In the footsteps of Anatoli Boukreev, Maxut Zhumayev sets up the Kazakh Alpine Club

I met Anatoli Boukreev when I lived in Almaty, Kazakhstan, from 1996 to 1999. When in Kazakhstan, Anatoli lived in a small alpine village above the ski field of Shymbulak, at just below 3,000 metres, and not far from the peaks posted below.

Talgar Peak, 5017 m, is one of the northernmost peaks in the Tien Shan, the most northern "five-thousand metre" mountain in Asia. Anatoli Bookreev lived in a small alpine village below this range.

This village is a weekend haven for many working mountaineers who live in the foothills of the Tien Shan in Almaty, and every Friday night either walk the four hours to their alpine huts from Almaty or drive.

I fondly recall spending Christmas and New Years day (1996-97) with my good mates Sergy and Yuri,(right) their families and other Kazakh and Russian mountaineers in their club huts  consuming large amounts of Vodka, horse meat and intestines, the staple of Kazakhstan. Outside at least a metre of snow covered the ground offering superb skiing.

It was here I first met Anatoly Boukreev, and was impressed by this strong, quiet mountaineer.
Spending days with Kazakhstani mountaineers and their extended families in the alpine huts in the Tien Shans while blizzards rage outside, was a warm and close experience. It was amazing to find in your midst those who have scaled Everest, Kanchenjunga, Makalau, Dhalagauri, and to hear them speaking modestly of significant climbs in most ranges of the world. I was also impressed by their fanatical approach to fitness and love of speed climbing.

Around this time there were a lot of young fit mountaineers in their late teens and early 30s doing a lot of training in the area.. One of them was Maxut Zhumayev

Two years ago Maxut Zhumayev completed a remarkable achievement.

At age 36, he had climbed the last of all fourteen 8000 metre peaks without oxygen including K2 which he called the hardest of the lot.

“What is there for me after?” Zhumayev, a sergeant in the Armed Forces of the Republic of Kazakhstan recalled thinking.

What he did was set himself a new goal. He would establish the Kazakh Alpine Club which he envisioned as being modelled along the lines of European alpine clubs.

Maxut Zhumayev with his son Isatay (Photo: courtesy Maxut Zhumayev)

The Kazakh Alpine Club is today just over three months old but that doesn’t deter Zhumayev from describing an ambitious vision to connect mountaineers in Kazakhstan, including older ones who climbed under the banner of the former Soviet Union.

“We would like to build some special mountain infrastructure including rest and camping places, and a network of huts like those in America and Europe,” said Zhumayev.

Over the next three to five years he wants to establish a guiding and mountaineering institute where young Kazakh mountaineers can be trained formally and conducting youth camps.

Other plans include drawing up climbing maps, collating information for climbers, building viewpoints for tourists, even building bridges to cross mountain streams.

“It’s my new Everest,” he said with a laugh about the work that lies ahead.

Lots of small cabins dot the landscape in a small village above Shymbulak where many Kazakh mountaineers do their training. It was here I met Anatoli Boukreev and Maxut Zhumayev. Photo: Bob McKerrow 

To help him along, Zhumayev has sought the help of the Austrian Alpine Association (Edelweiss section) which will provide him with advice on how to establish and grow the club. A memorandum of cooperation was signed in October and Zhumayev said he believes this memorandum will be helpful in the future as the Kazakh Alpine Club builds its infrastructure and organizational framework. ( Some of the information on Maxut  is from the recent UIAA newsletter)

Working in Central Asia - Keeping people alive in the Pamire mountains 1996-1999

A friend and colleague asked me the other day, what was the most rewarding Red Cross assignment I have had in the last ten years ? It was Central Asia from 1996 to 1999. Here are some excerpts from the diary:

As I write a bevy of 4000 to 4500 metre peaks stud the horizon less than 10 km from my window (see photo above). Living in Almaty, Kazakhstan, which nestles in the foothills of the northern Tien Shan mountains and working with people living in the Central Asia, has brought another distant dream true. Ever since I was a boy I was fascinated by the thought of Samarkand and travelling the ancient silk road which twists through the Celestial Mountains (Tien Shan)

After three years in Afghanistan (1993-1996) I moved in late 1996 to Central Asia to be in charge of major Red Cross programmes in Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan.


With the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1989, one in twelve people have had to move in Central Asia because of dire economic difficulties or conflict. In Tajikistan one in five people have had to move due to the civil war. Therefore my work with the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies in the support of the national Red Cross societies in these five Central Asian countries, has been important in assisting isolated elderly and families who are facing starvation and other forms of acute deprivation.

My work takes me from the high Pamirs in the east of Central Asia to the extreme west where the Kara Kum desert in Turkmenistan meets the Kopet Dagh mountains on the Iranian border. I am rarely out of sight of soaring snow capped peaks.

In Gorno-Badakhshan many children show signs of stunted growth because of malnutrition, and are delighted to get even one pie a day.


Much of my travelling is done along the ancient silk road which travels through the heart of Central Asia, formerly linking China in the east to Europe in the west. Frequently I pass through the historic cities of Samarkand, Tashkent, Khojent, Khokand, Dushanbe, Termez, Merv, Ashgabat and cross the mighty Oxus River.

One of the most Herculean tasks has been during the past 3 months when have hauled 3200 metric tonnes of coal, 2,000 m2 of glass, 25 tonnes of roofing iron, 500 stoves, 600 flues and 2,000 sets of bed linen plus thousands of tonnes of food to remote hospitals scattered throughout the high Pamir mountains of Tajikistan.


Sunset of the high peaks of the Pamir mountains in Tajikistan



The coal is extracted from the Alai coal mines at 3,300 metres under the shadow of the 7,134 m Peak Lenin, to the schools, clinics and hospitals situated in the Pamirs where temperatures plunge as low as -40 oC during the long and bitterly cold winter. Last winter we distributed just over 5000 metric tonnes of coal, but now with having provided all the institutions with an improved type of stove, which burns less coal and produces greater heat, we have distributed slightly lesser amounts this year. Our office in Osh Kyrgyzstan is run by Jagan Chapagain from Nepal, who is the lynch-pin of the operation.

From the Alai mine, the coal is moved by truck (more than 600 truck loads this year) over the Kyrgyzstan pass, further up the Kyzl-Art or Red Clay Pass at 4,275 m then over the incredibly high White Horse Pass at 4,650 m and driven to the recipients, an average of 600 - 800 km away.

A lake in the Pamir mountains in Gorno Badakhshan



The Alai mine is situated at the cross roads of the old silk road. It is in a small valley leading to the larger Alai Valley, which connects Kashgar and the Sarafshan mountains of Tajikistan. Traders going through the nearby town of Saritash had a choice of taking the Pamir route up to Murgab and then down into Afghanistan or the more westerly Alai valley.


Zebunisso Karimova; all she wants is her family to be healthy. Her eyes fill with tears as she tells the Red Crescent that most of her furniture has been sold or traded to buy food.


The stoves were produced in the ancient Kyrgyz city of Osh, creating jobs for many unemployed engineers and metal workers. Osh celebrated its 3000 year anniversary late last decade.

In the remote areas of Gorno Badakhshan Autonomous Oblast ( GBAO) in the Pamirs, we have worked closely with the Red Crescent Society of Tajikistan financing the purchase of sheep, goats and yaks to enable these remote Red Cross branches to generate income which will in time, enable them to finance their programmes. Earlier this year I visited I visited the valley of Joshangoaz at about 3,500 metres where a Red Cross shepherd tends about 150 sheep and goats.

One of the coldest nights I spent in Tajikistan was in Murgab situated at 4000 m, where the temperature dropped to - 30 oC.
Our Red Cross workers; drivers, shepherds and field officers tell stories of hardship and danger of the past three winters of getting coal and food out to the people. Heavy snow falls blocking roads for weeks, frostbite while repairing vehicles, convoys getting scuttled by avalanches and being looted by modern day highway men is not uncommon.

