Camels joined Zhumayev's expedition to K2

International expedition to K2 mount, or Chogori, switched from jeeps to camels in China and started a 4-day trip to the base camp, Kazakhstan alpinist Maksut Zhumayev posted in his blog. The caravan includes 40 camels, each of them carrying 100 kg of supplies. The equipment and food are expected to last until the end of the summer. The caravan are accompanied by ten camel-drivers. The expedition is planning to reach the mountain pass in two days and then spend two more days walking along the Shaksgam River. The camels were provided for the alpinists my Zhumayev’s old friend, a local Aksakal (the tribe’s head of Turkic people). He already helped the sportsman during his previous attempt to ascent K2 in 2007. A little earlier the expedition got delayed for a few hours in China. One of their trucks with equipment broke down in the mountain gorge. “Our guide Iskander sent a jeep back to find the truck. It turned out that it broke down in a mountain gorge and went back to the village. We had to rent a new truck and re-load all equipment. This caused the delay,” Zhumayev said. He also explained why the team had to regroup its supplies before crossing the Chinese border: “This was made for one reason – to hide satellite terminal and Thuraya phone, and the most important, to hide sausages! We were told that Chinese customs are particularly ill-affected to these products of civilization.” The goal of the expedition is to ascent the most northern eight-thousander: the 8611 meter tall Chogori. It is located in the Karakorum mountain range in Kashmir province (at the border between Pakistan and China). This is the sixth attempt to ascent K2 for Zhumayev.