Assignment 15 - Kelden Andrews

A topic I can really immerse myself in is, as you probably expected climbing. particularly new stuff. For example a polish team recently attempted the first winter ascent of K2,in the Karakorum. They were turned back but from that article I found several others. One of the members had a crack pot theory about acclimatization a necessary step to climb, that requires getting used to the thin air at such a high altitude. His was use Aconcagua in Argentina to acclimatize, but that's half a world away, how you ask? They would climb up to the necessary altitude on Aconcagua then run back town and fly all the way to the Himalaya, then climb from there, acclimatization made easy. I then started looking into the polish climbing scene at large which basically evolved out of boredom while they were part of the soviet bloc as many labor jobs were taken by Russians moving in, this lead to a healthy climbing culture in the Tatras. Their style was characterized by winter ascents. From this I learned of the Polish route all the way back on K2, one of the first routes, which ran straight up the roughest terrain, very direct, very straightforward, and so suicidal no one but the first ascenders went up it. And with that I was back at my original topic with 2 or 3 hours well wasted.