conditions and found them suitable for glissading. The next 30 minutes we glissaded from slope to slope and made short work of the steep slopes! Barely an hour and a half after we had started we were back at ABC, where Anant was found sleeping in our tent!