Two pairs of hallucinated eyes – one blue, one green – two angelic faces ravaged by three days of superhuman effort, split from ear to ear with a smile. For more than two months, the images of Benjamin Védrines and Nicolas Jean, radiant on their return to base camp after their “first” on the north face of Jannu Est (7,468 meters), in Nepal, on October 15, have toured the mountaineering planet and well beyond. For the first, aged 33, they illustrate “the rise of a lifetime”. For his partner, at the dawn of his 27th birthday, they arouse a “great intimate emotion”. Because, before overcoming this bastion in the Eastern Himalayas overlooked by a 2,300 meter drop of ice, snow and rocks on which around fifteen rope parties had broken their teeth until then, the two French mountaineers had to deal with thirty-five days of bad weather. Then benefited from a rare alignment of planets in the Himalayas: a four-day weather window without too many avalanches or rockfalls.
The ascent of this Nepalese citadel is an act of faith or madness – depending on your point of view – which amounts to literally placing your life in the hands of your climbing companion. Time management is crucial, and you have to understand yourself with an attitude or a look. And the two know each other very well. “I couldn’t have gone back with as much confidence with anyone other than Nicolastestifies Benjamin Védrines. He has evolved a lot in mountaineering maturity and as a man. » Return there, because a year earlier, in 2024, the two men, accompanied by a third rope and adventure companion, Léo Billon, were forced to turn back during the ascent.
Not in 2025. Their feat accomplished – in pure alpine style, without external oxygen supply, without fixed ropes or human assistance on the mountain, far from what prevails in the Himalayas – the friends, both high mountain guides, returned to their respective paths. The polar opposites of each other. Also a carpenter, Nicolas Jean rushed back to his native Ubaye valley, in the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence, to complete the renovation of a farm before the first snow. Where he cultivates his discretion, Benjamin Védrines flourishes under the projectors. And embarked on a crazy media tour, planned before their joint feat.
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