As part of our ten-year anniversary celebrations, the RED team has picked out some of our favourite RED projects over the past decade.
This month, Paul shares his high-altitude highlights from an amazing trip to Kyrgyzstan.
“There’s gold in them thar hills?” is an apt expression (from Mark Twain’s 1892 novel The American Claimant) to describe our trip to the Kumtor gold mine.
Like Twain, our goal was to come back with a story. And that we did, with a tale of adventure including an eight-hour expedition from Kyrgyzstan’s capital Bishkek.
Our epic 220-mile journey took us across some beautiful terrain, climbing to a spectacular site, located 50 miles south of Lake Issyk-Kul (near the Chinese border) and more than 4,000 metres above sea level in the Tian Shan mountains.
It was an amazing and truly humbling experience, hosted by Vice President of Operations, Rodney Stuparyk and his amazing team. The sub-zero, high-altitude working conditions are as tough as it gets for man and machine at the largest gold mine in Central Asia – and one of the highest gold deposits in the world.
With access all areas, we may have only been there for three days, but we gained so much respect for the friendly, yet professional approach of the Kumtor team, with a determination and spirit that was second to none!
Check out the movie below!