Goan duo on a high after summiting Himalayan peaks

The temperature was a minus zero degrees and the cold on the mountain was cutting through the skin, but this didn’t deter these Margao boys who persevered and achieved their climbing goal.

Last month, Gautam Verlekar and Rahul Prabhudesai scaled the twin peaks - Mount Kang Yatse 1 and 2 in Ladakh - in the Himalayas, thus becoming the only Goans to summit two 6,200-metre-plus peaks on August 23 and 27 in less than 100 hours.

The journey wasn’t easy, but the hours of practice and planning paid off. The climbers trained for years to make their pursuit of these Himalayan peaks come true. In a candid chat with Gomantak Times Digital, they recollected their time on the mountains, the food there, the local practices and more.

THEIR GOA TRAINING GROUND

The training to climb Himalayan peaks is far from ideal in Goa which is at sea-level, the mountaineers said. But, nonetheless, they climbed the Chandreshwar Bhootnath Temple hill in South Goa with their heavy backpacks as part of their training.

“We would walk up the Chandreshwar Bhootnath Temple hill in Paroda. This was part of our strength training that focused on muscles such as quadriceps and hamstrings. We also cycled uphill as part of our training to to build endurance,” says Gautam, who is a chartered accountant by profession.

To which Rahul quickly adds, “Spending weekends on Chandreshwar with heavy backpacks is something we both felt was important considering there is no other documented trail in Goa to train for Himalayan climbing.”

With the assistance of the Goa Alpine Club which promoted the expedition and the members of Boots & Crampons, the two Goan lads set up a base at 5,100 metres at Nymaling, in Ladakh.

Here, they got acclimatised to the cold weather for five days. The team took two days to set up and check their equipment. On August 22 night, the team set off for the summit of Kang Yatse 2 and touched the peak at 7.43 am the following day.

CREATING HISTORY

After every feat, you need to rest and the team took a 48 hours break for recovery, as they set up their camp on a ledge at 5700-plus metres in a cold and chilly mountain area. Rahul says, “Climbing down is always risky, especially when the climber is tired after over 8-9 hours of climbing to the top.”

During their adventure, they had to face falling rocks. “We experienced some vertical ice sections, but the most dangerous thing to experience was falling rocks during the descent,” adds Rahul, an entrepreneur, who has multiple 6,000/7,000 metre climbs to his name and is an inspiration to new generation of outdoor adventure enthusiasts in the State.

ONLY DEHYDRATED FOOD

Talking about food, Rahul says, “On the mountains, we ate simple Indian food with a mix of Western. Higher up in the mountains, we ate only dehydrated meals.”

Gautam and Rahul's feat serves as a testament to the spirit of adventure, and one which speaks of human courage to realise dreams and inspire others to follow suit.

While their achievement is worth talking about, at the same time it has been a pathbreaking year for Goan mountaineers, with Pankaj Narvekar becoming the first Goan to scale Mount Everest, followed by Karishma Verlekar who undertook a solo guided climb of Mount Mera.