RMI Expeditions BlogRSS

Posts from 01/2010

RMI Team Arrives at Casa de Piedra

Posted by: | January 11, 2010
Categories: *Expedition Dispatches *Aconcagua
Elevation: 10,700 ft.

This is Gabriel checking in from Aconcagua, we are at Casa de Piedra at 10,700’. Yesterday and today we have hiked through the Vacas Valley and everybody in the team did great. Finally, this afternoon we caught our first view of Aconcagua. The spirit of the team is very high and everybody is enjoying the trip. Today we had a persistent front wind during the hike, but the good thing is that the winds on the top of the mountain and at high camps were much stronger these past few days and we were not there.

Tomorrow morning we will cross the river with the help of the mules, so we will see who in the team receives the “Best Mule Rider!” Award. Later in the afternoon we will get to Plaza Argentina, our Basecamp were we will spend a few days.

We will be sending more dispatches and some pictures from Aconcagua basecamp.
Gabriel, Tyler and Jake.

---

Still in Punta Arenas

Posted by: | January 10, 2010
Categories: *Expedition Dispatches *Vinson Massif

Antarctica was simply not in the cards today. Too windy down at Patriot Hills, where our big four-engine jet transport has to put down on wheels on an ice runway. The prevailing winds are across the strip and it doesn’t take much to make airplane landing attempts unwise. It wasn’t a big storm system, just normal katabatics… the gravity driven flow of air off the polar plateau, downward and outward toward Antarctica’s coast. The good thing was that ALE could tell us definitively that the day wouldn’t work, rather than keeping everybody in their boots and waiting hour to hour for some calmer conditions. People were free to lounge about or to stroll the quiet streets. It being Sunday in South America, there wasn’t much at all going on in the streets of Punta Arenas this morning. There were a fair number of people walking about as a massive 2000 plus passenger cruise ship was anchored just out from the city pier. Well into the afternoon, it was a fine summer day, warm and windless, but in the late afternoon it clouded up and got cool and rainy. Typically, Punta gets dynamic weather with big swings on any given day. None of this prevented my climbers from going out to visit Otway Sound for a tour of the Magellenic penguin colony 70 km north of Punta Arenas. Once the gang was back in town, we walked a few blocks from the hotel for another fine and friendly dining experience at La Marmita. Walking home to the hotel, I told everybody to plan on flying, first thing tomorrow… but we’ll just see what the katabatics have to say about things.

---

On the Road to Pampa La Lenas

Posted by: | January 10, 2010
Categories: *Expedition Dispatches *Aconcagua

Hello this is Gabriel checking in with our group in Argentina. We left Mendoza yesterday and traveled closer to the mountain. We spent the night in the small town of Los Penitentes. Everyone is doing well and enjoying the steak, bread and wine of Argentina. Today we will hike to Pampa La Lenas. We are all looking forward to stretching our legs and getting on the trail. The weather has been great and we will continue to update you on our progress.

---

Punta Arenas, Chile

Posted by: | January 09, 2010
Categories: *Expedition Dispatches *Vinson Massif

Everything and everyone is in place at the tip of South America… ready for a flight to Antarctica. The past few days have been fun, but also a little stressful and hectic. There were the usual assortment of missed flights and lost luggage, but in the end, our team of five climbers made it down the length of the world intact. I arrived two days ago with the bulk of the team equipment and spent a day shopping for extra provisions and getting over jet lag. Today was the official start to things, as we began at 10 AM with our official introductory meeting with ALE (our logistics company for this trip) This orientation was a two-hour long gathering of all those who will be sharing the Ilyushin 76 transport plane with us to Antarctica. Roughly, there are about 25 climbers bound for Vinson who will be the big Russian jet’s final customers bound for the Ice this season.

It has been fun to run into old friends and guiding partners down here, as usual. Mike Sharp, one of the principals of ALE, gave our briefing today and had me reflecting back to my first visit to the continent in 1995 when he and I spent a stormy week in a tent together at Jone’s Sound on the Antarctic Peninsula. He showed slides of the operation at Patriot Hills and described the program out at Vinson Basecamp. He tried to impress on those assembled just how far from any government bases they would be and how independent and self sufficient the company and its customers must be. Afterward, I walked with my five climbers (we’ll meet our second guide, Namgya, down on the ice, where he is already working with other teams) out into the bustling but friendly center of Punta Arenas. This city of 150,000 is a gateway for tourists coming to see Patagonia and Tierra del Fuego as well as Antarctica, but it is also an industrial town of great importance to Chile. We walked the few blocks back toward Magellan’s Strait, and into our hotel at the water’s edge. The next task was to get rid of the bulk of our gear and supplies. We brought it all downstairs to be weighed and collected on a truck. ALE will do the heavy work of loading the mammoth IL 76 out at the airport today in the hope that we’ll get to fly tomorrow morning.

I got together with the team in the evening to go over maps and pictures of the Ellsworth Mountains in order to get everybody up to speed on which glaciers we’d be landing on and climbing up. We discussed strategies and expected hurdles… but I hope that we also got rid of some of the worry and nervousness that stems from choosing a goal in such a far-off and unique environment.

The work done, it was time for a dinner out on the town and a little relaxation. Punta Arenas has great dining spots… but we don’t want to visit many more of them. Our hope is that we get a call early tomorrow telling us that the weather window is open and that we should get our boots on and get set for flying to Antarctica.

---

Previous Page