Last year, they opened a new route on the Southwest Face of Manaslu. Now Andrey Vasiliev and his all-Russian team want to pioneer another alpine-style line next spring, this time on Everest. They have the expertise to succeed. All they lack is the money.
Vasiliev, with partners Sergey Kondrashkin, Vitaly Shipilov, and Natalya Belyankina, will fly to Kathmandu next Sunday to scout. “Once there, we’ll see,” Vasiliev told ExplorersWeb. The team plans not to use support or oxygen, either.
Financial struggle
The Manaslu 2025 expedition earned them the Russian version of the Piolet d’Or, and ExplorersWeb ranked it among the best expeditions of the year. Previously, Vasiliev led two remarkable attempts on the South Face of Everest.
Left to right, Sergey Kondrashkin, Vitaly Shipilov, and Andrey Vasiliev during their descent on Manaslu. Photo: Andrey Vasiliev
According to Vasiliev, the ideal plan would be to climb Everest this fall, to test their gear and their own performance without supplemental oxygen on 8,849m Everest, which will differ from their experience on 8,163m Manaslu, one of the lower 8,000’ers. The additional 700m is huge, especially without bottled oxygen.
Vasiliev on the precarious SSW Ridge of Cho Oyu in 2024. Photo: RAF
Alone on the mountain
Should they get there, they would be completely alone on the mountain and would need to find a way across the Khumbu Icefall. Such a feat is not impossible if there’s enough snow — Andrzej Bargiel did it on skis last fall — or if they plan a different route. However, days before departure, they don’t have enough money to climb Everest next month.
“We still need to raise [nearly $24,000] to cover the fall expedition,” member Natalya Belyankina confirmed. In a previous post, she said that their full spring attempt next year will cost almost $240,000. Even if you’re going alpine style and unsupported, Everest is never cheap.
Natalya Belyankina during a hypoxic training session in St. Petersburg. Photo: Natalya Belyankina/Instagram
“That is why we currently have in mind Plans A, B, and C, each of them very different,” Vasiliev said. When we last spoke to him on Monday, Vasiliev had not lost hope for last-minute funding, but was realistically preparing to climb either a more economical 8,000’er or a lesser peak.
Autumn costs
Climbing Everest from Nepal in the fall is cheaper than in the spring, when the permit fee is $15,000. The fall permit costs $7,500 for the standard South Col route and $5,000 for a different route. Among the other 8,000’ers, the autumn favorite is Manaslu, where the climbing fee is $3,000 per person. The other Nepalese giants — Lhotse, Kangchenjunga, Makalu, Dhaulagiri, and Annapurna — have a fall permit fee of $1,500.
On the final summit ridge of Manaslu. Photo: Andrey Vasilyev
