 |
| Mt. Elbrus Trip (August 1996) |
|
|
|
| High ho, high ho, it's off to hike we go... |
|
| Here we go again! Climbing another mountain. For most of us, this will be our first experience hiking in the snow, wearing plastic boots and crampons. Mount Elbrus is situated in the Caucasus range, near the border of Russia and Turkey. Our trip was arranged by an American outfitter and travel company, Recreational Equipment Inc. (REI). Rob Smurr, their representative, spoke fluent Russian, which was a great help. |
|
| After touring Moscow, we caught an internal flight to Mineralnye Vody (literally, 'mineral water'), which is the nearest town to Mt Elbrus that is equipped with an airport. Getting there was quite an experience - firstly, the boarding time of the flight changed a few times between the time the tickets were bought and the time we were boarding the plane. Then the ticketing office demanded more than US$100 to re-endorse. Next, we were fleeced of US$140 for our supposedly overweight carry-on bags. The locals were carrying even larger and heavier ones! Since it was free-seating on the plane, some of the locals put their luggage on the seats next to them and claimed that it was taken. Grrr... |
|
| A 4-hour ride on a bus took us to a small town called Terskol at the base of the mountain. Our elevation was just 2,000m. Almost everyday was spent exploring some new place on acclimatisation hikes. We walked through a lush green valley up to a waterfall, and hiked up to an observatory at 3,000 m. Another day was spent getting used to walking in crampons and doing self-arrests with an ice-axe. Only when the weather was bad did we spend the day indoors. |
|
| From Terskol, one could be 'carried' up the mountain in 2 cable cars, 1 chairlift and 1 snowcat. Unfortunately, the chairlift was not working, so we packed as lightly as possible, and hiked from the last cable car tower to the snowline where the snowcat picked us up. I had anticipated getting terrible altitude sickness as we moved from 2,100m in the valley to 4,100m where Priut Hut is located, but amazingly none of us suffered any ill effects. I never thought that spending a few days acclimatising were so important. |
|
| Priut 11 looked like a space station on another planet, with its rounded edges and metallic plates on the outer walls. However, the inside was very cosy, complete with beds and mattresses. Going to the toilet was quite an experience in itself. First, you had to walk about 20m in the snow to the toilet. The single cubicle on the right had a proper door whereas the double cubicle on the left had only a blanket covering the entrance. Once a strong wind is blowing, you can see your toilet paper flying back up again through the hole the moment you throw it down! No wonder there was so much soiled toilet paper around the floor. Probably this earned Priut the nickname of 'Typhoid Tower'. |
|
| Our guides were a wonderful husband and wife team, Vladimir and Helen. At first glance, he looked like a slim version of Einstein, with long curly locks of hair and keen blue eyes. However, do not be fooled by their looks as they were fantastically fit. Their backpacks were so heavy that we could barely lift them. Inside were our food, cooking pots and crockery, in addition to their personal gear. As Helen was also the cook, she made spaghetti, stewed chicken, porridge and a variety of soups, supplemented by sausages, biscuits and bread. We were really pampered! Other climbers were seen eating instant noodles heated in their vacuum packing. Poor fellows. |
|
| Up there, our acclimatisation hikes took us up the slope to Pastukhov Rocks, a cluster of rocks 500m away. "Boy, the weather there was really unpredictable! ", I thought. One day it was sunny, the next it was snowing with howling winds. Tiny snow pellets smacked us all over whenever the wind picked up, and visibility dropped to less than 20m. Occasionally, the clouds would part to give us a glimpse of clear blue skies. Even though the original schedule had 2 extra days for several summit attempts, we were stranded one day in Terskol and another in Priut due to inclement weather, so in the end we had one last morning left. If the sky had not cleared that morning, we would have had to pack up and go down. |
|
| On the summit day, the snowcat fetched us up to Pastukhov Rocks, at 4,600m at 5:30am. Trying to put on the crampons on a steep snow slope was not easy, especially when our hands were encased in huge gloves and snow was blown onto our face by a fierce wind. The twin summits can be seen from there. The lower east summit (5,621m), being less treacherous, was our objective. The guides would only bring us to the west summit if the weather was good, and if we had demonstrated sufficient competency at using ice axes and crampons. |