The Tien Shan mountains lie mainly in Kyrgyzstan with northern parts stretching into Kazakhstan and a south-east finger poking into Uzbekistan. Approximately 750 km, or half of the Tien Shan lie in Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. Home to 60% of the world's dwindling population of the snow leopard ( Panthera uncia) there are estimated to be about 450 snow leopards dwelling here.

A young Kazakh girl.

In the foothills of Kyrgyzstan's Tienshan mountains, the International Federation of Red Cross supports the Kyrgyz Red Crescent to run a large relief programme providing food to isolated elderly people on a pension of approximately US $15 a month, and to institutions such as schools, orphanages and mentally handicapped homes.


I live on the outskirts of Almaty, Kazakhstan, at about 1000 m.

It is paradise for mountaineers and skiers for you can drive to 2600 m within 45 minutes and can climb a 4200 m peak in a day and for six months of the year, the Chimbulak ski field offers some of the best and cheapest skiing in the world.

But it the people that makes Almaty's local mountains unique. The relationship between mountain dwellers and mountains has long fascinated me and it has been great to make strong friends with Kazakhstani mountaineers and share their natural mountain life-style.

Looking across the foothills to Almaty in winter



These mountaineers live in the foothills of the Tien Shan and every Friday night either walk the four hours to their alpine huts from Almaty or drive. They spend every spare moment, every holiday in the mountains and from the age of three or four, the children ski like the wind and climb rock like a mountain goat. They have their songs, poems, climbing competitions and age old traditions of producing exquisite wood carvings.

Khan Tengri, the highest peak in Kazakhstan 7000 metres high


I fondly recall spending Christmas and New Years day (1996-97) with my good mates Sergy and Yuri, their families and other Kazakh and Russian mountaineers in their club huts consuming large amounts of Vodka, horse meat and intestines, the staple of Kazakhstan. Outside at least a metre of snow covered the ground offering superb skiing. It was here I first met Anatoly Boukreev the famous Kazakh climber who not only climbed Mt. Everest a few times, but made one of the most selfless rescues on Mt Everest in 1996.

I met the greatest of Kazakh mountaineers in 1997, Anatoli Boukreev

Spending days with Kazakhstani mountaineers and their extended families in the alpine huts in the Tien Shans while blizzards rage outside, it has been amazing to find those who have scaled Everest, Makalau, Dhalagauri and to hear them speaking modestly of significant climbs in most ranges of the world.

In 1997 the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies has assisted 3 million elderly, orphans, handicapped people and multi-children families through a very difficult year. With one of the worst winters on record affecting Central Asia and heavy snow and severe gales lashing the region, we have stepped up our relief assistance to those without heating and inadequate clothing.

A view from the road into Gorno Badakshan in the Pamir mlountains. We had to cart coal over passes up to 4,600 metres in winter.

Bob McKerrow 1999

Anatoli Boukreev - the mountain iconoclast

Mountains are not Stadiums where I satisfy my ambition to achieve, they are the cathedrals where I practice my religion...I go to them as humans go to worship. From their lofty summits I view my past, dream of the future and, with an unusual acuity, am allowed to experience the present moment...my vision cleared, my strength renewed. In the mountains I celebrate creation. On each journey I am reborn.

These words written by Anatoli Boukreev are featured on his memorial chorten (above) at the Annapurna base-camp in Nepal, under the peak he died on 25 December 1997 while attempting a bold new route.

During the past six months I have got back into reading about the world’s great mountaineers spanning the 30 years from Herman Buhl, to Reinhold Messner, and from 1986 up until today. On 16 October 1986, when Reinhold Messner stood on the top of Lhotse, he became the first man to stand atop all the world’s 14, 8000 metre peaks. What was there left to do ? If someone asked me "who do you think was the greatest?" I would struggle with my choice, but somehow Anatoli Boukreev would be near the top, possibly on the top, slightly ahead of Messner. It is his sincerity, honesty, humility and simple love of the mountains, when added to his remarkable physical achievements at high altitude, brings him to the forefront of great mountaineers. These qualities that Boukreev possessed, gave him an uncompromising attitude, some saw him as abrasive, to high altitude climbing. The way he looked after himself, monitored his performance, and the performance of others, gave him the ability to care for others under extreme situations.

