Guidebook Sokol P.S. Part 1

Part 2

Other possibilities… or how you can have god time not hurting yourself.

Igor Petrov

Sudak is manifold. Besides Sokol there are a lot of interesting objects. So, if you have two free days, which you decide to dedicate to resting, you are lucky – you have a problem of choice. You can visit Noviy Svet and walk along so-called “Golicinskaya path”. It is necessary to notice that place there are unique, not without reason Golicin founded Russian wine-making there and Russian tsars liked to swim up there on their own tsars’ ships. Saying in a word, it is very beautiful there. It is also possible to visit Genuese fortress. It is one of the best in the Crimea for its safety moreover, an excellent view to surrounding landscapes, including the mount Sokol, can be seen from it. You can have a walk round the cape Alchak along an equipped path. Although it is situated in only some kilometers from the Golicinskaya path, the landscapes there are different. If you have some time, we recommend you to visit Kerch or Feodosia. Here you are the main but not full list of places you can visit during your day-off.

If something happens…

In spite of plenty of rescue organizations in the Crimea, only Control-Rescue station will rescue you. Call to EMERCOM by phone number 001 and the orderly will readdress you to Control-Rescue station. The address of it is: Sudak, Primorskaya Street, 48a (if you go to Noviy Svet from Sudak, you will find it just beyond the rest home “Lvovsky railwayman”), phone number 80656694380, phone number of the chief of the station: 80677404124. The chief of the station is Igor Petrov he is calm, kind and very responsive person. He, as well as his fellows-rescuers, works due to their pure enthusiasm, and we can say them only big humane thanks. Nobody pays them for their rescue work.

About the guidebook.

All of the route describe in the guidebook were passed and described personally by the authors in a period from summer 2005 to winter 2006. The deions were made in the day of passing the route to reach maximal reliability. But as there is such great quantity of data, regardless of whether we want it or not, some amount of mistakes is inevitable, and it has to be taken into account. There is no perfection… but it is necessary to work for it.

The deion of each route consists of two parts: the line of route, detailed on the photo and text of the deion itself. We don’t describe each meter of each rope otherwise the text will replace the spirit of adventure. We base on the opinion that the person that is going to pass the route of certain grade of difficulty is physically and technically prepared and doesn’t need special promptings.

The grade of difficulty of the rope (level of free climbing/ level of climbing with self-made points of rest) we define according to the most difficult strip of the rope. It means that if along the rope of 45 meters long there is a strip of 6c grade of difficulty, we write simply: “45 meters long, grade of difficulty – 6c”. If we write “your own belay”, it means that you may need hooks, nuts or cam devices to pass the strip. Apropos, on the many route on the Sokol it is difficult to organize full-fledged belay without cam devices. We emphasize the places where there are serious problems with organizing belay. We had not an aim to make a guidebook that includes the deion of all the cracks we tried to describe the main known ways of routes on rather detailed photos. And we also described some variants of going from some routes to neighboring ones.

Sometimes we made stations in non-typical places, different from those ones that are recommended by other authors (for example, on the route “Kosoy 4A” we made it on a small tree). It is just our opinion about making stations. We showed preference to the points from which it is better to examine the route, where it is easier to react to falling of the leader, where the danger of stones falling to your head is less marked, sometimes to the prejudice of the comfort of staying at the station. It means that we improved the safety of the route. Stations like these were made using only our own equipment. We don’t thrust our opinion on you, you can use stations on “standard” places, described by other authors.

For some of the routes we give the grade of difficulty that differences from generally accepted. We do it on the basis of contrastive analysis of the routes on the Sokol, basing on the well-known routes on the other mountain ranges in the Crimea. Moreover, we had to make the correction because of general tendency to low the level of routes. It is connected with the fact that the “7th grade of difficulty”, that hasn’t been accepted yet, is introduced virtually, lowering existing routes. For example, route “Grebnevaya 2B” is shown in the guidebook as 2A. If you compare the route with other routes of the second grade of difficulty on the South-Western wall, you will agree with us. Other routes, on the contrary, got higher grade of difficulty in our guidebook.

Speaking about possible mistakes, we can say that probably there will be a mistake in appreciating rock-climbing part of routes. We are not professional climbers, and give grade of difficulty to the route basing on our own feelings. Moreover, real danger plays its important role – in such situations all the strips seem to be more difficult than they are in fact. But if the real grade of difficulty of the rope is 6b+ we won’t appreciate it as 6a. The matter concerns a mistake of a half of the grade, hardly more. Most likely, we will appreciate the strip as 6c, not as 6b+.

Alpinism is a sport of self-dependent people that can reach decisions. So we must specify: our lists of recommended equipment for one or another route are only help for you in choosing your equipment, but it is not the catalog of necessary things without those you will get your end at the route. You have to decide yourself what to take to the wall. But it is better to use stranger experience as your own bruises and bumps can be very painful.

About the authors or “who is at fault?”…                                   

Terr

We have an invisible connection with this mount… Sokol. At first we simply from time to time went to the Crimea and spent some days communicating with this mount, then it became not enough for us and we started going there more often. Terr began to spend every weekend near the Sokol, he was lucky, he lived in Simferopol that is in hour of riding by car from Sudak. In Friday after the end of his working day he ride to Sudak and on Monday morning he went back to his work. As for me, I live in Russian Moscow, and Terr’s order doesn’t suit me, so I went to Sudak rarely but for longer periods. At first, I spent in Sudak a week, then two weeks, then month… The situation ended as it had to. Terr left his service and moved to Sudak’s Control-Rescue station… Now he has his own house at the station and a lot of friend that visit him to climb different routes. I have become an often guest in his house. As Igor Petrov noticed: “It is time for you to change nationality, you have become the citizen of the Crimea more, than of Moscow”. And there is a great part of truth in his words.

Alex

So, we went to Sudak and climbed different interesting routes, but what uncle Terrorist is known for – his concern for public welfare. It means for brother our – alpinists. Most of the time he spent on making new rock-climbing lines, and restoration and re-making existing alpinistic routes. About three years ago I joined him. But once we got another idea. Great amount of questions, that alpinists coming to Sudak and wanting climbing something asked us, encouraged us. We became something like consultants about the region. But the alpinists couldn’t take us to the mount with themselves. So, we decided it was time to make a guide-book. And we began. And in spite of the fact that we had already passed rather big amount of routes to the Sokol, we decided to pass everything afresh in order not to fabricate something according to our memory, but to describe the route in almost real-time mode. In the morning we passed the route and in the evening described it. We tried to do our best… but if something is incorrect, you can know who played the role of Susanin here…

If somebody has remarks about the guide as a whole or about any routes, please, mail to Kuzminsky Alexander, manull(@)bk.ru.