Classic Climbs in the Caucasus

Rating:
Summary: Better no guidebook at all than this area "guide"!
Review: I am the native of the area described, I climbed for some time there and I live in the USA now. First of all it's a joke to try to try compressing the North Caucasus' climbs in 200 or so pages. The book contains astonishing number of errors in places' names, misspellings and incorrect captions, that ruin any confidence. The most terrible mistake is in the very name of the book where author calls the Balkar portion of the Range "The Svanetian Range". That is a huge misnomer because the real Svanetian Range separates Upper Svanetia from Lower Svanetia with Mt. Laila being its highest point. Author probably used very old, perhaps the World War II maps of the area used by the German "Edelweiss" division when fighting the Russians there. One of few color photographs clearly shows the Adyl-su valley while the caption states "Nakra valley" or something like that. The book is poorly translated from German, with some puzzling phrases for example, the Split Glacier is called Abgezweigert Glacier, the name that doesn't even distantly resemble the local tongue.
Actual route descriptions are VERY OUT OF DATE! For example if you follow the advise and climb Mt. Ortokara, you will be probably killed by a rockfall, since nobody climbs that side of the Bezingi valley for many years, due to the Global Warming and glacier melting. Route schemes are very detailless and shabby! The routes numbering is a mess! Grades are simply stated in Russian system where a 250-meter rock climb in Crimea and The Russian route on Mt. Everest have the same 5 A grade! There is absolutely no useful practical information in this brochure. On the contrary the book is often misleading even in safety issues. For instance it doesn't even mention the dangers of crossing into or even getting close to the southern slopes of the Range (Shkhelda valley in summer) , lest being robbed or murdered by the Svans, whose land descended into a complete lawlessness in the recent years.
Feel free to reach me with any questions on DETAILS of REAL, CURRENT CONDITIONS of climbing in the North Caucasus at [e-mail]