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Published: February 14th 2008
…because I’m still sneezing out dust covered boogers.
This weekend (Feb 2nd and 3rd) I went on an expedition to an ice cave in the mountains around Chemal with a club of extreme tourists. Prior to the expedition, I learned (only two days, less than 3 hours really) how to use climbing equipment, mostly in Russian. The trek was 8 km up a mountain to Кульдюкская Пещера, Kol’dioskaya Cave. Kol’diokskaya literally means “ice cave” in the Altai language. I am in the Altai region of Russia, but Russians were not the first people to live here. There are ancient remains and a prehistoric tribe of people who used to (and perhaps still do because I think there are people who still speak the language) live in these mountains. Certain caves have cave drawings similar to the ones in France, and a while back, they discovered a mummy (the Altai Princess, I believe) who was frozen stolid, and since her skin was still intact they could still see the tattoos on her arms. Supposedly there is also a mammoth skeleton somewhere in Biysk. But on to my trip…
I became acquainted with the Extreme Tourism Club through Sasha, (my friend
in Biysk whom I met through Couchsurfing.com), the weekend I took a dip in the Biya. They told me about their future expedition and were surprised that I wasn’t afraid to sleep in a tent in the Siberian cold. The Wednesday before the trip, I went with Zhenya (the other girl who swam in the Biya with me) to the club meeting. There I learned how to properly equip myself in climbing gear and how to use a жумар, кроль, самострах, and спускаться (zhumar, kroll, samastrakh, and how to repel). The lesson was a mix of Russian and English because Zhenya speaks English (very well), but complicated issues like ropes and twisting and attaching and item names were all in Russian. Experienced climbers, forgive me if I make nomenclature mistakes. I learned in a very garbled way. Finally the leader of the expedition, Danil, told me what I would need to pack and to bring it with me on Thursday to make sure I had appropriate clothes, supplies, etc.
On Thursday I returned to the club with my backpack, the clothes I would wear, and a few other items. Zhenya, who was unable to go on the trip, generously
lent me her sleeping bag, climbing gear, helmet, headlamps, Russian felt-lined galoshes, and leg covers (to keep the snow out while hiking). During the rest of the meeting I trained with the equipment again and we finalized the details and paid. The trip cost 600 rubles… about $25, and the generosity of a friend. I am extremely grateful to Zhenya for her help, encouragement and generosity. On the way home she said to me (in English), “You are a brave girl. I like brave girls.”
At this point I was feeling a bit apprehensive. In truth, my ability to use the climbing equipment could be a matter of life or death. Falling 100 meters to a solid floor is nothing to sneeze at. On Friday I taught my lessons and hurried home to check all my equipment and pack. Couchsurfing Sasha also called me to wish me well and to warn me, “Chris, don’t rush, don’t panic, and be careful.” I tried to go to bed early, but I did not sleep very well. On Saturday morning I woke at 6am, ate breakfast, and went to the polytechnical institute to meet up with everyone and get on the bus.
Everyone was in good spirits as we took off for the mountains. There were 14 people altogether on the trip. I had met Petya and Dima previously at Sasha’s, and became acquainted with Katya and Lyena (two of Zhenya’s friends) and Danil, our trip leader, on Wednesday. We stopped twice on the way to the mountains, once to buy bread, and a second time to use the outhouse. Some advice: Don’t look to deeply into the depths of a frozen Russian outhouse. Urinal icicles are not all that pretty.
We stopped on the highway (M-52 I think) in the mountains somewhere outside of Chemal, put on our backpacks, and began the trek up the mountain. The first half of the trek was a mild grade (about 5-25 degrees), and we walked along compacted trailer tracks. My calves were burning at first, unaccustomed to walking continuously uphill in snow with weight on my shoulders, but eventually I settled into a decent stride. So long as the hike was like this, I would have no problems. After awhile (I have no idea how long… generally, I completely lost track of time throughout the trip) we stopped, had lunch, and rested
Me and Katya
Happy bus ridefor a bit. Then we began the real trek.
