Nadhira sets sights on world’s eight highest mountain

Nadhirah al Harthy is on a mission to conquer yet another peak, Manaslu, after flying Oman's flag high on many of the world's top altitudes.

Located 8,163 metres above sea level (ASL) in the Mansiri Himal, part of the Nepalese Himalayas, Manaslu is the eighth-highest mountain in the world. It is standing head and shoulders above the pine forests of Nepal's Budhi Gandak river valley. The mighty Manaslu is nicknamed 'killer mountain' by the local people in Nepal.

"I’m climbing Mount Manaslu at the moment... and we are in preparation for the last round of the summit push," she said from Manaslu.

She added that communication might get disrupted as the internet was not good at the heights and would soon be in touch with the rest of the world.

“I decided to climb Everest in 2017, and I trained for two years. Then I did it in 2019. So I started to learn everything during the two years when I was training.”

Nadhirah started mountaineering at the age of 40 after meeting Khalid al Siyabi, the first Omani to climb Everest. Nadhirah met Al Siyabi during her tenure with the Ministry of Education. In a few months, she was standing right in front of Mount Himalaya.

Al Siyabi became her coach, and she took arduous lessons in climbing the peaks from him that enabled her to become the first Omani woman to reach the mountain’s summit.

"My simple message is to try and give space to do new things, but properly. When you want to do something, you should have a passion for what you are doing. If you have a goal, you have a dream. So you should know what exactly you have to do: what to eat and how to train,” she said.

Nadhirah is the first Arab woman and the second Omani to reach the summit of Mount Ama Dablam (6,812 metres), one of the highest Himalayan peaks in the hilly country of Nepal, in May 2019.

The all-women Arab group 'Dream of Everest', which climbed the top of the world’s tallest mountain, had Joyce Azzam, Nelly Attar of Lebanon, Mona Shahab of Saudi Arabia, and 42-year-old Nadhirah in the team.