Hola todos!
I just had an awesome adventure to the tallest mountain in North and South America. Originally I had posted crappy quality photos of all the pages from my journal accounting my experience, but due to popular request have since transcribed them into the following, more readable, account. Read below for the story of how it all went down. Thanks!
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| Sleeping at 5050 meters above sea level. Still over one vertical mile to go to get to the top from this, Plaza Canada. |
Dec. 30, 2013
I guess things are actually rolling with this Aconcagua adventure. I mean literally rolling, my bus took off just ten minutes ago destined to Mendoza, Argentina from Santiago, Chile and having found myself in the seat when it departed I came to the realization that this whole thing is actually going through. Oh. My. God. What have I signed up for!?
To be perfectly honest I am having quite a difficult time focusing my thoughts. There is quite a lot I am very worried about. All logistical things, I cannot help wondering if I will be able to get all my ducks in a row in the next few days before I hit the trail. Included on the to-do list are rent plastic mountaineering boots, buy a compass, find waterproof pants, buy food for the expedition, arrange for a mule service, buy my permit for climbing the mountain, and before all of that exchange money! That last item on the list scares me the most - exchanging money. I'm currently sitting with over a grand in cash in my pocket - all of which I will need to complete this expedition, and that's cheap in comparison to what most people end up paying. I'm going as cheap as possible, no porters, no chef service, mules (but only to get to basecamp, not to get out of the park), and no guide. I am going solo, so any single fuckup is completely my own fault. I just wish I could stop worrying about getting robbed...
I know everything will probably be fine, I am just tired of stressing my brain with this worry worry worry. I just want to climb this mountain and stop overthinking it! How is it so impossible to stop this train of thought when there is absolutely nothing I can do for now but sit?! Maybe that's why the phrase is 'train of thought', because trains are huge and impossible for a human to stop. I'd rather it be a 'Chilean bus of thought', which are weak, and stop for everything. We are stopped now...
I keep nodding off and every time immediately drift to dreaming. This time I was in a dream on Aconcagua. The scenery was incredible, and my path flat and easy. I was happy. A baby cries somewhere on our bus and I am snapped from the dream world back to reality - this time with a sense of calm, train of thought no longer running wild. I feel calm, and in this calm state I feel as if the mountain has already been climbed. I take a deep sigh of relief. Maybe things will be okay after all.
Dec. 31, 2013
It's New Year's Eve and I have arrived in Mendoza. The day is full of running from chore to chore. One by one I check the boxes on my to-do list each with a confident flourish. Things are falling into place nicely.
The plan is to get to the village of Penitentes today by late afternoon - a four hour busride from Mendoza. Penitentes being the closest village to the trailhead leading to Aconcagua, it is required to buy the permit to climb the mountain, in person, in Mendoza and then catch this bus to Penitentes. After having completed all my other objectives, I lumber to the bus station under the weight of my 95 lbs of gear and food. Tickets to Penitentes are sold out today. Damn.
On my way out of the bust station to find a hostel I meet Galen and Michael, two South Africans with their sights on Aconcagua as well! Together we find a hostel, I tell them what I know about the mountain, and we spend the night swimming, cheersing a good year, and talking about our plans for the mountain and beyond. An excellent way to usher in the New Year.
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| Michael and Galen, the two rad South Africans. |
Jan. 1, 2014
Wake early, head to the bus station, and catch the first available one to Penitentes. Meet with my mule-driver and deliver my baggage, check my permit and begin hiking. Woohoo! This trip is finally underway. After three hours of hiking, I arrive to Confluencia, make dinner, and camp under the stars.
Jan. 2, 2014
Today is supposed to be the longest hike of the entire trip, so I wake early and begin hiking by 9am. It's beautiful today. I am hiking on a well worn path of dirt directly through the barren Horcones Valley. While the path winds back and forth across a river running parallel with the valley floor, it becomes immediately apparent that this is not a place that supports much life. Bones litter the ground and plantlife begins to thin as I slowly get higher in elevation. After about five hours of hiking I arrive to basecamp, Plaza de Mulas, where I find my duffel bag (with broken eggs and yolk all over everything) and set up a place to camp and sleep soundly. I am now at approximately 14,100 ft of elevation.