The second half of the hike was much more difficult. The snow was around our ankles or even up to our knees and not very compacted, and you never knew when your foot would sink further into a hole. Simply walking in snow is also much more physically exerting because you must lift your legs much higher than usual and because like sand, it slips away beneath your feet. Additionally, from this point on, the mountain was much steeper (30 degrees), but your backpack still weighed the same.
We continued on for what seemed like forever, step by step, шаг за шагом, like horses, slowly advancing up the mountain. The weather was beautiful; we had a sunny day, it was pleasantly warm (about -10ºC), and the scenery was excellent, but for most of the trek I was staring at the ground so as not to trip or fall and actively cursing each step under my breath. I would look up and see people farther ahead of me, farther up the mountain, and still steep, and oh how my quads had started burning! My legs were worn out, my heart
Our Leader, Danil
Наш хороший руководитель thumped in chest, the cold air hurt my lungs, and I discovered muscles along the side of my ass that I never knew existed. And yet, about halfway through the second, more difficult part of the trek I reached a sort of zen state. Each step was not more painful, it was simply painful, and each step was progress toward an end. There was no question of stopping, I had to continue forward, and so forward I went. And really, it was very enjoyable. Once I accepted the fact that my legs hurt and that the road was hard, but that I had to keep going, I really began to enjoy the trek up the mountain. Maybe it was just endorphins kicking in, but it was a truly exhilarating feeling. Additionally, I am proud of the fact that I managed to keep pace with everyone. Generally I was at the end of the first group of people or the beginning of the middle group. I did not trail behind, and there were several normal group members who seemed to be having a much more difficult time than me.
The trek up the mountain also reminded me how much I
The bus got stuck...
...but we had strong Russian men. love mountains. Admittedly, I cursed the flats of Wisconsin, which caused me to lose the mountain muscle tone I would have had while I still lived in Pennsylvania, running up and down the hills in Stackhouse Park. But really, I can’t fathom not living in the mountains. The fields and bluffs of Wisconsin are very, very nice, but they don’t feel natural to me. When I am in the mountains; however, I feel more at peace… like I am home. Some people get high altitude sickness… I think I have low altitude lethargy. I remembered when I first moved to Wisconsin that one of my main gripes with the state was the lack of mountains. It’s still one of my main complaints. Ah well. Onward and upward, and hurrah for tectonic collisions!
Eventually, we reached the top of the mountain, and began to set up camp. Relief and bliss settled in, and I happily hopped through the snow, unburdened, freeing dead branches from the trees for firewood. There were two hand saws, and some of the men went about chopping down a tree or two for logs for the печка (pyechka), the small stove inside our tent. Dima set
Siberian Toilet
There's no need to look to closely. up a fire and rigged a rope from a tree to hang buckets above the fire to melt snow for tea and cooking. We set up the tent and prepared some kasha with meat. It was quite tasty with a bit of mayonnaise.
After dinner, it was time for the first group to enter the cave. I was in the first group with Danil, Dima, Lyena, Dennis, and two more people whose names I didn’t catch. We put on our climbing gear and set off for the cave around 8:30pm (? Maybe, again I have no sense of time). We walked along the ridge of the mountain for a while, and I’m sure it would have been a breathtaking scene, but the sun had already set. We started to descend on the opposite side of the mountain and it was quite steep… back country double black steep. I thoroughly enjoyed myself on the way down, because I attempted to ski/slide in my boots on the steep parts… basically the whole way down. On the other hand, I realized that eventually we would be going back up the slope.
As it turned out, we went up and down the
Blissfully ignorant
Prior to heading up the mountain hill a few more times than necessary because it took us about an hour or so to find the entrance to the cave. “Damn GPS. This is an American invention… Chris, what do you say?” “But of course, as usual the Americans are at fault.” While we were searching for the cave, Dima also asked me, “Chris, do you have skies like this in America?” The sky was cloudless and since we were in the middle of nowhere, the stars were absolutely beautiful. I could have gazed upwards for hours if only it weren’t so cold. You could see so many stars. I even saw a falling star later in the evening/morning.
