Choba Bhamare: Searching for the Needle

Separating the upper watersheds of the t3 Sunkosi and Tamakosi riven north-east of Kalhmandu is a long saw-tooth ridge of black rock known as the Pamari Himal or Lapchi Kang range. It runs northwards from Ama Bamare, 5325 m, along the border between Tibet and Nepal´s Dolakha district to a 6070m high unnamed peak 20 kilometers further north.

Dwarfed by the Jug aland Lang tan granges to the west and the lofty peaks of the Rolwaling and Khumbu to the east, this lesser Himalayan range has largely been ignored. What little recognition it has received has almost exclusively been due to the presence of one peak that juts prominently upward like a dark fang. The peak, nicknamed ´the Needle,´ stands 3.5 kilometers north of AmaBamare. It has three sheersnowless sides (the west, south and northeast faces) that rise from below the jagged ridge crest.

What is this mountain´s real name? How tall is it? An attempt to answer these two simple questions invited a lot of confusion. Only the mountain´s appearance, and its location between Tain akosi/B hotekosi ´s tributary Chyadu Khola, and the Tibetan town of Dram/Khasa was certain. Tourist brochures and panoramas – including Himal´s own panorama- and all maps published in India starting with the 1934 "l-inch-to-8-miles" map, label a mountain called Chhoba Bamare, with varying heights of 5946m, 5960m, or 5970m.

The 1:50,000 Lapchi Kang map by Austrian cartographer Erwin Schneider contains one peak called Chaduk Bhir, height 5933m, and one peak north of the Chyadu Khola named Jobo Bamare, height 5927m. The Apa map published by Nelles in Munich retains Schneider´s names and heights. But it also labels Pamari/Lapchi Kang´s northern end peak as Chhoba Bamare, height 5971m. The 2042 B.S. Dolakha district map by HMG´s Topographical Survey Branch, and most of the maps subsequently published in Nepal do not label any of the above mountains. They only name one mountain: Chomo Pamari, height 6109m, located 28 degrees 03´26" north, 86 degrees 05´23" east, near the range´s northern end.

Compared to the higher Himalayan ranges, very little information is available about Pamari/ Lapchi Kang. The range follows the Sino-Nepali border in areas that had been made off limits to other nationals by the Panchayat government. Its peaks are no t open for mountain¬eering, though already in 1955 Tom Weir, in his book East of Kathmandu, promised that it could offer some of the world´s best rock climbing.

Two detailed ´restricted circulation´ maps at Nepal´s Topographical Survey Branch finally brought together some pieces of the puzzle. Though here too, the Nepali map labelled only Chomo Pamari, 6109m, and the Indian map labelled only Chhoba Bamare, 5946m, both maps showed all peaks in the Pamari/Lapchi Kang: there are about ten mountains above 5000 meters in the range. Most tourist maps seem to have picked only a few of these peaks.

With photos from various angles, a ruler, and several maps, we can establish as a fact that both Schneider´s Chaduk Bhir and the Indian maps´ and. Nepali tourist brochures´ Chhoba Bamare are indeed our "Needle." Why Nepali cartographers labelled only Chomo Pamari, 6109 meters, is not clear. A mountain of that height does exist, it might have that name. But it also seems plausible that they could have tried to find the "Needle" and using pictures and descriptions of Chhoba Bamare appearing higher than its neighbors, they might have sought the tallest peak in the range and slightly adjusted the spelling.

If any of you readers havemore information about the peaks of the Pamari/Lapchi Kang range, Himal would be glad to hear from you. To me, Arnico Panday, information on Choba Bamare is of personal interest, because I lived    and    travelled    in Sindhupalchok and Dolakha district as achildand have been watching Choba B am are´ s rock peak longer than that of any other mountain. I will now be leaving Nepal and Himal magazine to attend college in the United States. Writing this column has been a great learning experience, and I would like to thank everyone at Himal, as well as Ms. Elizabeth Hawley and Dr. Harka Gurung for their help with this "Know Your Himal" column. The magazine hopes to continue the column and asks interested people to submit articles  that will illuminate* interesting aspects of the Himalaya. Though initially begun as a description of individual peaks, the idea behind the column has evolved into the wider goal of spreading the excitement about mountains to Himal´s mostly Himalayan readership.