All Four 7000ers and Khan Tengri in One Season. I departed Italy on July 2 and returned August 28. The following peaks were climbed in sequence. In the Pamir, Andrey Molotov, Denis Urubko and I summitted Pik Lenin (7134m) on July 15 four days after arriving at Base Camp. It was the first ascent of the season. Pik Korzhenevskaya (7105m) was then climbed on July 27 in three days (Moro, Mario Curnis, Molotov, Urubko). It was the first ascent of the season. On August 8, after four days of climbing, Moro, Curnis, Molotov and Urubko reached the summit of Pik Kommunism (7495m). It was the first ascent of the mountain in two years.

After a move to the Tien Shan, Moro, Curnis, Molotov and Urubko climbed Khan Tengri (6995m) on August 19 in 48 hours. Then, on August 25, Molotov and Urubko climbed Pik Pobeda (7434m) in four days. Moro came down with dysentery and abandoned the climb the day before the summit.

This was not the first time that the four 7000ers and Khan Tengri were climbed in one season by one group. A Russian group in the days of the former Soviet Union managed the same feat. I don’t remember the names, but I met one of the team members. He told me that they had been sponsored by the Communist government and their military club and that their climb had been easier than ours because the five mountains were at that time in one country (USSR) and they used helicopters to go to each base camp. We used cars, helicopters, buses, jeeps and foot to climb the five mountains that are now in three different republics (Kazakstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tadjikistan). In Tadjikistan there is a war (both civil and with Afghanistan) and it is very difficult to move around. Ten years before us, Anatoli Boukreev and Rinat Khaibullin climbed four of the five in one season, but this, too, was in the days of the USSR.

Simone Moro, Italy