I am in the final stages of planning a Mt Elbrus trip for this July. We will be climbing independently via the North slopes route. We will be accessing the mountain by flying into MinVody and over-landing through Kislovodsk and Pyatigorsk. I was wondering if anyone had any thoughts on purchasing supplies (specifically food) in Kislovodsk or Pyatigorsk? Do you think it would be reasonable to purchase some full meals to stock the base camp that we would not be able to haul to higher camps? Our transport will drop us off at the location of the base camp, so it might be nice to have some heavier foods like eggs, bacon, pancake mix, etc.

I have no idea what to expect in from grocery stores in Russia. I wonder if others who have climbed the peak before brought all of your meals as dehydrated food from abroad? Any thoughts would be appreciated.

You can find any kind of food at the markets in Pyatigorsk or Kislovodsk. We made an attempt to climb Mt. Elbrus via the North route in 2007 . We bought all the food including meat, chicken etc for the base camp in Pyatigorsk.