Spanish all-female team have climbed Eternal Flame route on the Nameless Trango Tower

Lucia Guichot and Nieves Gil successfully climbed the Eternal Flame route on the Nameless Trango Tower (6251 m) in the Karakoram mountain range in Pakistan. The route, known for its difficulty and beauty, is 600 meters long with a grading of VI, 7b+, A2.

Nieves Gil

31-year-old Nieves — from Huesca
she is a forestry engineer.

Lucia Guichot

34-year-old Lucia — from Madrid,
she is a Mountain guide

The two women met as part of an all-female mountaineering team (2018-2021) and have since formed a strong partnership, successfully completing several historic routes on iconic peaks around the world. In 2022, they climbed the north face of the Eiger in the Swiss Alps, and in December 2023, they ascended the classic Supercanaleta route (1600 m, 80˚, 6a+, 5.9, WI4, M5-6) on Fitz Roy in Patagonia.

“Nieves is my adventure team. With her, I would go to the ends of the earth, ” says Lucia about her climbing partner.

The two women undoubtedly have a significant influence on young Spanish female climbers, motivating them to pursue new achievements. We hope their ascents will continue to inspire within our women’s climbing community.

Eternal flame route on the Nameless Trango Tower (6251 m) via Slovenian route

Difficult: UIAA VI, 7b+, A2, ED
Total Length 1200m (including 650 m Eternalflame routeand 550 mto the sunny terrace via Slovenian route)
Lucia Guichot and Nieves Gil completed the route in 7 days.

Eternal Flame is a world-famous multi-pitch route up the Nameless Tower in the famous granite Trango group in Pakistan’s Karakorum mountain range. It was established in 1989 by an extremely strong German team comprised of Kurt Albert, Wolfgang Güllich, Christof Stiegler and Milan Sykora.

The route captured the world’s imagination and over the last two decades many of the world’s best have tried their luck at freeing the line, but all ground to a halt due to prohibitive weather conditions combined with the extreme difficulties at altitude.

The first free ascent was carried out by German brothers Thomas and Alex Huber during an unprecedented spell of good weather in August 2009.

The first all-female team to climb Eternal Flame was Slovenian climbers Tina di Batista, Tanja Gromvsek and Alessandra Voglar (2006), and the first woman to climb it entirely free was Barbara Zangerl (2022).

Lucia and Nieves, two Spanish women, traveled to Pakistan with a group of friends, planning to climb Eternal Flame in three separate teams. It took three days of trekking to reach the Baltoro Valley from Askole. According to Lucia, this trek is the most dangerous part of the journey. She describes the actual climb as casually as if it were just another trip to the Alps or the Pyrenees: “When we reached the start of the route, a window of good weather opened up immediately, and we didn’t have much time for acclimatization. We fixed ropes and the next day we climbed with backpacks to the ledge where the first bivouac was. The entire route is a mix of free climbing, aid climbing, and jugging with haul bags.”

Lucia admits that the most challenging part was “carrying a heavy backpack and dealing with the altitude.” On the fifth day, Nieves was hit by altitude sickness, her face swelled up, and she had a severe headache. “And yet we made it to the summit, ” says Lucia. “The next day was a difficult descent down the wall from the pre-summit snow ledge (around 6000 meters), but we managed to reach base camp. We ate a lot of ham to celebrate the achievement. Our colleagues Pablo Ruiz Blin and Roberto Muñoz reached the summit in five days, while it took us a total of seven days, even though we started at the same time as them.”

Since the women managed to complete the route fairly quickly, they spent the remaining time trekking around Baltoro, enjoying the excellent views of K2 and Broad Peak.

Lucia Guichot:

My friend Nieves Gil and I go to the mountains every year. Last year, we were in Patagonia and climbed Fitz Roy. The year before, we were in the Indian Himalayas and climbed Zanskar on rock routes. This year, we had the idea to go to Pakistan. Friends invited us to join them to climb Trango Tower, and we thought it was a great opportunity and a good project for our team.

Six of us friends from Spain teamed up to climb Eternal Flame on Nameless Tower in three independent pairs. This route, considered one of the most beautiful in the world, was within our capabilities. We saw it as an expansion of our possibilities. Nowadays, many climbers aim to climb this line free, but that was not part of our plans. We intended to climb in our own style, combining free climbing, aid climbing, and big wall techniques.

The ascent took us 7 days—6 days for the climb and 1 day for the descent. The route is 1200 meters long. First, you need to climb the Slovenian route to the Sun Terrace. This first part, 12 pitches long, took us 2 days. On the first day, we fixed ropes, and on the second day, we climbed up to the terrace where we set up a tent. This bivouac was at an altitude of 5800 m. On the third day, we fixed ropes on the Eternal Flame route and then descended back to the Sun Terrace. In the next two days, we climbed the second half of the route. On the fourth day, we fixed ropes higher up. On the fifth day, we climbed with haul bags and bivouac gear to a snow ledge before the summit bastion, where there is room for one tent and a few bivouac spots. There was still a bit of ice on the ledge that hadn’t melted completely. That summer was hot. We went in August, so there was almost no snow on the route. But there was a bit of ice on the ledges, and we could make water.

On the sixth day, we reached the summit. It was a rather long day. First, we climbed about 12 more pitches to the summit, some of which were very difficult. We overcame the hardest sections with aid climbing. Then we descended directly to the Sun Terrace. We summited at the same time as a team of Poles. It was unforgettable. The weather was excellent that day, almost hot. We all sang “Eternal Flame” on the summit and took photos together. It was a wonderful and touching moment.

The rest of the descent took us one day. By this time, we had been at an altitude of 6000 meters for several days. My friend Nieves felt unwell on the last night due to the altitude. She woke up with a swollen face. When we started packing up in the morning, Nieves told me, “Lucia, I can’t make it down.” It was quite a challenging situation because we were alone, in the middle of the wall on Nameless Tower, in a remote area of Pakistan. It was a real test of our abilities. We rappelled all day with backpacks weighing 20-30 kg, descending very slowly. Nieves had a headache and dizziness. She took a pill to help with the dizziness and symptoms of altitude sickness. But the pill caused diarrhea, so we had to stop frequently. Sometimes Nieves couldn’t even wait one pitch. It was a funny story because she descended the entire way in wet pants.

When we were almost down to base camp, our Spanish teammates, who were waiting for us there, came to meet us at the start of the climb. They brought Coca-Cola—the best gift they could give us—and a bag of delicious Spanish sausages. It was a wonderful and very touching moment.