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| Skeletons of mules and horses littering the path from Confluencia to Plaza de Mulas. |
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| Broken eggs in my duffel on the back of the mule. Dried egg ALL over my things when I arrive to basecamp. |
Jan. 3, 2014
A lazy, lazy day. I wake late feeling overpoweringly tired. Decided it's going to be a rest day after yesterday's long hike. Change my mind an hour later and run up to the next camp, Plaza Canada, with a load of things to cache there. I'll move the rest of my things up there tomorrow and camp there. On the way up I meet an American team of climbers. It is so good to hear native English again! These guys are prepared, they have GPS tracking devices (for their families to see where they are on Google Earth in real time), satelite phones, porters, and wherever they camp their campment resembles a Mountain Hardwear advertisement. Awesome.
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| As a drastic comparison to the technology displayed by the American team, my armory consisted of a map, compass, and pen. |
Jan. 4, 2014
I spend the morning running the rest of my things up to Plaza Canada. My pack feels light after yesterday's gear drop. While setting up my tent I wave goodbye to two Scandinavians I met briefly yesterday, Rickard and Joel. Like me, they are proceeding solo, without a guide, and therefore might be good partners to link up with later when we are all closer to the top. They seem strong.
After having set my tent and eaten lunch, I look down at my watch surprised to realize it is only 1pm. I have the rest of the day to do nothing and, feeling strong, decide to make a load run up to the next camp. I can stash some food there, and might buy myself an extra day in doing so. I pack my bag with a load of compressed gas and food and head for Alaska - the camp where the Scandinavians are staying.
It feels a bit like I am pushing up too quickly, but I am well acclimatized (having climbed up to 19,200 ft just five days ago on Volcan San José), and, muscle fatigue aside, it is important to push up as fast as I can to the upper camps in order to get into position to take advantage of a good weather window for a summit push. The weather on Aconcagua has been eerily clear, and I am afraid that if I do not hurry I will be caught in a storm in the upper camps and will lose my chance to get to the top. The thought of returning home empty handed from this mountain makes me shudder. All that money down the drain. I simply cannot let that mentality dictate how I ascend. Listen to your body. Rely on your training. Watch the daily weather reports. These are the things to focus on right now.
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| View of the adjacent glacier from Plaza Canada, camp 2. |
Jan. 5, 2014
A very restless night last night. I wake this morning feeling incredibly sluggish. Up and moving by 9:15, I pack and make my way to Nido de Cóndores, the next camp above Alaska. My pack feels heavy and any small excuse allows me to stop myself for a break. I arrive to Nido de Cóndores around noon, find a place for my tent, and immediately lay down to take a nap in the spot. For the first time on this trip I can really feel the altitude. It's no surprise either, in just four days I have ascended from 8,500 ft to 18,200 ft. The nap helps a tad, but I wake up still feeling groggy. It takes all of my willpower to head down to Alaska to retrieve the food cache from yesterday's run. Rickard and Joel are down there, they accompany me back up to Nido de Cóndores and we set up our tents next to eachother.
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| Joel and Rickard, the Scandinavians, with their ONE backpack (120 Liters) which they traded off between themselves every day. Shared a tent the final night with these amazing fellows. Picture here taken from Plaza Canada. |
I awake feeling groggy and tired. Thank God today is a rest day! It comes much needed. I poke my head out of the opening in my tent and see the friendly faces of Rickard and Joel preparing their breakfast. They plan to move up to the next camp, Cólera, today. Good for them, that means a summit bid on their part tomorrow. I wish them the best.
''Not me, not today,'' I think to myself, ''I need to rest today.''
I don't feel the altitude as strongly as I did last night. A quick read of my vitals shows I am acclimatizing well. But nonetheless, my journey has been almost completely non-stop since I left Santiago, and it's not wise to push your body as hard as I have been - well acclimatized or not.
I leave the tent and wander over to the American's campment of Mountain Hardwear tents. The weather is looking fine for Jan. 8, 9, and 10, they inform me, and each of those days will be getting progressively worse. Awesome, I think. That is actually perfect for my ascension schedule. January 8th will be my summit day then, and I'll get my long awaited rest day after all.
