Trek to Tilicho Lake

Day 16 Tilicho Base Camp to Tilicho Lake

Heading up the valley we traverse an old moraine and as we gain height there are tremendous views of Khangsar Kang, Tarke Kang and Gangapurna to the South as well as an impressive retrospective over Manang and towards Pisang.

We continue traversing some very large scree slopes. They are less steep and exposed than on yesterday's walk but there is a danger of rock falls: as the sun warms the rocks on the upper part of the slopes (hundreds of metres higher up) it will also melt ice and possibly dislodge stones. Blue Sheep which are quite common in the area might cause it too. What then happens is that these stones will roll down the very long slope and gain incredible speed and bounce all the way down to the bottom of the valley. This is a dangerous place and you should not stop on the traverses and keep an eye on the upper part of the slope. I won't say that you should be running, you are at around 4700m and there is no running at this height,especially for the day trip trekkers who were far less acclimatized than we were, but keep going at a good pace.

Beyond what I ended up calling "the shooting gallery" the trail climbs over a couple of crests and we get to the snow and finally at a ridge decorated with a chorten and many prayer flags, we get our first view of Tilicho Lake at around 5000m. This is a truly awesome site. The turquoise waters reflect the line of snowy ridges between the 7000+ metre peaks of Tilicho and Khangsar Kang. This is what Maurice Herzog termed ‘the Great Barrier’ when he came this way looking for a route to Annapurna.

The glaciers of these peaks come right down to the lake ending in vertical ice walls which sometimes calve into the waters.

As there was quite a bit of snow we continued for another 45 minutes to a hill located a little to the Northeast of the lake that was partly free of snow and set our camp there.

The views of the Great Barrier and the lake are breathtaking. Unfortunately the sun disappears early behind the mountains and it gets quite cold (-20C that night).

Walking time from Tilicho Base Camp to the lake is about 3 hours, or 4 hours if slow and not well acclimatized..

Highest lake in the world?

Tilicho is often called the highest lake in the world especially in Nepal. It is of course always compelling to call yourself "biggest", "highest", "tallest" but in case of a lake the problem starts with the fact that there is considerable uncertainty about defining the difference between lakes and ponds, and no current accepted definition of either term exists.
Many bodies of water are higher than Tilicho (which is at an latitude of 4920m) but they are generally no more than a few hundred metres in size. So let's say that for its size Tilicho is the highest lake in the world. All the higher expanses of water are quite a bit smaller.

Day 17 Tilicho East Camp to Tilicho West Camp

As the crow flies it is little more than 4km from our camp at the southern end of Tilicho Lake to our next at the northern end. However there is no easy route around the lake shore. To the west the way is barred by glaciers while on the eastern shore, a large vertical cliff drops right into the lake. To reach the north shore we must first ascend the bounding ridge to the east of the lake. Behind the ridge is a notch at 5340m and we can now descend to the lake shore following a small tributary stream.

Weather was excellent and the snow was perfect but the two short steep climbs were quite tiring. The camp near the West end of the lake was quite well protected from any wind. Again the sun disappeared early behind the Great Barrier.

Walking time between the two camps is 3 to 4 hours going quite slow.

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