How to get there:
The town of Monkhkhairkhan, is the nearest location with some services.
The drive from the paved hwy. on the east side via this town to the trailhead
requires 5.5 hours of driving on dirt tracks with a good 4WD.
The road to the BC is pretty good until you cross the river that
originate at the mountain. Then it gets progressively worse with
several sections where rocks make driving slow. A capable 4WD
is absolutely needed.
A good base camp / parking is between several
small branches of a river at location N46.96371, E091.45316, elevation
about 2870 meter.
Route description:
There is a route even visible on some maps, that runs into
the valley, then climbs steeply to the glacier.
However, our route first climbs the "bonus" peak
Barilgachin. This peak has 130 meter of prominence with
its key saddle in the col between the two peaks.
From a camp near the river somewhat beyond the last normade hut,
proceed along the right hand side of the river, then follow a trail
that ascends the obvious, small side valley coming down from the
right. Continue to up to the large hillside above. There are many signs of
paths where climbers have walked. There are also some scattered cairns
indicating good routes. However, overall the terrain is cumbersome with
several sections with large boulders. Continue uphill until you
finally reach the edge of the glacier.
This glacier has a low angle and few (if any?) crevasses. It is an easy
walk to the summit. One may bypass this summit (say when going back) in order
to save a little on the vertical gain. However, it pays to cross fairly close
to the summit.
From this glacier, one will
see the highest summit ahead. The glacier is
no longer connected, a section with rocks must be crossed before the ascent can
be completed on the final, also low angeled, glacier.
Note on elevation:
This peak used to have a glacier dome as its highest point in the past.
However, the glacier is melting and
now a rock summit very close to
the highest snow summit
is 3 meter higher. Based on several GPS measurements,
also with different units, we estimate that the rock peak is 4200 meter.
The units used agreed within a quite small tolerance of 2-3 meter.
Comments:
Here is a quick summary of peaks climbed in Mongolia August 2024.
We had a slow morning after yesterdays ascent of Baatar.
Breakfast around 0900 and ready to drive closer to 1000. The drive across to this
BC is actually quite long, almost all the way along tracks.
We made a stop for lunch
in the small town of Monkhkhairkhan (Tsenkher).
After crossing the river
in our final valley,
the road got worse and some 4WD driving experience is needed in order to get
the cars to BC.
We had breakfast at 0430 and started hiking at 0500. It was still dark, we have moved west
from the peak Bumbat. There we started at 0500 with
daylight. However, daylight came quickly and I cached my torch-light at 0535.
We reached the first glacier after 3:25, quite a big hill with scattered boulders.
Route finding was challenging if one wanted the easiest path. The guides had vanished
out of sight and so had Steven, thus I made my way uphill based on local choices,
some involved easy claas 3 scrambling. I rejoined the guides at the edge of the glacier,
Steven was already well on his way to the summit.
We made the summit of Barilgachin shortly before 0900. A brief stop there before
continuing to the main summit. Arrival at 1030, so a pretty long trek to gain this
summit. The highest rock is already several meter above the snow, thus it seems
pretty certain that this peak will again be the number 2 peak in Mongolia with respect to
elevation. The two competing peaks, Tsast Uul and
Sutai Uul both have glacier summits that will melt down
more in the coming years.
We rested and took pictures the next 30 minutes before heading back down.
I tried to save on the vertical by crossing way left of the Barilgachin summit,
however, this detour bacame much longer than anticipated. In conclusion,
it pays to return across Barilgachin only a much smaller distance from its summit.
Back at camp in 4:25, for an overall trip time exceeding 10 hours.
A full day, to be completed by a nice evening
meal prepared by Gangaa.