Anatoli Boukreev lived in a small alpine village, at about 3000 metres, above Almaty in Kazakhstan. The village is home to small farmers and mountaineers and is situated above the famous skifield, Chimbulak. Photo: Bob McKerrow


Brought up in the hard school of Soviet climbing, he developed a resilience which few western mountaineers could match. If you take a look at his ascents in the Soviet Union in the late 80s, in addition to Himalayan ascents in the same years, they are simply remarkable.

1990
Peak Pobeda, First Winter Ascent, 7400 meters
First Solo Speed Ascent, Khan Tengri, 7005 meters
First Solo Speed Ascents, Peak Pobeda, 7439 meters
(Khan Tengri, Peak Pobeda and Peak Lenin) are extremely difficult 'massive mountains')
First Place, Mt. Elbrus speed Ascent, 5642 meters,
Record Time, I hour, 40 minutes

Khan Tengri, Kazakhstan. 7,008 metres.

1989
First Place Mt. Elbrus Speed Ascent, 5642 meters,
Master of Sport with Honors and Order of Personal Courage,
Awarded by President Gorbachev, USSR
1987First Round Trip Speed Ascent of Peak Lenin, 7137 meters, 14 hours.


During this period he was coach of the Russian women's cross country ski team where he honed his scientific training with his knowledge of physiology and got outstanding results.

                                                         Anatoli Boukreev

His extraordinary stamina was demonstrated most dramatically in 1996 on Everest, when he reached the summit as a commercial guide to one of several teams caught by a fierce storm on the evening of 10 May. Despite climbing without supplementary oxygen, Boukreev was moving more strongly than most of his fellow guides and had descended to the shelter of Camp 4 at the South Col before the storm struck. He was later criticised fiercely for abandoning clients and colleagues, four of whom died above the South Col. However, the critics glossed over the fact that later that night Boukreev repeatedly left the safety of his tent, risking his life to fight through the blizzard and rescue another group of climbers stranded a few hundred yards from the tents.

Anatoli Boukreev (l) on the summit of Everest holding the Kazakh flag.

That rescue mission at 8,000 metres, by a man who had just climbed to the summit of Everest without oxygen, was remarkable enough. Even more extraordinary was Boukreev's action the following day, when he climbed back up to 8,400 metres, in a forlorn attempt to help his American colleague Scott Fischer. It was too late, for his friend had already died, but Boukreev was able to bring back some mementos for Fischer's family. After a memorial service at base camp, in one final gesture of defiance, Boukreev demonstrated his phenomenal stamina by speeding back up to make a one-day ascent of Everest's neighbour Lhotse, the fourth highest mountain in the world.

Anatoli Boukreev was born in 1958, in the Russian Urals, but spent much of his life in Kazakhstan, adopting dual citizenship after the collapse of the Soviet Union. As a mountaineer he made his name in a series of bold, fast ascents in the Caucasus and Tien Shan ranges, whilst earning his living as ski coach to the Russian women's cross-country ski team.
Although he was later to earn a reputation as an individual iconoclast, his first big Himalayan success, in 1989, was as part of a meticulously organised Soviet team on the world's third highest mountain, Kang-chenjunga. The expedition, which received little recognition in the West, made the first continuous traverse of Kangchenjunga's four highest summits.

Boukreev lived in a small village, high above the Medeo alpine skating rink and Chimbulak ski field, in the Tien Shan mountains overlooking the city of Almaty, Kazakhstan. Photo: Bob McKerrow
In the interests of safety, Boukreev and his companions used supplementary oxygen but in subsequent ascents of 10 of the world's 14 8,000-metre peaks, Boukreev eschewed this artificial aid. His refusal to use bottled oxygen even when guiding clients on Everest drew criticism from fellow guides, who argued that this rendered him less fit to help his charges. His bravery on the South Col in 1996 - and his actions in 1995, when he waited two hours on the summit until all his clients had started to descend - would seem to refute those criticisms.