When everyone had assembled at the cave entrance, Dima, who is a very experienced climber/extreme tourist/МЧС worker began to set up the ropes we would use to repel into the cave. Once everything had been prepared, Dima explained where to put which carabineer and when, and we set off. Danil went first, then Lyena, then me and then everyone else. To enter the cave you first needed to walk slowly down a mild slope to the mouth of the cave where the ropes were tied to a
Cave Entrace
Setting up safety ropes large branch. After this you fastened your safety carabineer to the branch and switched your repelling gear to the second rope. Then you unfastened to the safety carabineer and it was time to go down.
After the first few seconds of apprehension following the unfastening of my safety carabineer I began to descend. And ohh it was fun. One hundred meters, straight down, hanging by a rope. I wanted to go faster, but Danil and Dima advised me “Don’t rush,” and so I descended at a fairly slow pace, admiring what I could see of the cave walls. When I touched down, Lyena helped me unfasten myself, and I yelled back up that I was free, and the safety rope could be pulled up. Then I began to explore the first room.
The first room in the cave was called the Hall of Altai. Along the wall on the right side were ice stalagmites… literally ice columns that grow up out of the ground every year, and so are different every year. There was also the Throne of the King, a natural phenomenon. Along the ceiling were many crevices, and I didn’t notice at the time, but when
100m Descent
Lyena enters the cave I looked closer at the photos, I noticed many tiny brown furry bodies lining the crevices between the rocks. Yep. Lots and lots of cute little bats. I’m amazed that they can survive at these extreme temperatures. We even saw one fly out of the cave when we were setting up the ropes.
After we had looked around the Hall of Altai for a while, we prepared to descend into the lower level of the cave. Again, we needed to спускаться (spooskat’sya - descend, lower oneself). This time we had to slide underneath a log and slant sideways before we could descend straight down. Once we had reached the floor, we had to lean to the right in order to get to the left side where there were rocks, because the floor was not a floor so much as an ice slide. This level of the cave was much more impressive. The low ceiling was actually a huge mass of ice, 15m thick, and technically the floor of the first room we were in. On the opposite side there were long columns of icicles, and at the end of the room an ice flow that looked like frozen waves
or fingers. Within these ice fingers were candles. Very pretty. Beyond this room we went under the low ceiling into a second room with more interesting ice shapes. Internet willing, there should be some pictures here eventually. We then crawled down a crevice and saw the room with the candles from a lower level, and the end of the ice flow. It was time to return.
The way back was relatively uneventful. We had to climb up the ice slide, further up the slanted wall and under the log to get to the first level. I had some trouble with the ice slide because my feet kept slipping out from under me, and then when I got to the log, I was concerned because my safety rope and my climbing rope were crossed and I didn’t know whether that was a very bad thing or nothing to worry about. But I made it out just fine. I wandered around the first room for a few minutes to give my arms a break, and then began the 100m ascent to the mouth of the cave where Dima instructed me how to properly exit the cave. Then I waited for everyone
else. Ice cave explored, mission complete.
We climbed back up the hill to the ridge of the mountain, and it wasn’t that difficult. Actually, it was really fun. I would have done it a few more times given the opportunity, but it was already about 2am by the time we returned to camp. We returned to camp, had some tea and the second group set off for the cave. I sat by the fire and chatted about life with Lyena, stared at the beautiful night sky, and then crawled into my sleeping bag to sleep.
Sleeping was definitely not pleasant. It was cold, and the ground was hard and lumpy. Even though I was exhausted, I didn’t sleep more than 4 hours, and I awoke several times. But, nevertheless I did sleep some. The next morning I woke at 7am, a little more than an hour before the second group returned from the cave. We prepared cornmeal kasha with dried grapes and compote, and the second group slept for a while. At noon we had noodles with meat and mayonnaise and/or ketchup and packed our things.
The trip down the mountain was of course much easier and
The second level
Right now we're very happy that it's -20! took much less time. I admired the logs and steep sections that I had cursed on the way up and was in good spirits. I felt alive and happy. We arrived at the bus at about 3:40pm and returned to Biysk. Zhenya and her husband (yet another) Sasha met us at the polytechnical institute I returned her things, and we walked home (with Katya as well). I was more than ready to take a bath, brush my teeth, and go to sleep.
More pictures some day... some day...
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Jess
non-member comment
I'm glad you survived, too!
When are you scaling Everest?