The Lure of Elbrus

It’s an enticing idea: conquer Europe’s highest peak.

Gazing from a distance at Mount Elbrus’ two white peaks, one might be tempted to think, “How hard could that be?” After all, it’s only 5642 meters (18,510 feet), and a rail car can take you up to the base camp at 3800 meters. Surely the panoramic view of the Caucasus from the summit – stretching from the Black Sea to the Caspian – would be worth it.

But beware: Elbrus, a dormant volcano, is a devious mountain. And it should be noted, at the risk of stating the obvious, that all the stories told about scaling this impressive mountain are told by those who lived to tell the tale. Others did not and have their names engraved on memorial stones that glint in the sun along the path from Mir waystation to Mount Pastukhov.

“Elbrus cannot be conquered.” That’s what locals will tell you. And it is what every climber experiences. The climber cannot be negligent, over-confident, or smug.

“Elbrus punishes.” That’s what the superstitious climbers say. So you need to prepare for every eventuality, gather your courage, and surround yourself with people ready to share the joy of exhilaration that this journey will bring. Then, perhaps, you’ll be ready to go. Perhaps, because in the end it’s not you who will decide if and when you go.

It is the mountain.

Boris Tilov is head of the Mount Elbrus Search and Rescue Team, which is part of the Russian Ministry of Emergencies. And it is safe to say that Tilov knows pretty much everything there is to know about Elbrus.

“Every year an average of 15 to 20 people die on Elbrus,” he said, “and this is not because Elbrus is such a difficult climb, but because people who go there are poorly equipped, disorganized. Sometimes they don’t even bother to register and get a free briefing from the Rescue Services. So 95 percent of the accidents happen to ‘wild tourists’ as we call them, people who don’t have the qualifications to climb and don’t file their route. And even if it’s not their first time in the mountains, they are risking not only their own lives, but those of the people around them.”

Another reason for the high incidence of accidents is climbers’ attitudes. Many view Elbrus as an “easy” mountain, compared to, say, its six sister peaks . But the mountain is far from an easy climb. Hikers who start late in the morning end up heading down in the dark, or in bad weather. Many lose their way or freeze to death. The weather is very tricky in the Caucasus; it can change in minutes, and, it’s difficult to navigate when you can’t see anything. And then there are the thousands of deep crevasses... Fall into one of these, the rescuers say, and it will be next to impossible for them to find you.

The Seven Summits

(highest peaks on each continent; height, and year first climbed)

AFRICA Kilimanjaro 5,895m ~ 1889

Antarctica Vinson Massif 4,892m ~ 1966

Australia Carstensz Pyramid 4,884m ~ 1962

Asia Everest 8,848m ~ 1953

Europe Elbrus 5,642m ~ 1874 (1829)

North America Mount McKinley 6,194m ~ 1913

South America Aconcagua 6,961m ~ 1897

“Even Tenzing Norgay, the first climber to summit Mount Everest,” Tilov said, “declined the ascent [of Elbrus] because of weather conditions. That should tell you something.”

“Some people have an irresponsible attitude toward the mountain,” Tilov continued. “That’s why there are so many tragic cases. When the fog is descending and people lose their orientation, they start to panic, they stop thinking clearly. And, because they aren’t sufficiently acclimatized and are in a rush, altitude sickness sets in. Then people cannot think clearly at all. At this point, if they don’t immediately descend, they risk pulmonary or cerebral edema. And that’s what I see more than anything: instead of descending, people ascend! I remember once there was this group from Poland, and one of the guys had altitude sickness. They said they made him descend, but instead we found him going up. You see? He felt sick and they let him return on his own! When people have altitude sickness, they don’t know where they’re going. That’s ‘normal’ behavior in that state of mind.”

Prohibiting climbers who are unprepared would not solve the problem, Tilov explained. Climbers would simply avoid rescuers and choose more difficult routes, so as not to run into officials. “We shouldn’t prohibit things,” Tilov said, “although we have to make sure there is some order in the way things are being done. We have to create conditions so that people will come to us themselves, so they will know that we are not their enemies.”

