No shaggy dog story: stray follows climbers 23,000ft to reach Himalayan mountain top
Summit reached by homeless animal on accidental expedition may be the highest recorded
A STRAY dog befriended a mountain expedition and followed them to the top of a 23,389ft Himalayan peak.
The female dog, which the climbers named Mera after a peak near where they first met it, reached the summit of Baruntse in Nepal without any assistance and was still able to run once it had reached the summit.
Sherpas with the expedition said they had never seen such a feat, and an organisation that documents expeditions said the climb may be the highest recorded for a dog, according to the outdoors magazine Outside.
“I am not aware of a dog actually reaching the summit of an expedition peak in Nepal,” said Billi Bierling, of the Himalayan Database. “I just hope that she won’t get into trouble for having climbed Baruntse without a permit.”
Dogs have previously been found at Everest Base Camp, with a height of 17,600ft, and have followed climbers up to Camp II (21,300 feet).
The 45lb stray is thought to be a cross between a Tibetan mastiff and a Himalayan sheepdog.
Mera had bounded up to climbers from the Kathmandu-based Summit Club when they were already at 17,000ft and latched on to Don Wargowsky, from Seattle.
Mr Wargowsky said the Sherpas at first only tolerated the dog, but then began to appreciate its climbing ability.
“They’d never seen anything like this happen,” he said.
“They said she was a special dog, that she brought luck to the expedition. Some even thought that she was blessed.”
On the day of the final ascent, he said, Mera seemed unconcerned by the altitude or precipices on either side and bounded ahead of the group. “I have no clue if she’d been up there before, but she seemed very confident.”
Mera ran ahead on the final ridge and waited for him panting, he said, adding: “I’d never been on top of something like that with a dog. She was leaning up against me and wanting to be petted. It was pretty surreal.”
Mr Wargowsky said that at the end of the expedition, he was heartbroken to think of leaving Mera on the streets.
“I was sick about it,” he said. “I told
‘I’d never been on top of something like that with a dog. It was pretty surreal’
Kaji [Sherpa, the base camp manager] it was breaking my heart to think of leaving her. He said, ‘No way, she’s special. She’s coming with me.’”
The dog now lives with Kaji Sherpa, who has renamed it Baru after the summit they climbed together.
♦the search for British climber Tom Ballard and Italian Daniele Nardi on Nanga Parbat, the world’s ninth-highest mountain, was called off yesterday after a week when searchers lost all hope of finding any trace of them.