Where the Ice Never Sleeps: Walking the North Slope of Kawagarbo

For seven days I walk in the shadow of a mountain no one has ever climbed. Kawagarbo — 6,740 metres, the highest peak in Yunnan — rises above me, and I am not here to conquer it. No one is. This is the North Slope, the "Pojun" route: not the famous pilgrim road, not a scenic park, but the muddy harvest paths of matsutake and caterpillar-fungus families. It is genuinely hard, a true five-out-of-five — roughly 50 kilometres, nearly 4,650 metres of climbing, glacier moraine for a bed, a high point well over 4,000 metres. I come in summer, late May to August, because that is when the trail is walkable. It moves me because so little here yields to me: the mountain hides in cloud far more than it shows, and the longer I walk, the more I understand that this is exactly the point.

The land

The Meili Snow Mountains stand wedged between two great rivers — the Mekong (Lancang) to the east and the Salween (Nujiang) to the west — within the Three Parallel Rivers UNESCO World Heritage Site, inscribed in July 2003. The protected area spans some 1.7 million hectares, holds more than 118 peaks above 5,000 metres, and ranges in elevation from around 760 metres in the gorges to Kawagarbo's 6,740. UNESCO calls it the most biologically diverse temperate region on earth, and after a single day climbing from forest into moraine, that is easy to believe.

Kawagarbo itself — 6,740.1 metres, with a prominence of 2,232 metres — is the highest mountain in Yunnan, straddling the border of Deqin County. From the range spills the Mingyong Glacier on the south face: monsoonal, temperate, fast-moving, almost 12 kilometres long, its terminus reaching down to around 2,700 metres. It is one of the lowest-latitude, lowest-elevation glaciers in all of China, and it is retreating quickly. Reported figures vary by period and method, but every account points the same direction — the ice is going. Here, you can watch the climate change in real time.

On the North Slope I face a different ice: a hanging, pale-blue glacier below a wall of three peaks over 6,000 metres. The camps climb to places like Pojun at about 4,120 metres, where the Tibetan name means "the valley where immortals live."

A short history

Kawagarbo has never been summited, and that is no accident of difficulty alone. In 1987 a joint expedition made a first reconnaissance. Then, on the night of 3 January 1991, an avalanche struck Camp Three — set at roughly 5,100 metres — and killed all seventeen members of the Sino-Japanese team: eleven Japanese climbers from the Academic Alpine Club of Kyoto University (京都大学学士山岳会), led by the 45-year-old Jiro Inoue, together with six Chinese members. It remains one of the worst single disasters in modern mountaineering. Ten bodies were found first; the rest emerged over years, sixteen of the seventeen eventually recovered in 1998 on the Mingyong Glacier at around 3,700 to 3,800 metres, carried down by the moving ice. One man, the doctor Hisanobu Shimizu (清水久信), was never found. The Kyoto club returned to attempt the peak again in 1996.

In 2001, local-government laws banned all future climbing on cultural and religious grounds. So Kawagarbo stays, by law and by faith, untouched — the most prominent and best-known of China's legally protected sacred peaks.

The people & their mountains

To the Tibetans who live around it, Kawagarbo is not a summit to be claimed but a living being — the spiritual home of a warrior protector deity of the same name, Kawagebo, and one of the most sacred mountains in all of Tibetan Buddhism. When the 1991 expedition died, many locals interpreted the loss as the anger of the gods at the intrusion. To walk here is to walk through someone's faith.

That faith is not abstract; it has feet. Each year some twenty thousand pilgrims walk the outer kora around the mountain — roughly 240 kilometres (some sources say closer to 250, over eight to ten days) — circling the peak rather than climbing it. The North Slope itself is no temple route; it is the working land of village families who climb these slopes to harvest matsutake mushrooms and caterpillar fungus. Since 2024 the village of Yagong requires every hiker to travel with a local guide — a rule that fits both the danger of the terrain and the simple courtesy of being led through a place that belongs to others.

Walking the route

The walking is hard in the honest way: long climbs through slick, dripping forest, mud underfoot, leeches in the wet months (the locals carry salt for them), then the cold mineral world of moraine where you sleep beside the ice. The reward is not a clear postcard summit — summer trades that away. The reward is access, solitude, and the rare privilege of standing close to a glacier almost no one reaches.