The park ranger tent is nearby so I wander there next. God, what a lazy life it is up here in the mountains when you don't have to be hiking anywhere. Should have brought a book, note to future self. The park rangers have a different forecast than the Americans. Mind you, every available forecast has a huge margin of uncertainty, the rangers inform me that the last of the current good-weather window will be tomorrow and that January 8 will definitely be too windy to summit. Damn! My plan potentially foiled, I walk back to my tent stressed and unsure which forecast to believe - the American's or the ranger's. Inventorying my food, I realize that while I do have enough food stockpiled to scrape by while waiting out a four day storm in hopes of a chance to summit afterwards, it would not be comfortable to do so and it may not be necessary if I could just move my schedule back one day.
I head back to my tent to think and process. It's a tough decision. Forging ahead means a greater chance a getting up this mountain, taking advantage of this weather window. On the other hand, pushing for the summit tomorrow means no rest day today, with implies an abbreviation of my acclimatization schedule, and potentially making myself susceptible to high altitude sickness - which is absolutely not worth getting to the top of this mountain. A quick jot of a pros and cons list organizes my thoughts and I emerge from the tent with confidence having come to a decision.
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''I made a decision guys,'' I announce to the Scandinavians, ''I'm going up with you guys tonight to Cólera. Tomorrow we summit!''
Together we cheer, and immediately get to work preparing. We have agreed to share their three-man tent and leave mine here to fill with things we won't need up there. We will bring one stove, enough gas for 3 days (in case of emergency) and all of our super-warm clothing. The temperature, we hear, can get as low as -15° F up there, so we don't want to be turned away by the cold.
Ready to go by 6pm, we leave Nido de Cóndores with light packs and arrive to Cólera after laborious hours. I feel like I'm sucking heavily at the thin air up here. We are now at approximately 19,600 ft and every tiny action feels like a chore. Standing up too quickly brings on a debilitating headrush, collecting ice to melt feels equivalent to an entire day spent mining, and on top of it all we must melt ice and snow with our altitude-suffering stove to produce enough water for tomorrow. Ughhh. We set up the tent upon arrival and the effort required nearly exhausts us.
Cozy in our sleeping bags with stove sputtering, we melt snow and ice until 11pm but I'm still not sure we have produced enough. Too tired, and too affected by the altitude to continue, I fall asleep by midnight to the sound of wind whacking the walls of our tent. Tomorrow is summit day, I need to sleep.
Jan. 7, 2014
It's 2am and I am wide awake. My stream of consciousness is as active as a kitten and I cannot go back to sleep. Goddammit, on the one night that sleep is the most important, I cannot get it. I never have problems sleeping, and look at me now. The seconds tick painfully by like minutes.
Joel and Rickard are up at 4am making more water for the day. They both feel incredible, they say, and cannot wait to begin. Not me, I feel like complete shit, with a headache that rivals those after my most intense all-niters in college. Ughh. I really hope this headache is a symptom of sleep deprivation and not the altitude. I roll over in my sleeping bag and try to snooze off the pain. The plan is to leave the tent by 6am.
At 5am I get up to force down some oatmeal. The headache lingers painfully, but the boys are supportive.
''You have to come,'' they coax, ''this is the day you will summit Aconcagua and the weather is perfect.''
Man, wouldn't it be great to finish this thing today? God, how ready I am to be done with this mountain. But I know the severity of pulmonary or cerebral edema, and I will not flirt with disaster. In my mind the only options are to descend or ascend - I will not stay here at this camp. If I ascend it must be without headache, if I descend it must be because the headache did not abate. I am well acclimatized, having just ascended Volcan San José just 9 days ago up to 19,200 ft, and the head pain doesn't feel altitude related like I have experienced in the past. Running through my Wilderness First Aid training, I remember the notes on HACE and HAPE. Taking pain-killing drugs at altitude is a tricky business. Typically it isn't recommended to pop pills at the start of any ailment high in the mountains, but then again if ibuprofin is administered for headache in high altitude and pain does not abate, then one has reason to worry. If the pain goes away, all is well until/if further symptoms arise. Cautiously, I take two pills and begin eating my oatmeal, crossing my fingers for the best.
Like magic, the pain is gone an hour later and Joel, Rickard, and I excitedly prepare for our day with renewed enthusiam.
