TheFreeBird
After years of trekking into Sahyadri / Western Ghats / local hills the trekker bug in you wants to upgrade to some scenic treks into Himalayas. Then the usual beginer treks like Sar Pass, Valley of Flowers, Kedarkanth etc happen usually with wallet-freindly organiser like YHAI. Having got a flavour of Himalayan life you feel the need to upgrade your trekking skills to be able to survive in the mountains without much dependency. This is when trekker tries to graduate to a mountaineer. This is the journey from Trekking to Mountaineering
The Himalayan altitude demands different set of skills than your local hill treks. The most basic of them is an extreme stamina which i guess you have already started to build over the last few years trekking in your localities. The stamina can be upgraded by some months of consistent exercising , the part which we are going to talk about is the knowledge. The know how section can be broadly broken down into Rock Climbing Skills, Snow Craft & Ice Craft .
For getting aquainted to all of these i would suggest doing the Basic Mountaineering Course (BMC) . This 30 day long course will be split across these 3 crafts : Namely Rock Climbing , ice craft and snow craft . However if you have never tried any of these i would suggest trying out some rock climbing first , which becomes the basics for learning ice craft ( read – ice climbing ) before going for BMC. As such the basic block for entering into mountaineering becomes rock climbing.
Basic Rock Climbing Course (BRC)
The best way to hone your skills is to join rock climbing groups or join some indoor wall climbing club. These days plenty of rock climbing gyms are opening up, you can easily find one near you. (List of rock walls in India)If you want to be introduced to rock climbing in a more proper way ( and get a certificate to show it) we have Rock Climbing Courses at the following government institutes
- SVIM- Swami Vivekanand Institute of Mountaineering: SVIM at Mt Abu- Rajasthan offers a 10 day residential course for Rs 1500* approx. This is the most reputed place to do your basic rock climbing from . I did it from here which you can READ here
- IHCAE-Indian Himalayan Center for Adventure & Eco Tourism: IHCAE at Sikkim offers a 3 days course for Rock climbing. Natural as well as artificial rock wall climbing.
- GGIM-Guardian Giripremi Institute of Mountaineering: GGIM, Pune – Maharashtra offers a 4 day course
I have done my BRC from SVIM and i would highly recommend it. Once you do this you can for go more technical knowledge with Advance Rock Climbing , Method of Instructor Rock Climbing courses.
Basic Mountaineering Course (BMC)
Once you have basic knowledge of rock climbing and a sizeable stamina you can apply for Basic Mountaineering Couse. Get ready for a major level of knowledge upgrade and prepare to not-like-anything-but-mountains. BMC is a 30 day course and can be done from various insitutes like
NIM – Nehru Institute of Mountaineering, Uttarkashi
HMI – Himalayan Mountaineering Institute, Darjeeling
JIM – Jawahar Institute of Mountaineering, Pahalgam
ABVIMAS – Atal Bihari Vajpayee Institute of Mountaineering and Allied Sports, Manali
NIMAS – National Institute of Mountaineering and Allied Sports, Dirang-Arunachal Pradesh.
IISM – Indian Institute of Skiing and Mountaineering, Gulmarg ( More famous for Skiing)
SGMI – Sonam Gyatso Mountaineering Institute, Gangtok ( Only trains army – not sure )
PNSMTI – Pandit Nain Singh Surveyor Mountaineering Training Institute (Younger bro of NIM )
I did my BMC from NIMAS and would recommend it for everyone . Once you complete BMC you can get higher technical knowledge by doing Advance Mountaineering , Method of Instruction and Search & Rescue courses. This will make you the most ready you can ever be to take on those tiring mountain climbs.
Once you have this life -changing skills it’s time to practice mountaineering by going for expeditions with experienced group of people. This culminates with you being the guide for other mountaineers. I have started my expedition with a non-trekking peak of Stok Kangri which at 6000m gives a feel of high altitude without being technically challenging. You can then graduate to other peaks and technical climbs at 6000m like KangYatse 1 , Bandarpoonch , DeoTibba etc. and slowly move up the ladder to reach 7000m and 8000m. Now you are a mountaineer.
Basic Skiing Course (BSC)
Once you start high altitude expeditions you realise that climbing the mountain is easy but getting down in one piece is very hard. Modern day climbers use skiing as the way for fast, less tiring descends. This is where skiing plays an important role. You are most likely a person from sea -level who only sees snow on treks. As such getting knowledge about skiing is very critical and one can enrole for such courses to get a good idea. Some good options are :
- IISM – Indian Institute of Skiing and Mountaineering, Gulmarg: Most Famous , highest waiting period
- JIM – Jawahar Institute of Mountaineering & Winter Sports – pahalgam
- ABVIMAS – I have heard that they too have a skiing course but cant confirm this since their website is not working properly since long.
Just as the Basic Rock Climbing & Basic Mountaineering Courses have advanced courses so does skiing. Once you are done with basic Skiing you are qualified to go for Intermediate skiing & Advanced Skiing Courses.
The latest addition in my bucketlist is to do a skiing course. And for the year 2020 i see myself doing it and complete my checklist for journey from Trekking to Mountaineering
All the knowedge you get through these courses is practical one and are easily forgotten if not practised. As the age old saying goes,
” The best exercise for mountaineering is mountaineering “
Thats it for this post. I hope you found something useful in your journey for Graduating from Trekking to Mountaineering
Related Posts
- Mountaineering as a career in India
- Should i quit my job for a Mountain Life ?
- Mountaineering Books to keep you Motivated
- Basic Rock Climbing @SVIM | 10 Days | Did this in Jan 2019
- Basic Mountaineering @NIMAS | 30 Days | Did this in April 2017
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