Huascarán Norte, Northeast Face and Oqshapallka, South Face, and Other Peaks, 1979. After acclimatizing on Yanapaqtsa, Pisco and Toqllaraju, all by their normal routes, Bruce Blatherwick and I climbed the north face of Ranrapallka by the 1975 route in ten hours from the highest lake in the Quebrada Ishinca in late July, 1979, descending on the second day. One week later Robert Blatherwick and I made an alpine ascent of the magnificent 5250-foot-high northeast face of Huascarán Norte by the 1973 route in two days to the summit. Climbers should note that the fixed ropes left by an earlier ascent party on the 500-foot vertical rock band are extremely rotten and cannot be trusted. With a medium-sized aid rack, this is a superb climb. On August 9, 1979 Robert Blatherwick and I made the first ascent of the south face of Oqshapallka (5881 meters, 19,295 feet). From the glacier above Laguna Llaca the route takes a direct line up the center of the face to the summit. Eighteen hours of difficult mixed climbing on the first day led to a bivouac in an ice cave just below the summit cornices. The following day it took us four hours to climb the remaining 150 feet of nearly vertical snow to the summit. The descent took five hours via the north face to the glacier above Ishinca.

Mark Richey