By 6am we leave the tent and the cold penetrates us like a bucket of ice-water. I turn to Rickard and ask, ''aren't you cold?!'', as he is wearing nothing more than a light down jacket and military-issue hiking boots.
''No way,'' he retorts, ''my viking blood does not allow me to feel cold!''
The proceeding thirteen hours turn out to be the most strenuous of my entire life. The 3,300 vertical feet we had to climb that day were done at such a snail's pace over loose scree that the entire day was spent slipping and sliding - eight hours up, five hours down - at a rate of two steps up the path one step sliding backwards. Absolutely horrible.
About four hours into this torture-fest, we reach the infamous Travesia - a flat section about half a mile long which is susceptible to winds upwards of 50mph. Winds of this strength, plus already extremely cold high-altitude temperatures equals deathly cold windchill and frostbite temperatures. I'm wary of this and have prepared by renting plastic double-boots and am covered from head to toe in down clothing; however, this seems to be news to many who are clad in nothing more than light jackets and hiking boots. I see a few turn back early because of their ill-preparedness.
We begin the traverse and I am immediately chilled to the core. At one point I turn around to see that the man behind me has his nose partially exposed from under his goggles and facemask and that the exposed part of his nostril is blue-white, clearly frost nipped. Startled, I try to point out the issue, ''su nariz'' I repeat over and over. ''Your nose is freezing'', I try in English but to no avail. He just returns a blank stare as if in a trance. This man is not in good condition. The man's guide then sees what I am talking about and stops the man to fix the issue. I move on, checking my own face for exposed flesh. Frostbite, I remind myself, is extremely common on this mountain. Wiping my own nose leaves an entirely intact snot-icicle on my glove about two inches long. I wonder what I would look like without a nose.
I'm now supposedly one hour from the summit. I have just run into Joel, Richard, and Nick (the only member of the American team to try for the summit today) who are all on their way down from the top. My energy level is hovering on Empty so it is incredibly good to see familiar faces.
''One more hour'', they all chime in unison. Apparently they were the first to reach the summit today. I am happy for them. They leave me with water, food, and confidence - all of which I had previously depleted - and I'm on my way again with fresh legs.
The next hour was easily the most difficult of my entire life. Every five steps over the loose path I stop, panting for breath, sucking at the thin air. Each break growing longer than the last, my last ten steps to the summit are so labored that upon reaching the summit I collapse in a miserable pile on the rocks and sleep soundly for 30 minutes.
Upon waking, the fanfare of reaching the top of this kept to a minimum between my nausea, sudden need to shit, fatigue, and a dorky American couple poking me awake in order that I will take their photo with the rubber ducks they have hauled to the summit. I oblige, but the wacky scene is too much for me, I snap a few photos and am already making my way down.
Like before, I find myself stopping every five steps for a break and a quick microsleep. The path is so difficult to descend - as hard, if not harder, than the ascenscion. From the top of Aconcagua you can clearly see camp Nido de Cóndores - where my tent, sleeping bag, and food lie - and from where I sit resting (my energy completely spent, sucking at the non-existent air), those tents down there seem impossibly far away.
Five steps, rest. Five steps, rest. Five steps, rest...
About halfway down I get passed by a park ranger escorting a hiker down the loose scree. The hiker, attached to the ranger about the waist by a leash of webbing, is stumbling down the path as if he is completely drunk. The path is loose on the way down, and it is hard me to get good footing, but this guy has something fundamentally wrong. Clearly in a worse state than I, if this altitude-sick climber can make it down alright, then so can I. I find a second wind in this comparison and redouble my efforts, increasing my pace.
Fifteen steps, rest. Fifteen steps, rest. Fifteen steps, rest...
Further down the path I get, and progressively the air become easier to breathe. Before long the tents don't seem impossibly far away and I find myself no longer needing breaks between steps. I'm still exhausted, but have almost made it home.
It's at this point that I realize exactly what I have accomplished. I have climbed Aconcagua - the tallest mountain in the Americas - and emotion hits my tired brain like a train. Not only have I reached the top, but I did so in seven days! That's fast. Like, ungodly fast, I hear. It's no wonder I am so exhausted.
