Tibet’s
Secret Mountain: Sepu Kangri. Chris Bonington and Charles Clarke. 228
pages, including 16 black/white photographs. Perfect Bound Paperback.
£12.99. Vertebrate Publishing.
‘In
Xanadu did Kubla Khan a stately pleasure-dome decree’ Samuel Taylor Coleridge.
Originally
published as a hard back book by Weidenfield and Nicholson in 1999,
this has now been republished as a paperback by Vertebrate. Sepu
Kangri 6,956metres is a peak in the eastern section of a mountain
range, the Nyenchen Tanglha which lies to the east of Lhasa in Tibet.
When Bonington and Clarke first visited the area to undertake a
reconnaissance in 1996 it could truthfully be described as a little
known region, but the completion of the Qinghai-Tibet railway in 2006
has opened up this region to tourists and trekkers in a manner
thought unlikely a decade earlier. The two authors had first sight of
Sepu Kangri, flying from Chengdu to Lhasa in 1982 on the way to take
part in an attempt on the North East Ridge of Mount Everest.
The
route taken by such flights vary due to weather conditions in the
Himalaya regions, but whichever is followed it crosses areas
dominated by impressive, unclimbed peaks. The flight path in 1982 was
over the Nyenchen Tangla and standing above the surrounding summits
was Sepu Kangri, excitedly noted by Bonington and Clarke who vowed to
visit this mountain at some time in the future. This turned out to be
fourteen years later, but before setting out to reconnoitre the
approaches to this, they were able to delve into historic accounts of
previous travellers to that region, to find that the claim that this
was somewhere that ‘no man had gone before’ was rather specious
for the trade route from Lhasa east to Peking was well trod by
merchants following a route, a road?, known as the Gya Lam.
By
way of introduction, the lead in by Bonington explains his interest
and how plans developed to explore the Sepu Kangri area, followed by
an informative history about explorers, travellers and missionaries
who journeyed in Tibet over a period of almost a thousand years. This
by Clarke is a basic primer, but for those wishing to follow this up
further there is a bibliography included in the end papers of
‘Tibet’s Secret Mountain’ to which I would add Freddy Spencer
Chapman’s ‘Lhasa the Holy City’, gleaned from his service as
Secretary to the ‘Diplomatic Mission’ to that country in 1936/7,
and ‘Duel in the Snows’ by Charles Allen, this the story of the
Younghusband 1904 incursion into Tibet noted by Clarke in his review.
Both Charlie and Chris were relieved to find that despite
photographers, acting for the Chinese Mountaineering Association had
produced prints of Sepu Kangri and its environs, no attempts had been
made to climb the mountain.
Dealing
with officials in both China and Tibet can be bureaucratic, and are
not helped by there being two bodies with mountaineering briefs, for
besides the Chinese, there is also a Tibetan Mountaineering
Association. And in any journey planned in that country one must be
aware of the politics pertaining between Beijing and Lhasa, plus
India and the situation of the Dalai Lama and his entourage in
sanctuary in the north of that country. But in August 1996, Bonington
and Clarke travelling via Kathmandu reached Lhasa and using a local,
Mr Fix It, Pasang Choephel they were soon under away on their
reconnaissance. This must have been an enjoyable outing; it hardly
warrants the term ‘expedition’ but they managed to reach Sepu
Kangri, glean enough about its climbing prospects to return in 1997
with a full complement of participants that could definitely be
termed ‘an expedition!’ Five climbers, a Base aid, a cameraman,
the ‘fixer’ Pasang , a cook and three Sherpas. How things have
moved on, for one could imagine Nick Bullock and Paul Ramsden turning
up in 2020 at Sepu Kangri, with no other support and attempting the
mountain ‘Alpine style’.
This is not to denigrate the efforts of
Fotheringham, Lowther, Porter and Bonington in their attempts to
climb the mountain in 1997, but it just was not to be. The weather
did not play ball, conditions were dangerous with avalanche threat,
and days of heavy snow meant retreat and the abandonment of the
climb. The photographs of Sepu Kangri reveal a complex mountain, its
northern aspect reminding me of the Rakhiot flank of Nanga Parbat. There
is however much to enjoy in this book, and as the story progresses it
develops into a travel odyssey, which I found more interesting than
the attempts to climb Sepu Kangri. For instance the details of the
relations with the local people of the area, many of whom still
follow the animist Bon religion, which held sway before the arrival
of Buddhism into Tibet in the 8th
century and a Chapter by Dr Clarke on Mountain Medicine. And
interestingly like him I have been surprised how Tibetan doctors by
just feeling the wrist pulse can make an impressive diagnosis. One
did this to me and I was to find some time later I had the cancer
that she warned me was developing.
