Hi, my friend and I are thinking of going to Elbrus in August 2015. We both were on Argentina mountaineering there for a couple months and attempted Aconcagua after. My friend made the summit, which was great. We are both pretty confident in our ability to make the summit without a fully guided tour, but given some of the local operator's low prices it may be worth the marginal cost to have a higher chance of success.

We looked at Pilgrim Tours, which seems to have a pretty good rep on the site. Another one that we looked at is Elbrus Tours, which I cannot get a lot of reviews on so far. Which guide service would you recommend, and if not either of these two, which others are on the mountain?

Thanks!

I have only had experience with Pilgrim Tours, who were quite satisfactory. I am sure that all of the guides are good, but try ask for Yuri or Vladimir as guides. They are both excellent.

We were happy with Elbrus Tours. We originally booked with Pilgrim for the south side, but the mountain was closed to foreigners because of trouble that year - 2011. Elbrus Tours was able to accommodate us on the North side. We had Yuri for a guide who I recommend. Yuri mentioned having also working for Pilgrim. Here is my trip report:
http://www.summitpost.org/elbrus-north-route/726384

Since we went the North route, not the standard south route I added this to the end of the trip report: "It helped that we went into this trip with significant mountain back packing and foreign experience. We live where we can hike above 4000m on the weekends. Winter climbs allow us to test ourselves and our gear in adverse conditions but less committing situations. I wouldn’t recommend this trip for those with little or no experience. Yes your guide can look out for you, but there are so many little things best experienced in stages on less challenging mountains."

Another company on the mountain was: http://5642.ru/ The page is in Russian. I can't speak of their reputation other than they seemed well equipped. I don't' know if they have English speaking guides.

Hello Andrew, I have been in contact with Ivan, certified mountain guide from there. You might want to contact him to get info. He knows Mount Elbrus very well and will be most probably happy to guide you - http://goo.gl/XSVijx Good luck ! Gauthier