The year has already coming to an end, but I have some obligations. I need to tell something. It happened in August. I have been suggested to work as a consultant in the project “Consultancy for a feasibility study for the Pamir mountaineering and climbing school (PMCS) Khorog, Tajikistan”. The general opinion of the project is positive. We could admire communicating with people, and there are a lot of mountains and prospects. Our club did its best to use as much benefit of the trip as we could. First of all we have got acquainted with the fellow travelers from Pamir Alpine Club. We climbed up the high rocks, and I believe it will be the first step to close relations between our clubs and establishing friendship. On the other hand, it’s useful to say some words about annual music festival « The roof of the world», usually held in Khorog at the beginning of August. Three days of music and dances, a great deal of guests from all over the world brought too much impression. One could admire grandeur and magnificence of Pamir Mountains and rocks . Everyone has its own idea of paradise, but rock climbers have quite different opinion. To my mind there are few trees in their paradise, there are only steep rocks and may be beautiful hourlies waiting for them… We have visited such place in Pamir Mountains that can be called “Granite Paradise”. The first rock climbing wall we had climbed is called Tang after the name of small village Tang (narrow) its situated at the distance 37^o3748.12”N 71^o45’44.32”. The history of discovering this rock climbing wall is as following: American rock climber Bo White came here with rock drill and screws in…? But as for me, I had climbed up those rocks in 1987-88s when I had been working at the construction of Pamir power station. At the result we had seen several routes of the stations provided with necessary equipment for upper protection (insurance) of complexity from 4 to 7+ UIAA, being not very long, 20m each of them. There are granite rocks, convenient cracks for stoppers and kamalots, short trad routes with reliable statins. There is also one light route (50m) fully perforated by screws (4-5 UIAA). It is very pictures and admirable. Besides, there are three routes of 5-6 categories at the distance 37^o38’5.27”N 71^o45’19.28”E in this area per one hour strolling along the road which were marked by our friend YvoWeidmann who noted the stations and complicated districts perforated by screws as it is shown at the picture. There are also a lot of rubbles for bouldering on the large glade stretching along the massif. The next object is situated in the region of the village Bogev. The distance of this route is one rope length long. But this route is unique on the territory of Tajikistan. It is perforated by screws and its complexity reaches the 8^th category in accordance with UIAA. 37^o31’32.86”N”C 71^o40’2, 31”E. it took us one day to climb half way of route, but it was very steep. We decided to visit it once more. As I have already mentioned, we have plenty of perspectives in future. On the whole there are a lot of rocks along the road and on the banks of the rivers Gunt and Shakhdarya as well as just in the yards of people. We also saw many beautiful hourlies at the music festival Generally speaking we have attended real granite paradise, unforgettable reminiscences! At the end of my description I want to express my gratitude to my project colleagues: to the director (manager) of Pamir Alpine ClubSaidrahmonovSharafand all his fellow travel ers from PAC for their hospitality and friendship to Judith Kloiber for best example of his efficient capacity for work, to TomislavDunderovich for giving us the opportunity to adopt European experience of climbing style.

Anatoly Sharipov, better known as Tolik

topo_overview_tang_gunt