Annapurna South, Southwest Ridge. The Meiji University expedition was made up of Yoshio Miyagawa, Toichi Mitani, Norio Nakanishi, Mas- ayuki Tsunakawa, Dr. Yoshio Kato and me as leader. The southwest ridge, which we selected, had been attempted by another Japanese party in 1974, but they gave up at 20,000 feet because of steep rock and knife- edges. We set out on September 7 and got to Temporary Base Camp at 13,300 feet on the west side of the glacier that descends south from Annapurna South into the Kyumrun Khola. On September 20 we placed Base Camp at 15,750 feet under the southernmost rock peak on the southwest ridge. We fixed ropes and gained the ridge crest to place Camp I at 18,700 feet on the 27th. We continued to prepare the route up the ridge over the second rock peak, and on October 3 placed Camp II at 18,925 feet in a col. The knife-edged ridge got much steeper above 20,000 feet. On October 13 we pitched Camp III at 21,000 feet. We had to remove 1300 feet of fixed rope from between Base Camp and Camp I to supplement the rope we still had. Above Camp III we left the ridge and climbed the south face to the right. On October 14 and 15 we prepared the route up the 60° to 70° face. On October 16 Mitani and Nakanishi left Camp III at four A.M. and stood on the summit (23,685 feet) at 8:45. On the 17th Miyagawa and I climbed to the summit as well.

Teruyuki Kouno, Meiji University, Japan