UKC

I understand that the Primary route up Lenin Peak is as non-techical as climbing abover 7000m can be... I was however wondering what information was available about the other routes of ascent?

In reply to KellyKettle:

There's some route info here:

http://mountains.tos.ru/lenin.htm

Click on the link halfway down the page for the topo.

In reply to KellyKettle: Thanks, that's some food for thought.

In reply to KellyKettle:

I climbed Lenin last August. That topo linked above is pretty approximate only, but people rarely climb the other routes anyway. Shortly before I summited a group did do a traverse, up the normal and down a variant of the #3 Chernukha. This made me wish I had allowed more time to acclimatise elsewhere and do the Chernukha, avoiding the normal route totally.

Personally I think a variant of the Chernukha is a better and safer route than the normal route. The day after we arrived at C2, at 0830 a massive avalanche ripped down and obliterated the route just below C2 on the flat section, luckily a good 30min before the first climbers arrived there from C1.

There is also some (smaller) avalanche danger on the Chernukha and it is no doubt steeper than the normal route, but the normal route is not steep at all and the potential avo danger on it is massive. For 20 years I've avoided climbing routes with that kind of blatantly obvious objective danger and I'm not crazy about having done it now, despite summiting no problems and enjoying the trip.

I should also add that when you are on the ground there the #5 Skurlatov route is further away than it looks in the topo and might be dicey to get onto.