Cameron
Good to read your editorial in the current issue - its not often anyone refers to Mineralnye Vody! I could relate well to what you described.
A week before we flew out to M.V. it suddenly made headline news because hijackers had blown up part of the runway! When we finally got there we were delayed all day, then held up all night on the bumpy road to Elbrus with a giant moving blancmange-like mudslide. We then did a circuit of Elbrus - just two of us with two guides, one of whom couldn't speak anything but a Ukranian dialect! We were robbed at two campsites and ate semolina most of the time, but had a fantastic remote backpack. Really felt you were pioneering, and we met Russian shepherds who had never met a Westerner before! Fantastic snowy passes and views, flowers, two foot high giant puffballs, waterfalls, and a huge icefield to cross. Some of the most sparkling and unspolit scenery I've ever seen.
And then, after the trek, we were attacked coming off the Elbrus chairlift after our guide had rightly asked two locals to stop smoking in the lift cabin! Our trekking poles had to fend off their head height kung fu kicks! Just a few weeks later the Chechen crisis erupted and although Elbrus is some distance away I'm not sure how many people are now doing or even thinking about the circuit. I know you did it - so hope this brings back some memories....
We left M.V. on an internal flight - which took off with a great dane scampering up and down the aisle, and at least six extra passengers standing up holding onto luggage lockers!! And when we eventually landed the back curtain flew open and dozens of trays of in-flight stale sausages and potatoes shot down the aisle....and the cabin crew then held all the passengers back whilst they collected them up and put them back into containers!!
Has anyone else done the Elbrus circuit?
