“Gruezi” from the Oberalp Pass at an altitude of 2044 meters in Graubünden in Switzerland. After a ten-hour train journey, during which I had to change trains four times with about 40 kilograms of luggage (including my folding bike), I have reached the starting point of my donation bike tour “School up! River down!”. One of the Rhine sources is located about three kilometers from here. When I arrived up here late in the afternoon, I was surprised: early September and already winter conditions.

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Once again, Manaslu turns to become the “Everest of the fall season”. The base camp at the foot of the eighth-highest mountain on earth (8,163 meters) will soon be reminiscent of the tented village at the highest of all mountains in spring. According to the newspaper “The Himalayan Times”, the Nepali Ministry of Tourism has issued at least 135 permits to foreign mountaineers o climb Manaslu. Assuming that there will be on average one local Climbing Sherpa per one climber from abroad and some latecomers, probably between 300 and 400 people – including kitchen staff – will be arguing for the best pitches in the base camp. And the normal route via the north-east flank of the mountain might become crowded.

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Despite my love for the mountains, I am also a river man. More precisely, a Rhine man. I was born in the Rhineland and grew up there, I live 30 meters as the crow flies from the river and work 100 meters from the Rhine. Day after day I ride the bike along the shore. I was exactly doing this when I came up with the idea of my next fundraising campaign for “School up!”.

Along with the climbers Gerlinde Kaltenbrunner and Ralf Dujmovits, I had launched “School up!” two years ago to rebuild the school of Thulosirubari, a mountain village about 70 km east of Kathmandu. The school had been destroyed by the devastating earthquake in Nepal in April 2015. Despite the heavy monsoon, the construction work has continued in recent months, the school building is increasingly taking shape (see the slideshow below). But we have not yet reached the goal and need more donations. That’s why I’ll start a week today a donation bike tour under the motto “School up! River down!”.

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Three attempts, then it was over. As reported, Alexander Huber, the Swiss Dani Arnold and the two East Tyroleans Mario Walder and Christian Zenz abandoned their expedition on the 7285-meter-high Ogre I in Pakistan and returned home. They had wanted to reach the summit of the mountain, which so far has been scaled only three times, over the still not mastered East Pillar. I spoke to Alexander, aged 48, the younger of the two Huber brothers, about the failed expedition.

Alexander, you wrote on Facebook that you knew what the mountain wanted to tell you. What was the message?

We set off to the mountain three times and were able to control the situation with maximum risk management three times. But we noticed every time that we were running extremely late. There was only a very short time window to move safely on the mountain. In this case you have to be en route with full steam to get out of the danger zone on time. We did it three times, and it turned out well. But one day it won’t work so well, and then you are in the middle of this extremely dangerous terrain and can not get out.

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Put the eight-thousander glasses aside! At an insignificantly lower mountain in the west of the Karakoram in Pakistan, two Japanese climbers succeeded an extraordinary ascent on 22 August. According to the International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation (UIAA), Kazuya Hiraide and Kenro Nakajima climbed for the first time via the Northeast Face of the 7611-meter-high Shispare. In four days, the two Japanese climbed in Alpine style through the 2700-meter-high wall to the summit and descended via the Northeast Ridge, it said.

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