Peak Lenin – Defecting to the Russian side

So, that was it, my chance at climbing Peak Lenin, something in the planning for a year was over, ruined by some mountain con man. I was faced with trying to get myself and all my stuff back to base camp and then to Osh. I turned to the Tien Shan Travel staff manning Camp 1 for some help and advice. The local Russian guides were gathered in the kitchen tent when I went to talk to them. I was upset, but I could have tried harder to hold back the tears. The men in the tent immediately tried to offer me vodka as a solution, but I insisted that I was British, and a cup of tea would suit me better. Over tea I explained the whole sorry mess. They were really helpful and offered several practical options which would allow me to continue the expedition. They directed me to a local guide, Alex, who was guiding two Russian clients but had had a third drop out. After some negotiation, organisation of kit, food and gas, and making sure that all parties involved were happy I became part of the Russian team.

 

I immediately knew that I had done the right thing leaving Andy and changing teams. I suddenly had the urge to write and take photos again. The worry of Andy’s competence had been more consuming than I’d imagined and I hadn’t felt creative at all, but now it had come back.

Peak Lenin is a 7134 m peak on the Kyrgyzstan/Tajikistan  border. It is renowned for being the technically easiest 7000 m peak – although, as I was to find out, there is no easy 7000 m ascent. Paradoxically, it is also infamous for being the site of the worst ever mountain accident. In 1990 an earthquake initiated a massive avalanche in the night. The avalanche wiped out Camp 2 killing 43 people.  Now Camp 2 is carefully located away for the avalanche prone slopes in a safer position. Peak Lenin is a significant peak in Soviet mountaineering as it is known as one of the Snow Leopard 5. If an individual manages to climb all of these 5 mountains located in Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan it is seen as a great mountaineering feat and the person is known as a Snow Leopard.

My new team was made up of a local Kyrgyz Russian guide called Alex and his Russian clients, Alexander and Jaroslav, who were father and son. Alex spoke reasonable English but I was worried about communication with Alexander and Jaroslav. As it turned out that they appear to be practically mute through out the entire expedition, so it didn’t matter that I didn’t speak Russian, as they didn't really speak full-stop. They were, however, generous with their cognac which they would even carry up to Camp 3 at 6100 m and was accompanied with slices of fresh lemon.

Camp 1 in the snow

Peak Lenin – The showdown

The initial plan was for James and I to climb Peak Lenin together but when I saw a heavily discounted commercial expedition advertised from the UK I thought that by joining this trip it would allow James more time on his Winston Churchill Fellowship Research. It would also allow me to learn more about expeditionary mountaineering from an experienced guide. It seemed the perfect solution. However, if something looks too good to be true then it probably is.

I met the ‘guide’ and a single other client at one of the nicer hotels in Osh and that afternoon we had a rather haphazard shop in the market for expedition food. James joined us and helped to negotiate discounts for bulk buys of pasta and the like. The following day he waved us off and we drove the 6 hours to Peak Lenin Base Camp, a meadow below the mountain where a series of yurts which we pitched our tents next to.

My concern started when Andy, the ‘guide’, seemed to be referring to the wrong mountain during our first couple of days acclimatising in and around base camp. This was quite strange for someone who had been to Peak Lenin twice before. The mountain is quite distinct in its ugliness and I could easily recognise it from the postcards I’d seen in Bishkek, but to make doubly sure I scrutinised the map. This identified Peak Lenin as the same mountain – the highest one. But we all make embarrassing mistakes so I didn’t mention anything.

Over the next couple of days we acclimatised and spent time establishing ourselves at Camp 1 on the edge of the glacier. As with base camp, Camp 1 was also well managed by the agency we were using, Tien Shan Travel, who helped orangise a kitchen tent and the horses which bought the majority of our food and equipment up from base camp. Heavy snow fell during our first night at Camp 1 and the following day Andy changed the plan again and we went for a slightly aimless walk across the glacier before he decided, with some prompting, that a training session on crevasse rescue would be useful. He invited me to teach it. I declined and suggested that as a mountain guide I’d be interested to learn from him. It wasn’t any surprise to me that his demonstration was chaotic and lacking some fundamental detail, one element was even just plain dangerous. Not to bore you with the technical detail but it was now completely obvious to me that Andy was not the qualified mountain guide he had been making himself out to be. Not only that, but I doubted 95% of everything he said and seriously questioned his experience. There were so many other little things that were odd about Andy. For example he said that it was the first time he had ever seen a marmot. These fat rodents live in burrows across the mountainous regions of North America, Europe and Asia, for which the grassy approach slopes to Peak Lenin were no expectation. They would stand on their hind legs and whistle their alarm calls anytime we would get too close. It was completely shocking that someone could not understand the consequence of lying about their qualifications and experience, it’s not as if I was employing an accountant with the risk of them getting my accounts wrong.

I took Andy aside and as unemotionally as possible confronted him. He maintained that everything he had told me was true. I gave him two options, firstly, from the 5% of what he had told me that I could work out was true, I had deciphered that he did in fact have more high altitude mountain experience than me and therefore maybe with the other client, Bob, we could continue climbing but as if we were a group of friends, having equal say in the decision making. Financially this would mean I would not pay him as a guide (as he wasn’t one) but we would continue the expedition together. The second option was that I leave. After much mumbling about his insurance and other nonsensical things he responded by saying that I should leave. So I did.

Base Camp

Approach to Camp 1 with peak Lenin in the background (that's the one on the right Andy)