Rarely
has a group of modern British climbers invested so much into climbing
a single Himalayan peak, but in 1998 Chris and Charlie were back for
their third trip to Sepu Kangri. Before the main climbing team
arrived Clarke with a younger tyro Elliot Robertson and Pasang as
their interpreter made a month long trek through the Tangla range
visiting monasteries, crossing passes, and the environs around Chamdo
and its historic sites. I have also been to Chamdo for the
Xining-Lhasa train stops there. As an aside the train journey from
Chengdu to Lhasa must be one of the most impressive rides anywhere,
to summit the Tanggula Mountain Pass it climbs over 5,231meters, and
Chris and his team could have reached Nagqu on this if they had been
a decade later; for this was their original start town to enter the
Nyenchen Tanglha, known simply to the locals as the Tangla.
It may
read as a dull occupation visiting monasteries, but in Tibet if you
wish to understand its history and culture you really need to allow
time to do this. I spent many days at the Labrang Si on the
Gansu/Tibet border where I became friends with two of the monks.
Labrang is a stronghold of the Gelugpa sect, the Yellow hats and I
have also visited Tashilunpo Si* near Shigatse, the home of the
Panchen Lama. He is the teacher to the Dalai Lama, and if you are
interested in knowing more about this I recommend reading ‘Peaks
and Lamas’ by Marco Pallis. From Liverpool; an Alpinist, Himalayan
explorer, composer and musician who climbed with Kirkus, Edwards,
Hargreaves, Hicks, Warren etc and who was inducted at Tashilunpo
into the Buddhist faith in the late 1940’s, and became one of its
foremost interpreters in the West.
*Si
means temple, and there are four sects in Tibetan Lamaistic Buddhism.
Gelugpa is one of these, and it is the sect headed by the Dalai and
Panchen Lamas.
Back
to climbing and a team sponsored by National Express assembled by
Bonington in 1998 was even larger than the previous year. Maybe
stronger with Saunders, Little, Muir, Robertson besides Chris as the
mountaineers, and Charlie as Doctor, plus a three man film team, the
‘fixer’ Pasang, a Liaison officer, a cook, and a couple of
Sherpas. I do not think today’s Green movement would be happy with
such a group reaching this then remote area. The film team was partly
made up of ITN personnel, sending out direct contact reports from the
mountain.
This needed two generators, computers and mobile
connections (they had these latter the previous year), and members
could speak directly to the UK, to their families and contacts,
answer e-mails and make requests for weather forecasts. These seemed
unusually inaccurate. I think Paul Theroux has the better philosophy
when travelling; no mobile phones, no e-mails, wishing a break from
such 20th
century demands and living conditions.
Once
again, despite changing the dates for their attempt from Spring- to
the Autumn- the second expedition had no better luck than the first
with conditions on the mountain. To be fair if they had received just
two more days of fine weather, they would I am sure have been
successful. But once again from high on their route the lead
climbers, Saunders, Little and Muir were forced down by extreme bad
weather and dangerous snow conditions. Intending to return once
settled conditions arrived, but they never did. It is surprising that
the Sepu Kangri region receives so much precipitation. Studying the
weather charts for that region the early Spring-March into April and
the Autumn-October into November might have been the best seasons to
make such a climb. Tibet is famed for its dry arid climate but that
does not seem to be the case in the Tangla range.
‘Tibet’s
Secret Mountain’ is I believe best judged to buy as a travel book
set in one of the most interesting regions of the Himalaya. Its
Appendices I recommend to study by anyone planning an expedition to
remote ranges, especially its medical information. I agreed to read
this book for review because it was set in Tibet, where my own
experiences, the friends and the contacts made have given me a
different view of that country than the popular western one, mainly
held by those who have never been there. Change is happening and to
educated Tibetans, the first generation to be University graduates,
they welcome this. They have no wish to return to the situation
endured by their grandparents, who lived a life in medieval
conditions working as cuvee labour for Noble families or the Lamas,
subject to their laws and cruel punishments for any perceived
transgressions. They are mindful of Tibet’s history and culture,
but the genie is out of the bottle, they are happy to embrace modern
living with all of its challenges.
Image: Dennis Jarvis
Sepu
Kangri was climbed by Americans Mark Newcomb and Carlos Buhler in
October 2002. They followed the route pioneered by the British, and
almost at the point where Saunders and Muir turned back, only about
150m from easy ground leading to the summit, they also were hit by
bad weather. They pressed on reached the top but then experienced
serious difficulties on the descent. The Tangla range is now well
visited and there are commercial operators offering climbs and treks
in that massif.
Dennis Gray: 2020
