Imja Tse 6189m (20,226ft) Summit

Adventure.I.Am Trekking Director Dan sits on top of Island Peak, otherwise known as Imja Tse at 6189m. Dan, accompanied by local Lead Guide Maule Tamang successfully summited after departing base camp at 0030hrs earlier that morning, taking approx 7 hours to negotiate the route to the top.

“It was quite tough going to be honest, with many people turning back. I was in pretty good shape, well acclimatised and pretty comfortable up to the transition point. At the transition point I ditched walking poles for my ice axe and donned my crampons before setting off using fixed ropes & jumar. Maule led the way as normal, he had summited here many times and I had my complete trust in him that we would achieve our aim. The climb up was quite hard going, something like a forty five degree angle up the face, we had practised this back at Island Peak Base Camp to get the rust out of my system, but still it was hard on the arms. Approaching the summit we paused to catch breathe whilst we let a party of Polish mountaineers take their summit pictures before heading up and submitting ourselves around 0700am on 16/10/22. We then had the place to ourselves for about one hour, from which we soaked up the surrounding panoramic views before taking our photos & video evidence. Now for the hard bit, we had to get all the way back down! Getting down involved walking steadily back down the ridge up top to a point at which we could then abseil down, the first of three abseils that get you off the top. I have to say my arm muscles were screaming by the time I had descended and my cold hands did not want to undo the carabiner. Once we were both down safely we trekked back down to the transition point where we switched back and then headed back downhill to the base camp and a nice cup of lemon, honey, ginger tea. Awesome!”