I arrive to my tent just as my energy gives out and collapse into my sleeping bag. Richard and Joel have already descended in search of pizza in Plaza de Mulas and I am sad not to have someone to celebrate with. It's alright though, I really am too tired to do anything - including cook. So instead I roll over and sleep harder than the rocks I have been scrambling over all day, feeling content, exhausted, and smiling.
Aconcagua, check!
After the Trip.
Reflecting on the torture involved in getting up Mt. Aconcagua, I am again reminded how much more important the journey can be than the destination on trips like these. Having arrived to the summit at the end of my rope, finding such difficult conditions and those dorky Americans with their rubber duckies, it makes me glad that I could share the experience with the Joel and Rickard, with the America team, with all the rad porters and rangers along the way, and it makes me especially thankful for having been able to complete the mission solo, successfully. All that time I had to sit in my tent and reflect on my experiences made the trip so much more meaningful than just any other mountain has ever been for me. Overall, I am incredibly glad (and lucky) to have been able to summit without consequence, but I think the summit won't ever be what I remember best about climbing Cerro Aconcagua.
Thanks for reading!
Joel and Rickard are up at 4am making more water for the day. They both feel incredible, they say, and cannot wait to begin. Not me, I feel like complete shit, with a headache that rivals those after my most intense all-niters in college. Ughh. I really hope this headache is a symptom of sleep deprivation and not the altitude. I roll over in my sleeping bag and try to snooze off the pain. The plan is to leave the tent by 6am.
At 5am I get up to force down some oatmeal. The headache lingers painfully, but the boys are supportive.
''You have to come,'' they coax, ''this is the day you will summit Aconcagua and the weather is perfect.''
Man, wouldn't it be great to finish this thing today? God, how ready I am to be done with this mountain. But I know the severity of pulmonary or cerebral edema, and I will not flirt with disaster. In my mind the only options are to descend or ascend - I will not stay here at this camp. If I ascend it must be without headache, if I descend it must be because the headache did not abate. I am well acclimatized, having just ascended Volcan San José just 9 days ago up to 19,200 ft, and the head pain doesn't feel altitude related like I have experienced in the past. Running through my Wilderness First Aid training, I remember the notes on HACE and HAPE. Taking pain-killing drugs at altitude is a tricky business. Typically it isn't recommended to pop pills at the start of any ailment high in the mountains, but then again if ibuprofin is administered for headache in high altitude and pain does not abate, then one has reason to worry. If the pain goes away, all is well until/if further symptoms arise. Cautiously, I take two pills and begin eating my oatmeal, crossing my fingers for the best.
Like magic, the pain is gone an hour later and Joel, Rickard, and I excitedly prepare for our day with renewed enthusiam.
By 6am we leave the tent and the cold penetrates us like a bucket of ice-water. I turn to Rickard and ask, ''aren't you cold?!'', as he is wearing nothing more than a light down jacket and military-issue hiking boots.
''No way,'' he retorts, ''my viking blood does not allow me to feel cold!''
The proceeding thirteen hours turn out to be the most strenuous of my entire life. The 3,300 vertical feet we had to climb that day were done at such a snail's pace over loose scree that the entire day was spent slipping and sliding - eight hours up, five hours down - at a rate of two steps up the path one step sliding backwards. Absolutely horrible.
About four hours into this torture-fest, we reach the infamous Travesia - a flat section about half a mile long which is susceptible to winds upwards of 50mph. Winds of this strength, plus already extremely cold high-altitude temperatures equals deathly cold windchill and frostbite temperatures. I'm wary of this and have prepared by renting plastic double-boots and am covered from head to toe in down clothing; however, this seems to be news to many who are clad in nothing more than light jackets and hiking boots. I see a few turn back early because of their ill-preparedness.
We begin the traverse and I am immediately chilled to the core. At one point I turn around to see that the man behind me has his nose partially exposed from under his goggles and facemask and that the exposed part of his nostril is blue-white, clearly frost nipped. Startled, I try to point out the issue, ''su nariz'' I repeat over and over. ''Your nose is freezing'', I try in English but to no avail. He just returns a blank stare as if in a trance. This man is not in good condition. The man's guide then sees what I am talking about and stops the man to fix the issue. I move on, checking my own face for exposed flesh. Frostbite, I remind myself, is extremely common on this mountain. Wiping my own nose leaves an entirely intact snot-icicle on my glove about two inches long. I wonder what I would look like without a nose.
