The Caucasus mountains are climbing skyward in a tectonic crumble between the seas. Among them Elbrus, the highest.

What do you need to know about Elbrus?

It is:

• 5,642m tall (18,510ft)

• Located in the western Caucasus – within the geographic Europe

• One of the seven summits (the highest mountains in each continent)

• Our challenge for the week

The taller summit (the one we went to) was first reached in 1874 by Akhia Sottaiev – a guide working for a few Englishmen and a Swiss.

One hundred and forty-three years later, as part of the guide team I found myself among the ranks of Exped Adventure. We were a ten-strong team of varied backgrounds and ages, ready for an attempt for the summit. Of course, there’s much more to be done in order to achieve such a goal and most of the things have been covered in the training day. Typical questions include the effects of altitude, the boots, crampons and the warmth of the kit that you may need.

The answers to most of th...

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“All that I know most surely about morality and obligations, I owe to football.” So said French philosopher and sometime goalkeeper, Albert Camus.

I understand where he is coming from but I would add on the word “stickers” to the end.

It has been my long-held belief that the way you collect football stickers as a child goes a long way to defining your adulthood.

Me? I collected every football sticker album going throughout the ’80s (and a fair few that weren’t about football).

Never completed an album. Rarely even got close.

And so it transpired that my later life has seen me flit from project to project without ever quite managing to perfect the art of focusing on one task at a time.

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