Sani Pakush Expedition / by Peter Thompson.

In 1998 I climbed the northeast spur of Sani Pakush during during a solo attempt on
Beka Brakai Chhok. At that time the 13km walk from my base camp at Lupdor to Sani
Pakush was mainly easy, flat ice. However by 2019 the upper Batura Glacier had
changed considerably. In 2019 we had hoped to make our base camp at China Camp
close to Sani Pakush but our porters refused to go beyond Lupdor due to the difficult
nature of the glacier. They told us that no one had been to China Camp for many years.
By 2019 the route had also changed. There were more seracs on the route. There were
also several avalanche fault lines on the route and we feared there could be more
avalanches. There had been a lot of snow during the winter. W e witnessed an
avalanche next to the route which swept across the approach to the route.
Nevertheless, we started acclimatising with several walks to 4600m above base camp.
We then spent three days in the nearby W artom Nala, sleeping at 4800m. However
when we attempted to make a carry to Sani Pakush we found the glacier very difficult
with no prospect of an easier way ahead. For this reason, and the avalanche danger on
the mountain, we decided not to attempt Sani Pakush.
We summoned our porters and returned to Aliabad in the Hunza Valley. Here we were
able to get permission to attempt an unclimbed 5920m peak in the Khunjerab National
Park above the Karakoram Highway near the Khunjerab Pass. Walking up to a bivi site
without porters, we attempted the peak. We reached 5800m but a very corniced final
ridge and poor snow conditions prevented us reaching the summit.

Google Earth coordinates:
Sani Pakushlat 36.566627 lon 75.380186
Base camplat 36.620382 lon 75.549274