Muscovite Arkady Bolsherotov recommended that climbers not “be in a rush while climbing. You can make it up and down in daylight hours. Technically, the route is not hard, the slope is 25-35 percent.” But the climb is deceptive, he said. “I remember how the sunrise greeted me at 5000 meters. It was so hard to breathe, I couldn’t move ahead for an hour. I was not the only one – all the climbers were motionless, standing or leaning on the mountain along the path. After a while, some people started to descend, unable to overcome their condition. Soon there were no people in front of me, although before that there had been about a hundred. When I decided to take a rest, I felt dizziness and almost fainted. That is the scariest manifestation of altitude sickness.”

Nonetheless, Bolsherotov made it to the summit. Later he said that some people were literally dragged to the top by ropes. The guide was being paid to get his clients there and did whatever it took, regardless of the consequences. Later, safe at home, the client could brag to his friends that he conquered the treacherous volcano-mountain. He could show them pictures taken at the summit, neglecting to mention that the guide had to hold his head upright for him. The true tale of his ascent would never be told.

Mount Elbrus is located partially in the Kabardin-Balkarian Republic and partially in Karachay-Cherkessia, in the Northern Caucasus, near Russia’s border with Georgia. Some locals tell how, in the winter of 1942, as Hitler’s troops were advancing, Russian and Georgian shepherds worked together to evacuate the entire town of Tyrnyauz (which is nestled in the Upper Baksan Valley and is the main provisioning site for Elbrus) through the mountains to Svaneti, Georgia. Today, such Russo-Georgian collaboration is but a distant memory.

During the war, German soldiers from the Edelweiss Division occupied the area and planted a Nazi flag on Elbrus’ western summit. Hitler was allegedly enraged when he heard the news, calling it a pointless stunt. In 1943, Soviet soldiers climbed both summits and planted Soviet flags atop both, destroying the swastika flag.

In ancient times Elbrus was known as Strobilus, which is Latin for “pine cone” or “twisted object.” According to myth, Zeus chained Prometheus up here after he stole fire from the gods. The modern name actually derives from the Iranian Alborz, which in turn derives from Harā Bərəzaitī, the name of a mythological Iranian mountain.

Elbrus is a two-headed giant; the eastern and western summits differ in height by just one meter. And, starting at around 3500 meters, the mountain is covered by 22 glaciers. The climate near the summit is significantly different from that in Tibet and the Himalayas and makes climbers more susceptible to hypoxia. While the climb is not technically difficult, arctic conditions on the ice, slopes and mountain peaks, combined with strong winds, makes it physically arduous.

The first man to climb Mount Elbrus (the lower, eastern summit) was Kylar Khashirov, in 1829. He was a Kabardian explorer on a Russian Academy of Sciences expedition. The first man to climb both the eastern and western summits was the Balkar shepherd and hunter Akhia Sottayev. He climbed the mountain nine times – the first time he was in his 50s, and the last time he was 121.

Vladimir Kopylov, 43, has spent more than 20 years in the mountains and has climbed Elbrus more than a hundred times. He welcomed the millennium from the summit, filming the sunrise and sharing it with TV channels around the world. A photographer, guide and author, his most famous Elbrus interaction may actually be playing the saxophone at a higher altitude than any other human being when he played Let My People Go atop Elbrus in August 2003. The achievement put him in the Guinness Book of World Records.

“There was this 73-year-old Japanese man, Shibata Akihiko-san,” Kopylov explained, “who played saxophone in a Tokyo jazz club. And Shibata Akihiko-san had a dream: to play his saxophone on the highest peak of Europe and Russia. He came to the Caucasus, but he had no strength to blow into the saxophone.”

The altitude had taken its toll and Akihiko-san asked Kopylov to help make his dream come true, quickly teaching him how to play. The hardest thing, Kopylov said, was carrying the instrument and gear to the summit. The saxophone weighed around eight kilos, and there were also several cameras, among other things. But it was all worth it: Akihiko-san cried from happiness when Kopylov played atop Elbrus.

