To the peak Volnaya Ispania (Free Spain) (4200 m) / English. Climbing / Mountain.RU


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Notice: Undefined variable: top_comments in /usr/local/www/mountainru/data/article/mainarticle.php on line 486 Автор: Mark Lavrichenko, Cherkessk-Moscow

To the peak Volnaya Ispania (Free Spain) (4200 m)

A wish to make an ascent to the peak Volnaya Ispania appeared long time ago. But sometimes I had no time to go to the Caucasus sometimes there was no company to join me.

At last one of the factors shaped well and in September 2006 I arrived to Cherkessk. All autumn and winter along I was training on the Elbrus, every weekend running to the Western or to the Eastern peak.
Sometimes for a change I went to the Kurma and Tchegetkara. I must notice that in spite of too much higher altitudes, to make solo-ascent to Elbrus is much easier than to make it to, for example, to Tchegetkara, on which the relief is more difficult and other complicative factors as avalanches and cracks are present.
As the deion I used the return of the Pyatigorsk alpinist club “Freeline” about the route along the Eastern ridge from the pass Kashkatash (it was written with lots of details, so many thanks to them). As for equipment, I took not much of it, it is logical when you are going to make a solo-ascent. Of heavy things I had products (3 potted goods, chocolate, cheese, dried fruits, porridge “Bistrov”, tea and crackers) on the basis of breakfast/supper for 4 days. A tent, sleeping bag, gas-jet and a dynamic rope №10 40 m long.

On the 1st of March at 7.00 a.m. set off for the Volnaya Ispania from Djan-Tugan. The weather was wonderful, there was not much of snow (there was very rough firn), I went like along cinder track. It took me 4 hours to come to the icefall of the mount Ullukara. The icefall was really “cool” – just in front of me several blocks two-by-two meters fell down exactly to the place where the gate had been. A week before a crumbling there had been more dimensioned so the blocks of ice were scattered within a radius of 200 meters from the icefall. However that may be, but I had to pass that strip so those 50 m I passed at a run. Then, rounding the cracks in two hours I went to the plato and stopped there to pass the night. Stars, silence sometimes interrupted by crackle of the glacier.

On the 2nd of March 2007 the weather was fine. I started at 7.00. By 10 o’clock I had come to the pass, and having turned to the right I began the climb with an ice-axe to a snow-ice slope. I must say that in that my undertaking the main problem was I hadn’t a workmate, so nobody belayed me. I had to be twice as careful and in some of the places to move slowly or even to turn back. I was lucky there wasn’t lots of snow. The first rocky outcrop I climbed over with a rucksack on my back, but, having come to the second one I decided not to risk and to draw it out after I would pass the main wall. I also took the gloves off to feel stone better. Although I got the arms frozen, but only a little bit. Having passed wide ridge, when had already come, I went down to a saddle and at 7 o’clock p.m. I stopped there for a nightpassing.

On the 3rd of March I set off at 6.00 a.m. According to the deion, from the right side of the ridge avalanches could descent, but all the week before my ascent it intensively warmed at day time and got frozen at nights, as a result there rough firn was generated and I climbed using an ice-axe easily. The jut I rounded to the right but it was terrifying without belay. By 4.00 p.m. having passed Bazaltovy, Gogol and four more rocky outcrops, having become absolutely exhausted, I was staying in front of the apical climb of the peak. It was difficult to make a decision: to stay to have a rest and to make an ascent on the next day or to go to the top that evening, but it was not known when I would come back. Barometer in my watches and wind said that the weather on the next day would become worth, so I decided to go to the top at that moment in order not to be caught with the “problem”. In 1.5 hours I came to the top and began the descent in the direction of the Southern ridge. By 8.00 p.m. gloaming had won a victory over the daylight and I hadn’t reached “Skovorodka” (frying pan) yet. Night, flashlight and cracks decreased the rate of moving to a minimum. This part of the ascent turned out to be the most hard and risk. Being overtired I came to the plato and about 1.00 a.m. stopped to pass the night. It seemed because of nervous overexertion and overfatigue I didn’t manage to fall asleep and at 6.00 in the morning I took my tent and went to Djan-Tugan. The weather became bad indeed, blanket covered everything, but my expedition was finished.

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