The mountaineer from Lanzarote, Joel Delgado, has finally conquered this Tuesday the 8,163 meters of Manaslu, in Nepal, the eighth highest mountain in the world. In this way, he manages to become the first Canary Islander to climb the mountain commonly known as the Mountain of the Spirits and be the second from the province of Las Palmas to conquer one of the fourteen peaks of more than 8,000 meters and the fourth in the entire history of Canarian mountaineering.
A sudden change in the weather brought forward by one day the adventure that began on September 20th with the journey to Camp 1. The first day took place on a not very technical and simple path, although requiring the use of crampons halfway through to be able to advance through the snow.
At 7 in the morning on Sunday the 21st, the expedition set off again to go to Camp 2. This new day had a greater complication when climbing several ice walls with crampons and the jumar, crossing cracks with stairs and ascending from 5,600 meters to 6,500 where Camp 3 was waiting. A new ascent of 900 meters and some other ice wall were the difficulties that the Lanzarote native had to face on the third day of the tough challenge. After the avalanches and landslides suffered in previous days near Camp 4, the expedition decided not to stop at this camp, and begin the attack on the summit of Manaslu from Camp 3.
The ascent began with a long uphill ramp ascending to 7,400 meters of altitude where the fourth camp was located. A new inconvenience arose, despite reaching the summit at half past five in the morning, it was not until ten o'clock when Manaslu could finally be crowned since the difficulty of accessing the summit due to its narrowness added to the fact that numerous expeditions, also aware of the window of good weather, took advantage of the optimal weather conditions to make the ascent from Camp 3 and Camp 4.
Despite having already passed the 8,000 meter barrier (the death zone), there was still a tough challenge, the descent. Up to eleven hours were necessary to descend from the highest peak without oxygen after Delgado's bottle ran out.
In total, 25 uninterrupted hours passed from leaving Camp 3 to reaching the summit and descending back to the same camp with the characteristic cold of the altitude of Manaslu during the ascent and a harsh heat on the descent, despite all the difficulties and the very harshness of the conditions in which life develops from 5000 meters of altitude and the hours spent more Delgado describes it as "very rewarding and exciting for new goals and challenges of the future with the eight-thousanders, that is what this new experience in high mountains leaves me and I want to thank the team of Nepalese sherpas who worked hand in hand with all of us throughout the expedition."
Already back at base camp, on Wednesday the 24th, the athlete from Lanzarote even had an unexpected and very pleasant encounter, while descending to base camp, with a true mountaineering legend, Carlos Soria. "Going down from Camp 3 to base camp I was lucky enough to meet Carlos Soria, a great reference in mountaineering at 86 years old who is commemorating the 50th anniversary of his first ascent to Manaslu and we had a very pleasant meeting with him and his team in which we talked about the different sections that he needed to complete his journey to Camp 3", Delgado highlighted.
The 8,163 meters of Manaslu join the 6,189 meters of Islan Peak (2023) and the 7,129 meters of Himlung Himal (2024), all of them in the Himalayas, which were previously conquered by Delgado. The mountaineer from Lanzarote once again thanks the collaboration of the Tourist Centers, the Government of the Canary Islands through the Sports area, the UD Las Palmas Foundation, the Volcán de La Corona and Summits Sports Events that has allowed to achieve this historic milestone for the high mountain sport of Lanzarote and the Canary Islands.