The road from Nalchik, the capital of Kabardin-Balkarian Republic, to the Elbrus area is anything but boring. You drive through pastures, hills, plains and valleys, passing both Kabardian and Balkar villages, and even some in which the ethnic groups live peacefully side by side. The people here are few, and cows, sheep, goats and horses have the right of way.

All of a sudden, just beyond the village of Zhankhoteko, the mountains begin. Before, they seemed distant, but now they are so close you can touch their sides by reaching out the car window. The road narrows – becoming barely wide enough for two vehicles – and has countless switchbacks; there is a steep mountain slope to your right and a sheer ravine to the left. It is awe-inspiringly beautiful, yes, but also terrifying. And worth every minute.

The Elbrus area is home to many things. It is a ski resort... a hiking destination with hundreds of routes... a place where sun and snow collide in every season and the smell of pine trees fills the air no matter where you are. The food is simply delicious: hichini (a thin fried dough with cheese and potato filling soaked in sour-cream or butter), shorpa (beef broth), manti (huge ravioli with minced meet), solyanka (thick soup with small meat chunks and vegetables), sea-buckthorn and barberry tea.

Of course, as in any world tourist destination, many locals make their living from feeding tourists, selling handmade gifts, clothes and souvenirs. Others rent out lodgings – there are many small bed-and-breakfasts throughout the area. While the service may be a bit different from what one might find in, say, the Alps, those who have visited both will tell you that the natural surroundings in the Alps simply cannot compare. Yet inroads are being made on the service front: the Kabardin-Balkarian government is working to make the place more attractive to tourists. There is a new cable car (since the 1970s a cable car system has taken climbers up to a base camp at 3800 meters), new hotels are being built, and investors are moving in.

These recent innovations do bother some local businessmen. Many have built small hotels in the region (often without official permits) and don’t want to lose them or be forced to adopt higher standards. Opposition has led to conflicts, which some have been quick to blame on interethnic rivalries. But, truth be told, it is all business and, in the long run, it will work to the benefit of tourists and climbers.

For almost all of 2011, the Elbrus region was shut to outsiders after terrorists killed three Russian tourists near the mountain. The restriction was difficult for the local economy, and it was a worrisome development given the coming Olympic Games in Sochi, which lies about 200 km to the west. Since then, much has changed. The tourists are back, the ski resort is operating normally, and infrastructure improvements are progressing. The two cable car lines now have 85 video cameras powered by solar panels.

“In all of Russia, only the Elbrus area has this sort of video system,” said the Elbrus Resort’s head electrical engineer, Mazhit Baidayev. “The video system is nearly impossible to incapacitate; each of the cameras works independently.”

“I have two pieces of news for you,” said Adey, who was guiding a group of Kabardin-Balkarian drug control officers up the Western summit to plant a special plaque. “Let’s start with the good news: we have passed the 5000-meter mark. You can honestly and bravely say that you have already summited Mont Blanc. What’s the bad news? It’s going to be harder from this point onward.”

“That’s what we liked about Adey,” said Lieutenant-Colonel Natalia Shausheva, one of the climbers, “he didn’t like to sugarcoat things. He is a true mountaineer.”

Shausheva shares diary notes she made immediately after reaching the summit.

“The way to the right is the ascent to the Eastern Summit, which is a bit lower, but we are not looking for easy paths. The way to the left leads to a steep descent covered with ice, with rocks below. Hardly anyone knows the official name for these rocks. Everyone calls them the ‘corpse collection.’ The phone is ringing constantly in my pocket, but I don’t want to pick it up. I feel that a lot of energy would be wasted on conversation... Here it is, the peak, the Mecca for thousands of climbers...

The whole world is at your feet,

and you are happy and mute,

and you are envious a little of those,

who may still step into your shoes.

Nothing to add.”

RL