Elbrus Expedition Dispatch

July 9, 2012 – A Hot Day Climbing to Pashtukov Rocks

I am calling you at about 4 pm, on Monday, the 9th of July. There is a lot of snow on Elbrus this year and it is making the mountain easier for climbing than any year that I remember for a long time. Parts of the route where we normally wear crampons, we are walking on firm, compacted seasonal snow far above the glacier. We see ski teams training on the lower mountain and we are meeting climbers from all over the world. Some of the nicest people that we talked to, who we had made best friends with, have been from Spain, Czech Republic, United States and all parts of Russia.

Of course we have acclimatization to deal with, now we’ve spent two nights at the Barrels. Yesterday we woke up feeling the expected symptoms, some people were dizzy, there were number of headaches and we in general felt like we were sleeping at a new elevation.

Yesterday we had a big day before us, the ascent all the way to Pashtukov Rocks. Basically what I can describe about the climb to Pashtukov Rocks was that it was hot. You see from the photographs we are sending that we climbed in the sunshine and the still air made the heat our only problem. But as we got higher and closer to the top, the weather did begin to change and in our descent, violent thunderstorms were starting off in the distance and it began to snow. The weather is definitely changing. Today both of the Vladimirs (Bakhmutov and Kopylov), Karina and I sat and carefully checked weather reports, 2 different weather reports in Russian and 2 in English.

All of the weather reports agreed, tomorrow, which could have been our first summit day, there should be snow at all elevations and winds to 35 kilometers per hour. The next day, Wednesday, which is our second summit day, should be clear although the winds will be even higher, perhaps 40 kilometers an hour at the summit. So it is clear for us, between needing to rest more from yesterday’s long day, getting ourselves properly acclimatized and going for the best weather, Wednesday will be our summit day. Life is good here at the Barrels and we keep reporting on about how we are doing, Tamara’s meals are wonderful and we are looking forward to some more rest before we go up for our Elbrus summit attempt.

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