Rakaposhi Expedition 7,788 m

Trip highlights

• The greatest vertical rise on earth

  5,800 metres from the Hunza river to the summit in about eleven kilometres — nothing else on the planet matches it.

• Two days from the road to base camp

  The simplest logistics of any big Pakistani expedition: no Skardu flight, no Baltoro, no week on a glacier.

• A mountain that is still quiet

  One of the least-climbed 7,000 metre peaks of its size in the range. You will not be queueing for the ridge.

• Thirty days on the mountain

  Enough for progressive camps, real rotations and a genuine wait for a summit window.

Dates & availability

Dates not working? Every trip here also runs as a private departure — tell us your window and we will build it around you.

At a glance

• 40 days, Islamabad to IslamabadTwo days in from Minapin, thirty on the mountain, and four days of driving either end.
• 7,788 m by the southwest spurThe normal route and the line of the 1958 first ascent — long, exposed and corniced rather than technical.
• Committing, with a low success rateSerious altitude on a long ridge. Previous 6,000 or 7,000 m experience and fluency on fixed rope expected.
• Small teams, self-led above base campLicensed guide, cook and full camp to base camp. High-altitude porters and oxygen are quoted separately.
• Minapin and the Nagar valleyNo flight and no glacier trek — the Karakoram Highway to Minapin, then Tagafari and base camp.
• Hotels either end, tents betweenIslamabad, Chilas and Minapin in hotels or guesthouses; tents from Tagafari up, with a full base camp.
• Mid-June to early AugustTwo departures a summer. The spur wants cold, settled weather and it does not get much of it.

Day by day

1. 1Day 1Arrival in Islamabad

   Your guide meets you at Islamabad International Airport and transfers you to the hotel at 540 metres. If your flight lands early there is time for the Faisal Mosque beneath the Margalla Hills and the Pakistan Monument. In the evening we run the expedition briefing, check documentation and insurance, and eat together.

2. 2Day 2Islamabad to Chilas

   A long day north — around 460 kilometres up the Karakoram Highway, over the Babusar route or through the Kaghan valley depending on the season and the road, and then along the Indus gorge. The scale changes somewhere around Chilas: the river runs brown and fast between walls of bare rock, and Nanga Parbat is somewhere above the haze on the right. Night in Chilas.

3. 3Day 3Chilas to Minapin

   About 220 kilometres up the Indus and then into the Hunza valley, past the Nanga Parbat viewpoint and the confluence where the Karakoram, Himalaya and Hindu Kush meet. Rakaposhi appears in front of you for most of the afternoon and does not look real. Night at a guesthouse in Minapin, at just over 2,000 metres, and the porters are engaged for the morning.

4. 4Day 4Minapin to Tagafari

   The walk begins. A steep, hard-working day up through terraced fields, then birch and juniper, and finally onto the moraine of the Minapin glacier to the meadow at Tagafari at about 3,700 metres. It is a big height gain for one day, which is why tomorrow is short. The face of Rakaposhi fills the sky at the head of the glacier from here.

5. 5Day 5Tagafari to Base Camp

   A short day up the glacier to base camp at about 3,900 metres. The camp goes up properly today — sleeping tents, the dining tent, the kitchen, toilet and shower tents and the generator — and the afternoon is for sorting loads and making your tent a place you can rest in for a month.

6. 6Days 6–35The climb — the southwest spur, rotations and the summit window

   Thirty days on the mountain. The southwest spur is worked from the bottom up in the usual way: the route to Camp 1 is found and fixed where it needs fixing, loads are carried, and camps go in progressively up the spur at roughly 4,800, 5,700 and 6,400 metres, with a high camp placed on the shoulder before the summit ridge when conditions allow.

   Between the carries there are rest days at base camp, and they matter as much as the climbing days. The pattern is the same one that works on every big mountain — climb high, sleep low, come down and eat — and thirty days is enough to do it properly rather than in a hurry. By the end of the second rotation most teams have slept above 6,000 metres and know how the ridge behaves.

   The summit push waits on the forecast. From the high camp the ridge is long, exposed and corniced, and the day is a serious one by any measure; this is the part of Rakaposhi that turns parties round, not the difficulty of any individual pitch. Be realistic. This mountain has a low success rate and always has, and the reason is weather and length rather than technical difficulty. Your guide decides when the team goes up and when it comes down, and that call is not open to negotiation at 6,900 metres.

7. 36Day 36Base Camp to Tagafari

   Camp comes down, loads are made up and the porters arrive. Down the glacier to the meadow at Tagafari — grass, running water and the first night in a month at an altitude where sleep comes easily.

8. 37Day 37Tagafari to Minapin

   The steep descent back through the birch and the terraces to Minapin. Settle up with the porters, and take the afternoon in the village: after four weeks on a glacier, apricot trees and a cup of tea in somebody's courtyard are the whole point of coming to Nagar.

9. 38Day 38Minapin to Chilas

   Back down the Karakoram Highway along the Hunza river and the Indus. A long drive, broken at the confluence viewpoint and wherever the driver decides the tea is good. Night in Chilas.

10. 39Day 39Chilas to Islamabad

    The last day on the highway, south through the gorge and out into the plains. Night in Islamabad, and a dinner that is not cooked on a glacier.

11. 40Day 40Departure

    Transfer to Islamabad International for your flight home. If the road has cost the expedition a day somewhere — and on the Karakoram Highway it sometimes does — this is the day it comes out of, so do not book a same-day onward connection you cannot move.

Good to know

Rakaposhi has a low summit success rate and we would rather you read that here than work it out afterwards. The southwest spur is not technically extreme; it is long, high, exposed and corniced, and it needs a settled spell of weather that the mountain does not hand out often. Thirty days on the mountain is a real window and it is still no guarantee. Come for the route and the valley and treat the top as the bonus.

The price covers everything to base camp and nothing above it. High camps, fixed rope on the spur, high-altitude porters to carry loads and supplementary oxygen are separate lines on the quote. That is the standard way the Karakoram is sold and it suits self-sufficient teams, but tell us at the enquiry stage what you actually want and we will price the whole expedition rather than leave you to find the gaps in Gilgit.

We look for previous experience above 6,000 metres, competence on crampons and fixed rope, and the fitness to carry loads repeatedly for a month. Rakaposhi is a bigger undertaking than Spantik in every respect except technical difficulty, and it is a reasonable objective for a team who have already done a 7,000 metre peak and want something with more commitment before an 8,000er.

One practical advantage over everything else we run: there is no Skardu flight and no glacier trek, so the logistics are the simplest of any big expedition in Pakistan. The variable instead is the Karakoram Highway, which is closed by landslide often enough that the last day of the itinerary is contingency rather than sightseeing.

The camp altitudes on the spur above are the pattern our teams have used and they move with conditions from season to season. Ask us for the current plan when you enquire and we will confirm it against this year's route rather than repeat a number off a web page.

Questions about this trip

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