Day 1 — Lijiang (or Shangri-La): the assembly point

I arrive and gather at altitude already climbing, meeting the people I'll spend a week of weather and effort with.

Day 2 — Lijiang — Shangri-La — Piru Mountain — Feilai Temple campsite

A long transfer deeper into the mountains, ending at the Feilai Temple campsite, the famous viewpoint that faces Kawagarbo across the valley.

Day 3 — Piru Mountain — Yagong — Zhubi campsite — Bamboo Forest campsite

We pass through Yagong village — the true trailhead — and climb into forest, camping among bamboo as the path narrows to a working trail.

Day 4 — Bamboo Forest campsite — glacier base campsite

The hardest kind of beauty: climbing out of the trees toward the glacier base camp on the moraine, the pale-blue ice and its wall of 6,000-metre peaks coming into view.

Day 5 — Glacier base campsite — Ciyagong Pass — Deqin campsite

A high crossing over the pass, the air thin and the ground bare, before descending toward the Deqin-side camp.

Day 6 — Deqin — Dajueba — Mangong — Yagong — Feilai Temple

A long day winding back out through high villages and down to Yagong, returning to Feilai Temple where the mountain first revealed itself.

Day 7 — Feilai Temple — Lijiang (trip concludes)

The descent out and the journey back to Lijiang, the mountain — as it so often does — keeping its own counsel behind the cloud.

Know before you go

• When to come: Late May to August. This is the only reliably walkable window for the North Slope — but it is also the rainy season, so expect mud, slick forest, and leeches. The trade-off is light: the dry months from October onward give the clearest "Sunshine on the Golden Mountain" (日照金山), the roughly twenty-minute dawn gold on Kawagarbo seen best from Feilai Temple — but that season is for viewing, not for this trek. The summer trail trades the clear views for a passable path.
• How hard: Strenuous, a genuine 5/5 — roughly 50 km, nearly 4,650 m of cumulative ascent, a high point well over 4,000 m with passes pushing toward 5,200 m, and nights spent on glacier moraine. At these altitudes, acute mountain sickness is a real risk; build in time to acclimatize, ascend gradually, and stay alert to how your body responds. If you have any cardiovascular, respiratory, or other health concerns, consult your doctor before committing to a high-altitude trek like this one.
• Guide or solo: Not optional. Since 2024 Yagong village requires every hiker to take a local guide, and the terrain backs the rule — this is remote, high, unmarked harvest path far outside any scenic park, where navigation is genuinely difficult and rescue would be slow and hard. A local lead guide knows the route, the weather, the river crossings, and the customs of the land you're passing through. A licensed local operator runs the logistics; for foreign trekkers, Inglite supports the trip in English.

FAQ

How fit do I need to be? Very. This is a multi-day expedition at altitude with long ascents, heavy mud, and moraine camping. You should be a confident, well-conditioned hiker comfortable with consecutive hard days and basic glacier-edge terrain — not a casual trail walker.

Will I actually see Kawagarbo? Maybe — and maybe not. The peak is famously shy and spends far more time hidden in cloud than revealed, especially in the summer rainy season. Treat any clear view as a gift rather than an expectation.

What about altitude sickness? It's a real concern above 4,000 metres, and the passes climb higher still. Acclimatize, ascend steadily, hydrate, and tell your guide immediately if you feel unwell. Anyone with relevant medical conditions should consult a doctor beforehand.

What's the deal with the leeches? The summer rains bring them out in the wet forest. They're unpleasant but harmless; local guides carry salt to deal with them, and gaiters plus insect-aware clothing help a great deal.

Why is a guide mandatory? Yagong village has required a local guide for every hiker since 2024. Beyond the rule, the route is remote, high, and unmarked, on working harvest paths with tricky navigation and slow rescue — a guide is a genuine safety necessity, not a formality.

Is this the same as the Yubeng trek? No. Yubeng is the well-known, well-trodden trail. The North Slope ("Pojun") is a remote, non-scenic-area route on local matsutake and caterpillar-fungus paths, with far fewer footprints and far less infrastructure.