|
| The sun broke through the clouds and bathed the snowy slopes in a golden light. Soon it became blindingly bright, and that required us to wear snow goggles. We staggered up the slopes against the unceasing wind. As we got higher, the wind got stronger and whipped the snow around us. The heavy snowfall the night before left a deep layer of snow which made walking difficult. Our guides kicked steps into the snow for us to follow, but seconds later, they were buried again. |
|
| There were other groups making their way up, some in perfect formation, one just behind the other, as if they were marching in the army, with the front man breaking the wind and kicking steps for the rest. Some were like us - scattered along the slope, identifiable only by the colour of their clothing. There were long wooden wands stuck into the ground at regular intervals, to show the way should the visibility drop drastically. |
|
| After some 6 hours of walking, I had reached a height where the jagged peaks of the mountains opposite us were all below me. What a breathtaking scene - glaciers reaching downwards from snow capped peaks, each successive one receding into the distance. As I pulled out my camera and pressed the shutter… it jammed. Arrgghhhhh! No amount of warmth inside my jacket did any good. |
|
| I realised that I was not making good time as there was still at least another 4 more hours before I could reach the east summit. With that and the descent to worry about, and not knowing if the weather would hold, I made the painful decision to turn back. At that point, I was standing at the saddle between the two peaks, at about 5,200m. Unknown to me then, the 2 guys that were fastest in our group had reached the very windy summit and had taken the all-important photos. Unfortunately, the few photos taken had the photographer's finger blocking out half of it, and we could not tell who were those people anyway with their parka hoods wrapped around their faces! Moral ofthe story "beware the gloved hand that blocks the cradle", oops, I mean the camera. |
|
| A trip to Russia is not complete without touring Moscow and Saint Petersburg. The highlight for me was seeing Lenin's body on display, perfectly preserved, lying in a darkened tomb on one side of the Red Square. Tourists and locals could be seen filing past him. There is now much pressure on the authorities to give him a decent burial after so many years, so I am not sure how much longer he will be there. |
|
| Russia's long and varied history could be seen as we visited their palaces-turned-museums, cathedrals and statues. The statues of Peter the Great, a Russian ruler, and Lenin were featured predominantly in public parks. One of the most famous was the Bronze Horseman, a statue of Peter the Great depicted as a soldier astride a horse. Another ruler, Catherine the Great, had a huge summer palace on the outskirts of Saint Petersburg. That had been transformed into a museum. The decoration was mainly done in baroque style, which could look very beautiful and ornate, but sometimes garish. Just imagine a room covered from floor to ceiling in wooden carvings completely coated with gold, furniture decorated with huge rubies, sapphires and semi-precious stones and you would know what I mean. During Ivan the Terrible's time, he had a beautiful cathedral built, with a colourful exterior and several 'onion-shaped' domes. It is situated at one end of the Red Square and is always featured whenever there are any documentaries or films on Russia. It was rumoured that he had the architect blinded in order to prevent duplication of this work of art. It was really terrible! |
|
| Though we had heard so much about robbery on board Russian trains, we were unaccosted on our journey from Saint Petersburg back to Moscow. Not only were the sleeping compartments tiny, cramped with double-decker bunks, we had to pay for the use of the pillow and blanket! |
|
| The last day in Moscow was spent shopping along Arbat Street, where most of the craftsmen displayed their wares. There were Matryoshka dolls (multiple wooden dolls where one is fitted inside another), colourful chess sets and handmade lace on sale. The most interesting Matryoshka doll I saw was a set with Gorbachev, Brezhnev, Kruschev, Stalin and Lenin in decreasing sizes! |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