...
I'm now supposedly one hour from the summit. I have just run into Joel, Richard, and Nick (the only member of the American team to try for the summit today) who are all on their way down from the top. My energy level is hovering on Empty so it is incredibly good to see familiar faces.
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| My Scandinavian Saviors! Rickard and Joel, with their anti-freeze viking blood. |
The next hour was easily the most difficult of my entire life. Every five steps over the loose path I stop, panting for breath, sucking at the thin air. Each break growing longer than the last, my last ten steps to the summit are so labored that upon reaching the summit I collapse in a miserable pile on the rocks and sleep soundly for 30 minutes.
Upon waking, the fanfare of reaching the top of this kept to a minimum between my nausea, sudden need to shit, fatigue, and a dorky American couple poking me awake in order that I will take their photo with the rubber ducks they have hauled to the summit. I oblige, but the wacky scene is too much for me, I snap a few photos and am already making my way down.
Like before, I find myself stopping every five steps for a break and a quick microsleep. The path is so difficult to descend - as hard, if not harder, than the ascenscion. From the top of Aconcagua you can clearly see camp Nido de Cóndores - where my tent, sleeping bag, and food lie - and from where I sit resting (my energy completely spent, sucking at the non-existent air), those tents down there seem impossibly far away.
Five steps, rest. Five steps, rest. Five steps, rest...
About halfway down I get passed by a park ranger escorting a hiker down the loose scree. The hiker, attached to the ranger about the waist by a leash of webbing, is stumbling down the path as if he is completely drunk. The path is loose on the way down, and it is hard me to get good footing, but this guy has something fundamentally wrong. Clearly in a worse state than I, if this altitude-sick climber can make it down alright, then so can I. I find a second wind in this comparison and redouble my efforts, increasing my pace.
Fifteen steps, rest. Fifteen steps, rest. Fifteen steps, rest...
Further down the path I get, and progressively the air become easier to breathe. Before long the tents don't seem impossibly far away and I find myself no longer needing breaks between steps. I'm still exhausted, but have almost made it home.
It's at this point that I realize exactly what I have accomplished. I have climbed Aconcagua - the tallest mountain in the Americas - and emotion hits my tired brain like a train. Not only have I reached the top, but I did so in seven days! That's fast. Like, ungodly fast, I hear. It's no wonder I am so exhausted.
I arrive to my tent just as my energy gives out and collapse into my sleeping bag. Richard and Joel have already descended in search of pizza in Plaza de Mulas and I am sad not to have someone to celebrate with. It's alright though, I really am too tired to do anything - including cook. So instead I roll over and sleep harder than the rocks I have been scrambling over all day, feeling content, exhausted, and smiling.
Aconcagua, check!
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| Summit shot: So tired, so nauseous, so ready to get down. |
After the Trip.
Reflecting on the torture involved in getting up Mt. Aconcagua, I am again reminded how much more important the journey can be than the destination on trips like these. Having arrived to the summit at the end of my rope, finding such difficult conditions and those dorky Americans with their rubber duckies, it makes me glad that I could share the experience with the Joel and Rickard, with the America team, with all the rad porters and rangers along the way, and it makes me especially thankful for having been able to complete the mission solo, successfully. All that time I had to sit in my tent and reflect on my experiences made the trip so much more meaningful than just any other mountain has ever been for me. Overall, I am incredibly glad (and lucky) to have been able to summit without consequence, but I think the summit won't ever be what I remember best about climbing Cerro Aconcagua.
Thanks for reading!
A few more pics...
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| The plastic double-boots appropriate for the summit, and fit for the Moon! |
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| Some of the rad cooks and porters encountered along the way. |
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| The hike in to Plaza de Mulas. |
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| Plaza Canada: The American team I met in view here, all tucked away in their Mountain Hardware tent kingdom. |
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| View from the final camp, Cólera, before January 7's successful summit bid. |
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| Summit Day: The sun rises over the clouds and Mt. Aconcagua. |
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| The Ghost of Aconcagua: As the sun rose over the East side of the Mountain, the shadow of our out-of-view summit was projected onto the westward hanging fog. |
