(9.05.2004) new!
07.05.2004.
Attention!!! We ended up by good news coming! Therefore after not long judgement we are going to tell you everything happened. The new route on Sablya peak via the left bastion of North-East face, presumably 6А graded has been sent.
Having taken off early morning yesterday, 06.05.2004, the team without portaledges but only with two tents left on the wall and after spending the night on snow-covered ledge, today at 17.00 they summited in full complement.
They managed to reach the summit in spite of it was blowing a gale, snowing with a rain, and all the gear and clothes were covered with ice crust. After afternoon weather finally deteriorated: it was still snowing and raining, cloudy, visibility worsened. The bad weather holds and now. The entirely route consist s of full seventeen pitches. According to Eugeny Novoseltsev, one and a half of pitches could be classified as VI А3 - А4 (according UIAA classification): the belay points nearly do not hold falling. As the result Sergey Kofanov had two technical falls (3 and 14 meters).
By the words of Eugeny, the new route appeared more complex, than Semiletkin's route on Svobodnaya (Free) Korea, graded as 6 (literally: "for a long time considers as duty"six"). The ascent was going on under adverse weather conditions (except for pair weather "windows").
All of us are safe and sound and getting now warm and dried in Aranetsky shelter after skiing trip from the mountain. Celebratory beakers have been already rose. The assault camp was taken off today. Tomorrow we wait for the helicopter and we hope to be in Pechora if a wind blows away the heaven dirty trick.

P.S. All our amicable company give our warm wishes and congratulations to the captain of the team and the ideological inspirer of the expedition Sergey Kofanov because of his happy birthday on May, 6. He met the next year of his life on the wall of Sablya. And today we wish happy birthday Lena Kanelyuk.

Generally speaking, we have a lot of occasions to be pleased. All the night long we will drink tea and sing songs.

Our greetings to natives and friends. Wait for us, we will come back soon.

05.05.2004.
We have got the next portion of the useful and important information directly from Sergey Kofanov who informs right from the wall: "For the present moment we have fixed 5 ropes and one rope more is fixed on the approach to the route. First hundred meters of the route present a complex ice-covered chimney with a steepness about eighty degrees - we climbed it using fifi hooks on 10 - 15-mm thin water ice. Further the wall became nearly vertical - the steepness on the next three pitches increases up to ninety degrees, and the wall hangs and abounds a lot of cornices in places. We had only to aid climb: the complexity is about А3 - А4. There are not enough cracks and many of them are quartz-caulked - because of that we prefers to use thin bolts - "hatchets" and stoppers of 1-3 size. The cracks are mainly deaf, therefore we had to use stoppers as copperheads: just hammering them. Climbing one site of the fourth pitch we had to bolt bolt's line 10 - 12 meters long. Long polar day allows to work round the clock - dark time of day takes only two hours. We work by three man-teams on 7 - 8 hours everyone. We hope for today to make two pitches more and then "to take off". Weather seems to begin improving, it stopped raining, and today at night even the temperature was up to negative 4. All participants are healthy and give the best regards to their friends and natives".

By results of the next connection with the team we've got last news (05.05.2004, 20.00): Totally it's fixed 6 ropes. Today the guys descended for spending the night. They plan to take off tomorrow and the assistants will remove assault camp tomorrow too. Now it became much easier to move on slopes and up to the pass - a confident ice crust has locked everything after a cold snap.

The subsidiary team (Shkabara, Belkov, Boyarskikh, Unisikhin + the operator Panteleev) summited Sablya via the Western buttress: the top is snow-covered, stones as well as on a wall are under thin water ice. Visibility is with variable success - periodically it is clouded over. From the top we cold see a very beautiful panorama - there is a lot of snow, severe peaks are towering.

As the guys left to Hoffmann's glacier and for two days will not send any news. As they return - at once you will hear from them.

(5.05.2004)
On April, 30 the rest of expedition members and cargo were transferred on snowmobiles to the hut under Aranetsky pass. We did not manage to get directly to Hoffmann's glacier because of active thawing of snow. Thawed snow doesn't hold the snowmobile with big loadings. The team joined and we made first full carry under Khod Konem (Knight's move) pass through which the assault group should pass on Hoffmann's glacier.

On May, 1.
We continued making full carry: the part of assault group left under the wall via Knight's move pass to Hoffmann's glacier (Primerov, Korobkov, Bobrov, Novoseltsev). They are going to start fixing the route tomorrow as the most of gear are dragged up to the wall's foot. Kofanov and Laryushkin will join them the day after tomorrow. Weather spoiled, a powerful cyclone came and brought snow and rain. Clouds tightened mountains and there is no visibility in area of passes from time to time. It has been raining yesterday, all the night long and today. Temperature reaches up to positive ten, snow is sinking right before our eyes. Everything in the air obviously feels subpolar spring coming. In the Knight's move pass area there is avalanche danger. And avalanches are constantly collapsing in the corrie of Northen- East face. The day after tomorrow we plans to finish gear carry and the six of us (the team in its full complement) will start working on the wall. We plan to take-off on May, 3. All of us have a good health, a good mood and a good sense of humour despite of the spoiled weather.
For tomorrow we are going to have a day of rest for those that has not left under the wall. Follow us.

