Can I theoritcally climb The Mount Erciyes in the summer?

Question

I recently wanted to climb that mountain because I literally love pushing myself and it looks fun.

Information about me

• I am a 15.9 year old male teen (14-12-02)

• I live in İzmir Karşıyaka (30 meters above sea level (MASL)

• The walking distance to my school is 1.9 Kilometers and I always go there and come from there on foot with my somewhat heavy backpack. (I have always gone to the school on foot in my life)

• Iron deficiency anemia (not very strong but I don't drink tea so I think its not a big problem also I don't use anemia pills anyway)

• I have not even climbed a single gravel pile in my life

The Field

• I will go to the Kayseri by bus on The Summer

• Before climbing Erciyes I will stay at the local village Yahyalı a few days (1330 MASL) for making my body adjust itself

The Plan

• Grab the leather and fur coat (sheep) and dress thick (also not forget the feet and the legs) and wear some gloves and some good boots

• Tuck in the layered clothes for making an air seal

• Have Nokia N8 as an mirroeles compact camera (or an C1300D DSLR) and the Vibe P1 Turbo for the altimer ler (climb recorder)

• a small backpack with water and food

• Climb to the summit of The Erciyes Alone (3917 MASL)

Possible Problems\Outcomes

• I get frostbite...

• My parents won't let me do it

• The heavy, sheep leather and fur coat of my grandpa eats all my energy

• I literally slip/fall

• Phone literally freezes

• I Suffocate

Questions

• How much water should I bring?

• what should be the weight of my backpack plus the coat? (I may get an full sized tripod too)

• will I make it without dying or getting parts of my body amputated or permanent organ damage ?

• does the standard rate of tempeture decrease of 1 degrees celcius every 200 meters hold up there?

• Will my phones freeze?

• Is my plan decent?

Answer 1

From what I have read, I would say the part of your plan to

Climb to the summit of The Erciyes Alone (3917 MASL)

is a no go with your experience and gear.

Assuming this route description is accurate the climb/hike starts at 2750m after a drive and a couple of chair lifts.

Your gear should be fine to get you there in the summer. It is then a 2.5 hour hike to PARMAK KAYA at 3700m. There is apparently a visible path with a moderate grade. From there you would have a nice view of the summits. Your gear would not be too much of a problem, but lack of experience and age would worry me. You would probably want to go with someone else, preferable someone with more experience.

From PARMAK KAYA to HÖRGÜC KAYA 3820m there are a number of obstacles requiring navigating a steep snow field and loose gravel slopes with constant danger of rock fall. This is the first summit. You might be able to make it there. As long as you can keep moving your cloths will be plenty warm. You do not mention anything about footwear, but you are probably going to need heavy boots to be able to kick steps and you may want/need an ice axe for balance. Given your experience this is probably a no go. With someone how knows what they are doing and reasonable boots, you could probably do this. That said, it is a serious climb and there could be many reasons that would force you to turn back.

To get to the summit 3917, there is a section of real rock climbing on what appears to be loose rock with some serious potential for a slip to result in a very big fall. Note the ice axes, helmets, and clothing for comparison purposes.

Some of the climb might be protected by a rope ladder, but from the descriptions I have seen, not all of it is.

The descent is the same as the ascent, so you need to be able to go both up and down. There is no way I would take an inexperienced person on that route without having first hand knowledge of the climb and descent.

In summary, the hike to PARMAK KAYA sounds and looks awesome. I would suggest trying to find someone with a little more experience and giving that a shot. You should be able to get lots of photos and stoke your desire to do more climbing.

Answer 2

Categorically, no.

1) As ab2 said, you need experience. You need to learn how much you can do (note that hiking endurance isn't very related to how one performs in sports--my nephew is 10 years younger than I am, plays multiple sports frequently but I, who have never played sports, can go much farther than he can) and how you handle altitude. I routinely hike in areas 2,400m to 3,000m above sea level, we live 800m above sea level. I see plenty of people up there who can't handle the altitude.

2) What ab2 missed is the nature of the climb itself. His advice would be appropriate if it were simply a hike on a reasonable trail. However, that is not the case--you are climbing on loose volcanic rock. This is a skill you obviously do not have and even with experience this isn't exactly the safest thing to be doing. (Personally, this alone would make me reject it on safety reasons.)

3) Even worse than the loose rock is that you can't reach the summit without mountaineering skills and equipment, something else you obviously do not possess.

4) Your proposed clothing is unsuitable. I say this without needing to know anything about how warm your coat is because no possible coat is acceptable. The problem is the temperature will be changing as you go up, and as the day progresses, for this much of an ascent you must have multiple layers of clothing so you can add or remove as you go.

As for the hazards you mention:

Keeping your phone from freezing is simple enough--carry it inside a warm layer of clothing. I've been hailed on, my phone in my shirt pocket didn't care. However, unless it's in airplane mode (which means no GPS) you're very likely to run your battery out.

Slip/fall--given what you describe vs what you're facing I would say the only question is how badly you fall.

Suffocate--no danger of that, but if you pushed on despite altitude sickness symptoms you're getting into the range where it could be life threatening.

Frostbite--I'd be more worried about not making it down in time and getting stuck overnight and getting hypothermia.

Edit: Since you still don't seem to realize what you're facing: While I haven't found any pictures of what the mountaintop itself is like I have found multiple people who have rated it as class IV. Thus I grabbed an image of a class IV route--this is simply the first hit from Google, not selected to be a hard example: