Hushe Karakoram Expedition. We spent two months in the Central Karakoram, exploring, climbing and geologising around the Masherbrum, Gondogoro, Chogolisa, Charakusa and Aling glacier systems, approaching from the Hushe valley. A late winter left snow in Hushe village until early April; conditions higher were somewhat bleaker. We had Base Camp on the Gondogoro Glacier during late April and May. British Dick Renshaw, Jon Tinker, Mark Miller, Simon Yates and I and Australian Craig Kentwell all climbed Gondogoro Peak (c. 5700 meters) on May 7 to 10. Miller and Yates climbed “Blob Peak” (c. 5800 meters) south of Masherbrum from May 14 to 16. Meanwhile, Renshaw and Tinker attempted a complicated mixed route on the east face of the lowermost peak of the three that make up the Biarchedi massif, east of Masherbrum. They climbed 2500 feet up the face before retreating. Kentwell and I went to the head of the Gondogoro Glacier and climbed to the main col connecting northwards to the upper Vigne Glacier between Chogolisa and Biarchedi, south of Mitre Peak. We studied the geology of the Aling Glacier to the Chongking Col which connects to the Liliwa and Baltoro Glaciers, the Masherbrum south Glacier and the Charakusa Glacier leading to K7. Renshaw, Tinker, Miller and Yates made three attempts on Trinity Peak from the Chogolisa Glacier but were defeated by weather and deep snows. The expedition left Skardu in mid May but Miller, Yates and Tinker travelled up to Hunza for another unsuccessful attempt to climb the granite spire of Bublumiting on the Ultar massif above Baltit.

Michael Searle, England