The Nanda Devi National Park is a national park situated around
the peak of Nanda Devi, 7,817 m (25,646 ft), in the state
of Uttarakhand in northern India. It was established as national
park in 1982 and was inscribed a World Heritage Site by UNESCO
in 1988. It covers 630.33 km².

The park encompasses the Nanda Devi Sanctuary, a glacial
basin surrounded by a ring of peaks between 6,000 m (19,700
ft) and 7,500 m (24,600 ft) high, and drained by the Rishi
Ganga through the Rishi Ganga Gorge, a steep, almost impassable
defile. Together with the nearby Valley of Flowers National
Park to the northwest, it is a designated World Heritage Site.
Both parks are encompassed in the Nanda Devi Biosphere Reserve
(223,674 ha) which is further surrounded by a buffer zone
(514,857 ha).
The entire park lies at an elevation of more than 3,500 m
(11,500 ft) above mean sea level.
The Sanctuary can be divided into two parts, Inner and Outer.
Together, they are surrounded by the main Sanctuary Wall,
which forms a roughly square outline, with high, continuous
ridges on the north, east, and south sides. On the west side,
less high but still imposing ridges drop from the north and
south toward the Rishi Ganga Gorge, which drains the Sanctuary
towards the west.
The Inner Sanctuary occupies roughly the eastern two-thirds
of the total area, and contains Nanda Devi itself and the
two major glaciers flanking the peak, the Uttari (north) Rishi
Glacier and the Dakkhni (south) Rishi Glacier. These are fed
by the smaller Uttari Nanda Devi and Dakkhni Nanda Devi Glaciers
respectively.[3] The first recorded entry of humans into the
Inner Sanctuary was by Eric Shipton and H. W. Tilman in 1934,
via the Rishi Gorge.
The Outer Sanctuary occupies the western third of the total
Sanctuary, and is separated from the Inner Sanctuary by high
ridges, through which flows the Rishi Ganga. It is split in
two by the Rishi Ganga; on the north side lies the Ramani
Glacier, flowing down from the slopes of Dunagiri and Changabang,
and on the south lies the Trisul Glacier, flowing from the
peak of the same name. This portion of the Sanctuary is accessible
to the outside (though requiring the crossing of a 4,000 m
(13,000 ft) pass). The first serious climbing expedition to
pass through the Outer Sanctuary was that of T. G. Longstaff,
who climbed Trisul I in 1907 via the eponymous glacier.
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