In 2015, Juan Gabriel Estellano, Lilen Sosa, and I climbed a five-pitch route (see AAJ 2016) on high-quality granite on the ridge extending northeast from the summit of Jati Khollu (5,421m). Over the next eight years,  Juan Gabriel and I discussed getting back to this hidden place to explore more options. In 2024, we finally made it.

On July 30, we entered the valley (-16.459557, -67.982060) and walked for an hour and a half, before bivying at 4,550m. The next morning we continued northeast, passing a col before reaching a lagoon at 5,100m. Above the lagoon loomed our objective, the most evident line on the rightmost tower, adjacent to the tower of our 2015 ascent. 

We climbed this new route in five pitches. The first pitch was easy, but I struggled with the overhanging section of the second pitch. Thankfully, a hand-sized crack made for secure jams. Another easy pitch stopped a few meters below a six-meter horizontal roof traverse. With a crack too small for fingertips and a featureless slab for the feet, I aided the roof using the 00 and 000 cams that Juan Gabriel had brought. Juan Gabriel took the final lead, avoiding an obvious offwidth crack, as we didn’t bring any number 5 or 6 cams, and reached the top at 5,240m. From there, we moved southwest approximately 100m and found a 60m rappel that led down to a scree-filled gully and back to our bivy.

The following morning, we hiked to the top of the tower and rappelled down to the unclimbed offwidth crack, which we cleaned and climbed. There appears to be another obvious and worthwhile line to the left of our line that would join the now clean offwidth.

We called our new route Triple 000 (5 pitches, 6b+ A1), as we found it remarkable that the crux was overcome thanks to two Black Diamond 00 and 000 cams. Even though the approach is long and the altitude high, I am looking forward to climbing there again; the granite is excellent, there are many cracks, and the area is very beautiful. It’s astonishing that 22.4km as the crow flies from the capital city’s main square, this place has escaped human influence.

— Alexander von Ungern, Switzerland/Bolivia