In any case, as he stated in 1997 before leading another team on Everest, no guide can guarantee safety at extreme altitude: "I offer my experience for hire. I will advise a group of people on how to reach the summit and I will help them, but I cannot be responsible for their safety. They understand that."
Those uncompromising words may seem unpalatable, but they are an honest assessment of reality on the world's highest peaks.

After months of coaching a totally inexperienced Indonesian Everest expedition, his training, selection, motivation and coaching, got three pof them to the summit of Everest in early 1997 under his watchful eye. He had moved from guide to mentor and coach.
Anatoli Boukreev seemed to be locked into that world of extreme adventure and on 25 December 1997, his luck ran out when an avalanche swept him to his death. He had just started up a new route, in winter, on the gigantic South Face of Annapurna - a typically audacious project for a man who will be remembered as one of the world's toughest mountaineers.

I met Anatoli Boukreev when I lived in Almaty, Kazakhstan, from 1996 to 1999. When in Kazakhstan, Anatoli lived in a small alpine village above the ski field of Chimbulak, at just below 3,000 metres, and not far from peaks posted below.

Talgar Peak, 5017 m, is one of the northernmost peaks in the Tien Shan, the most northern "five-thousand metre" mountain in Asia. Anatoli Bookreev lived in a small alpine village below this range.
This village is a weekend haven for many working mountaineers who live in the foothills of the Tien Shan in Almaty, and every Friday night either walk the four hours to their alpine huts from Almaty or drive.

I fondly recall spending Christmas and New Years day (1996-97) with my good mates Sergy and Yuri,(right) their families and other Kazakh and Russian mountaineers in their club huts ( see photo below) consuming large amounts of Vodka, horse meat and intestines, the staple of Kazakhstan. Outside at least a metre of snow covered the ground offering superb skiing.

It was here I first met Anatoly Boukreev, and was impressed by this strong, quiet mountaineer.
Spending days with Kazakhstani mountaineers and their extended families in the alpine huts in the Tien Shans while blizzards rage outside, was a warm and close experience. It was amazing to find in your midst those who have scaled Everest, Kanchenjunga, Makalau, Dhalagauri, and to hear them speaking modestly of significant climbs in most ranges of the world. I was also impressed bt their fanatical approach to fitness and love of speed climbing.
 

Talgar Peak, near Almaty Kazakhstan. Boukreev did a lot of training on this and surrounding peaks, and being just over 5000 m, offered good altitude training.

A year later when I was in New Zealand, I got the tragic news that Anatoli had been caught in an avalanche on Christmas Day 1997, while on the South Face of Annapurna. Immediately, his fellow Kazakh climbers led by Rinat Khaibullin flew from Almaty - Tashkent - Delhi – Kathmandu and joined a search party. Anatoli’s body was never found. When I returned to Almaty I spoke to Rinat Khaibullin about Anatoli's death and the unsuccessful rescue. It was a great loss for mountaineering in Kazakhstan, Russia and the world. The South face of AnnapurnaWeston DeWalt's who co-authored Boukreev’s book the climb, said this about Boukreev when he died.
I met Anatoli Nikoliavich Boukreev on May 28, 1996, eighteen days after the tragedy on Mount Everest. When I heard his story and those of the other survivors I recalled a quote that I had tacked over my desk more than five years before. The words are those of Andrey Tarkovsky, a Russian film director. He said, "I am interested above all in the character who is capable of sacrificing himself and his way of life — regardless of whether that sacrifice is made in the name of spiritual values, or the sake of someone else, or of his own salvation, or of all these things together. Such behavior precludes, by its very nature, all of those selfish interests that make up a "normal" rationale for action; it refutes the laws of a materialistic world view. It is often absurd and impractical.

And yet — or indeed for that very reason — the man who acts in this way brings about fundamental changes in people's lives and in the course of history. The space he lives in becomes a rare, distinctive point of contrast to the empirical concepts of our experience, an area where reality — I would say — is all the more strongly present."

Anatoli Boukreev, in my experience, was one of those characters, and I am honored to have collaborated in his effort to tell his story.