The route we passed as pioneers (comic story) / English. Climbing / Mountain.RU


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The route we passed as pioneers
(comic story)

That spring we climbed the route “Sokoliny” (“Falconine”) on the mount Zamok (“Castle”) in the Crimea . While we were climbing, we were swearing all the time. There were as much grass and lively stones as you can rarely find on the routes of the second grade of difficulty, and our route looked like a wall… But at the time from our mouths slaver with filth and railing were dispersing, our eyes were looking to the left. The relief there was more interesting than even the relief of our route. All in all we climbed up to the top of the mount, came to our tent and felt that, in general, our ascent was quite good. We are designed in such a way that when some time has passed from even the most terrible events, we take those events in like rather attractive adventures.

“That was a real ascent, - we were bragging about our resent salvation, - belay was natural, cracks – fresh…” There you couldn't pass the route with expressed only.

Little by little our thoughts were transforming in desire to create something equal. And at the moment we got Tirol declaration, there natural belay was praised. As we read the declaration, we decide to build up a route. The place for it we had already found – a wall to the left from “Sokoliny”. There untrodden expanse was, we could climb as much as we wanted.

Autumn had gone and we began to think how to make a reality of our idea. We enlisted sponsor's support, hired as many hooks as it was possible. Then we began to scrutinize photos of the wall and to consult with experienced people in order not to make on somebody's route our “pioneer pass”. It turned out that there were about ten routes on the “Zamok”, plus different variants of those routes. But in the place we wanted to create our own route nobody had ever climbed.

We arrived to the Crimea in the beginning of November, a week we spent on the rock “Krasny Kamen” (“Red Stone”), passed a route of third grade of difficulty, got warmed, so to speak. And started…

And the start was badly: on a wall of 80 degrees of steepness there was complete collection of local flora, we failed to find canes only. And we invigorated each other – “It is only the first twenty meters so dirty, further the wall is pure, will go up by climbing”. At breakfast Valentin volunteered to be the leader, it seemed he said it being only half-awake. Or, may be, his break with the girlfriend had influenced him in such a way? But let him so. As for me, I put on all the warm clothes we had, even pined on winter gloves. Neither more nor less – real Himalayan wolf . What a pity, Valentin didn't take a photo of me we could win a photo contest in a nomination “the best belayer of the year!”

- Where shall I climb here? – asked me my colleague and I pompously conducted him: at first you had to climb upwards, then somewhere to the left, then again upwards, and at last you had to go by traverse! That way we spent the day: Valentin “stuffed” the cracks and blisters with metal, jumped on skyhooks and scattered with stones, and I on belay was eating sweets and giving valuable instructions.

In November days are short. It starts getting dark at 4 p.m., and the weather didn't look like May one. We decided to change the leader every day, once a day. It turned out, you climbed a day, and on the next day you could eat sweets. That way everything happened. We had even lost the count of the days we were climbing. We thought we climbed for 5 days and when I came home, I found that the ascent took us 6 days.

Day by day, slowly, we went upwards, exploring and cleaning the route, hammering the bolts on the stations in. But a moment came when all our ropes were fixed on the wall. We had to climb further. By the time all our acquaintances departed. And it became sorrowfully and lonely. But, the main thing, nobody could get our ropes (to protect them from falling stones) we would throw down from the wall. So, we decided to throw down bottom 80 meters and to take the other with us to the top. We climbed to a big ledge, separated “bulwark” and the roof of the “Zamok”. We came to the pine-tree on the “Chapa”. It was getting dark. We had time to fix one more rope up to the plates of third grade of difficulty, in order to be able to climb the strip along wet stones if the weather would become bad. (and we were right doing that!). Then we started planning the ledge. We did it so: I was waving by axe and Valentin boiling tea.

The ledge was wonderful. Flat, something bigger than a rug. We sat there, had supper, made fire (luckily we managed to find dry branches). All in all we were sitting, excreting the hormones of happiness. But romantic with a fire and recollections about women continued only for twenty minutes. And then it started… at first it started raining, then – snowing, and then – raining again. Valentin, singing Glukoza's song, found small cornice. We threw our things under it and started making a ledge number 2. It took us a half of an hour to build it. We laid ropes there, covered knees with a rug and began to “sleep”. At 1 a .m. we said to each other that we couldn't “sleep” more and start warming by tea and bodily movements.

And suddenly – it was a miracle! – the precipitations stopped, moon rose and it became frosty. We wrapped ourselves with wet sleeping bag, clasped (don't think badly about us!) and fell asleep. In my sleep I felt how my legs in wet jogging shoes, got out of the sleeping bag to admire the moon, were freezing. But it didn't matter for me. Then there was morning, there were wet rocks of the roof and a wet trunk of about 40 kg . And we reached the top ! And then was the descent . I carried a huge falling to pieces trunk and Valentin was carrying 240 meters of wet ropes. At the bottom of the wall he took 80 more meters of ropes and became look like a great clew, inspiring me to malicious jokes-requests to roll down the path.

We turned back to the tent. There were neither firewood, nor water. The rain was becoming heavier . We decided to go home as quickly as possible. Taxi, bus, train. In a carriage there was warm, dark and comfortable. And we felt ashamed of our appearance and smell. But what could we do – romantic is uncomfortable thing. In the train I slept badly, all the night I dreamt that I was still on the wall and couldn't cope with my self-belays. By the morning I understood that it was because of dangling strap of my rucksack, swinging in front of my face.

Having returned back home we fell into boring measured city life with its small and big problems.

Recommendations to the route. If you plan to pass the night on the wall, you should climb in a mixed team or with reliable friend, as the ledge for night passing is narrow.

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