On May, 3.
Today Kofanov and Laryushkin finally made their trip to the foot of the wall, where the guys (Novoseltsev, Prinmerov, Korobkov) already started fixing the rope on the route. In total they have made four pitches for yesterday and today. There is a lot of snow: it was snowing today, but the wall of Sablya (Sabre) peak almost clean, the main amount of snow is on a mountain summit part. But small avalanches go constantly. In general, avalanches collapse in the mountain circus with a disgusting regularity in different directions (with periodicity about ten minutes). It roars continuously. Because of them we had to replace the assault camp to a safer place, which all the same is surrounded from different directions with avalanche cones (the camp is settled actually under the beginning of the route on the glacier). Our assistants made next full carry today (almost final), and between the wall and Aranetsky shelter set continuous communication line. We are going to remove the assault camp probably the day after tomorrow, and it would be one more full carry. Now there comes a small cold snap, with a frost at night. In the afternoon it is warm: the first half of the day was solar and hot, we could take air and solar baths.
Anybody has problems with health. There were small colds, but the doctor treated them. The mood remains vigorous. The generator slightly started to knock, it is quite possible, that "disassemblies" with it will proceed, therefore, if there are not any e-mails from us, you should not be frightened - everything is normally, but the generator refuses to give energy. That's all news. We are going to inform you about everything interesting at us.

(30.04.2004)
We are in Priuralsk now. The first part of the team (Kofanov, Primerov, Bobrov, Belkov and Korobkov) is already transferred under the foot of Sablya (Sabre) by snowmobiles. The weather still allows to move on "Burans" (in the mornings it freezes and there is ice crust for the time being). This night we plan to get other part of group and the rest of the cargo to Sablya. There is a lot of deep snow. Temperature holds positive the most part of the day.
There are only two snowmobiles: it is not enough to transfer all our big company with comfort, therefore the cargo will go on sledges, and the participants - on skis behind the sledges. There are about 70 kilometres from Priuralsk up to Sablya foot, and the trip seems to be interesting. In the afternoon visibility improved, the sky cleared up opening brilliant views on Sablinsky range. You can see that in added photos. We are in an excellent mood and normal health.
P.S. We carried out competitions on snowboard jumping from abrupt banks of the Pechyora river (Especial Thanks to E.Novoseltsev for the constructed springboards). Now we are preparing to the full carry.

(27.04.2004)
On April, 27. At 6.00 a.m. Hastily mustering overslept participants all over the night Ekaterinburg, friends and sponsors methodically formed the group of those who was going to departure on the platform of the station. In the train the expedition's cargo was carried by ten together in some bids and it filled up two compartments and a half of the tambour - we'd like to separate thank the conductor of the 10th carriage of the train "Khabarovsk - Moscow" for the favorable attitude to the Ural mountaineering!
The team consisted of climbers together with the doctor, rescuers and assistants, total whether 13, whether 14 person, finally left Ekaterinburg. Sergey Plotnikov, Moscow, is going to join them with the satellite phone given by firm "BASK".
We will learn later how successfully they reach their terminus changing in Kirov, Pechora, Kozhva, and how many boxes, handbags, snowboards they will get lost en route. Therefrom there are two ways to reach up to Sablinsky range: by helicopter for a pair of hours or on snow-tractors for 1-2 days. The helicopter back is reserved for May, 8-10.

Photos from the previous expedition

(26.04.2004)
From April, 25 till May, 10 a team of young Ekaterinburg climbers is going to summit Peak Sablya (Sabre), 1497 meters, via a new route on center of the 600-meter and 70 degrees wall.
Nowadays this mountain territory is a part of Jugyd-Va National Park with the city of Pechera as administrative center. The mountain Sablya is a pearl of Subpolar Ural with its atypical for Ural alpine relief. In this area there is the biggest glacier of the Ural mountains - Hoffmann's glacier. In post-war years Subpolar Ural was well enough investigated by tourists, basically skiers. Plenty of passes are gone here, on the most outstanding tops the elementary routes of ascents are laid. At the same time, the area practically was not visited by climbers. You can count on fingers the technically complex ascents made there. In this meaning the area remains a blank space. The area is remote and deserted and the declared ascent will pass in the conditions of full autonomy - the nearest settlement is in 70 kilometers through the taiga.
There are only two routes of the highest category of complexity laid on the top by combined team of Saint Petersburg and combined team of Perm before this attempt. The new declared route is the most complex of any possible. Though the wall is similar to usual walls in big mountains, such as Himalayas, Karakoram, it is located not so far and you don't have to acclimatize for many days as in the Himalayas, but at the same time it is the object of "the international class".
The team consists of skilled climbers:
Sergey Kofanov, Ekaterinburg
Alexander Korobkov, Nizhni Tagil
Daniil Primerov, Ekaterinburg
Eugeny Novoseltsev, Ekaterinburg
Igor Bobrov, Ekaterinburg
Andrey Laryushkin, Ekaterinburg

Sergey Kofanov reports: Our Expedition starts on Tuesday in the morning from Ekaterinburg. We are going to get the foot of the mountain by snow-tractors, and our evacuation is planned by helicopter. According the reports of weather forecasters there is negative 20 there now, but we hope that it will be little bit warmer in May.