Clach Liath
I am happy to say that the trip to Russia was successful and I reached the west summit of Elbrus shortly before 10am on Sunday, 24th July 2016 with my two team mates and two local guides. I will write a fuller blog with photos once I have caught up with my backlog.
In the meantime, here is a panorama from the summit.
Tomorrow I am off to Russia.
I am going to the Caucasus mountains. They are in the south of the country near the border with Georgia. A quick check of the “About” section of this site will reveal that I have been to this area before. The Foreign Office advises against all but essential travel to this area. This is because the region is close to Chechnya and other areas that have been unstable in the past. It is an area well visited by tourists though. And, of course, climbing mountains is an essential activity!
The objectives for this trip are a couple of peaks at around 4,000m and Elbrus. Elbrus is one of the “Seven Summits” (in other words it is one of the continental high points and is the highest mountain in Europe) and stands at 5,642m.
A further review of the peaks listed in the “About” section reveals the previous trip to Elbrus. Last time (in 1996) I scaled the east summit. The west summit is higher and a little bit more tricky. What can I say? 21 metres matters.
