Srinagar: Zeeshan Mushtaq was just 18 when he joined a hiking expedition to Khemsar Lake.
A new to the sport, Zeeshan comfortably accomplished the mission organized by the Jammu and Kashmir Mountaineering and Hiking Club. The feat aroused his appetite for trying more challenging tasks and scaling adventurous peaks.
Come 2024, Zeeshan (24) is the only professional ice climber from Jammu and Kashmir who apart from climbing multiple icy peaks, opened new routes to the hiking paradise.
“Mountains shaped my vision and I pledged to make this sport my career. Soon after my first hiking expedition, I attended a basic mountaineering course by the Jawahar Institute Of Mountaineering in 2021. My interest in mountaineering grew and I studied apart from using online sources to gain more knowledge about it,” he said.
After getting used to the sport, Zeeshan started accompanying mountaineers to various peaks to gain more experience. “The money I earned was utilized by me to buy professional gear,” he said.
A resident of Nowshera, Srinagar, Zeeshan has many accomplishments in his kitty. “I have mapped trails for many alpine lakes of Kashmir. In August 2023, I was part of a team that opened a new route from the west side to Harmuk Peak. We were awarded the Award of Excellence in Mountaineering in India,” he said.
For the last two years, Zeeshan has been reviving the ice climbing in Kashmir which started in the year 2016. “ I want to make this sport accessible to the masses. I wish there should be a community and every year festivals for ice climbing be held in Kashmir. For me ice climbing is training for scaling bigger alpine peaks,” he said.
Zeeshan in 2023 became the first from Kashmir to climb Thajiwas Peak (4854m) via the Great Couloir route.
Zeeshan made the historic second ascent of the Couloir on July 2, 2023, 78 years after the last successful climb by Jackson and Buzzard in 1945,
This year, he along with an Italian climber ascended the frozen Tramkazan waterfall to the top, making the first ascend the waterfall. He has also opened five ice climbing routes in Kashmir including Pahalgam and Thajwas.
Zeeshan believed that Kashmir has all the resources to emerge as one of the leading ice climbing destinations.
“The reason behind all my efforts is to promote Kashmir as a mountaineering destination. We have all the natural resources that could make the valley the leading mountaineering destination of the world,” he said.
While Zeeshan is preparing for even more challenging peaks in the future, he is serving as an inspiration for aspiring mountaineers who seek his guidance to adopt this sport.