Entries from Expedition Dispatches
Hi Everyone,
Thanks to the Chilcabamba Eco Lodge the team has been well fed and all are well rested. After a leisurely breakfast the team finished packing for another climb before our ride arrived. It took as an hour to reach the parking lot at 15,000’. We hiked for about 45 minutes to reach the hut at Cotopaxi which resembles a modern two story house.
All is well and the weather is improving. We will spend the next few hours playing cards, getting some sleep and plan to awake at midnight. If things go well we should arrive on the summit of
Cotopaxi near sunrise. We will call from there if the mountain allows us to do so.
Wish us luck!
RMI Guides Casey Grom, Adam Knoff and Crew
Noah's Ark doesn't have anything on us! Yesterday the mountain received a little precipitation and as our team approached
Camp One, we discovered a new river running through camp.
Not only are tents up and people are settled in but we are on ditch digging crew to divert our new river, which we named Rio
Horiskey.
The entire team did great getting up to 16,500 feet. We are camped a little higher than the normal camp because we like peace, quiet and pristine water. The agenda for tonight is to make hot drinks and eat another fine meal.
I have a little surprise for the team. In honor of playoff weekend I brought some Green Bay Packers hot dogs. You know...for good luck!
RMI Guide JJ Justman & Team
On The Map
Hello Everyone,
After a severe spanking on our first climbing objective, expedition skills seminar Ecuador has settled into a well deserved day of rest. Here at
Chilcabamba, a beautiful rustic Eco lodge located ten miles north west of Cotopaxi, Ecuador's most famous mountain, we have been treated like royalty. Luckily, whatever crazy wind dance some angry jungle tribe did to irritate the mountain climbers has seemed to run its course. So, by this afternoon many of the dark clouds and biting wind gusts seemed to have subsided which by dinner time treated the team to spectacular views of the mountain we are to attempt next.
Because Cayambe was such a struggle, we opened today up to doing anything, within reason, each person wanted to do. Armed with the the Spanish speaking skills of a two year old, I did my best to arrange a car to drive five willing folks to Machachi, the nearest town. When a pickup arrived with seating enough for four, shoulders were shrugged, the back seat was packed sardine style and twenty minutes later Ginger's legs were numb. But so goes travel. After a few hours in town the team returned and a quality debrief of our Cayambe experience hopefully prepared us better for what's to come on Cotopaxi. By 5 p.m. more training ensued and Clark was imitating self arrest in the front yard peppered with llama poop while Albert attempted to mock rescue Ginger out of the imaginary grass crevasse. Who needs a glacier? This segued perfectly into dinned and eventually into Jan and Gary kicking the guide's tails in a heated game of cribbage.
The team is growing closer every day and can't wait to attempt another climb. Stay tuned.
RMI Guides
Adam Knoff &
Casey Grom
Another great day here (barely) south of the equator! We woke up this morning to slightly overcast skies that made me wonder if we were going to see anything at all today on our first acclimatization hike. Nevertheless, the team hopped a few taxis in front of the hotel and headed over to the Teleférico. A short gondola ride deposited us at an elevation just shy of 13,000'. Despite the cloud cover above we enjoyed clear and sweeping views of the metropolis below and even some occasional sun breaks came through to heat us up very quickly as we hiked along. After a little over three hours of hiking and a fun rock scramble we found ourselves standing on the summit of
Rucu Pichincha! At an elevation above 15,000' many personal altitude records were broken today. We took some photos, hung out a bit hoping the cloud would dissipate for a split second (no luck), and began our sandy descent. After a mildly adventurous ride back to the hotel the gang has been chilling out while
Katie and I did a little grocery shopping. Another team dinner tonight should commemorate our last evening in
Quito before we head for the hills.
Talk tomorrow...
RMI Guide Billy Nugent
Rest and Relaxation. Our team is doing great! Everyone had a great nights sleep and are feeling more acclimatized. It is our last day in
Aconcagua's Base Camp so we are indulging in good food, doing laundry and taking that last hot shower. A clean climber is a warm climber.
Stay tuned tomorrow. The team is moving on up to
Camp One!
RMI Guide JJ Justman
On The Map
Hi everybody and welcome to another series of dispatches from an
RMI Expeditions' Ecuador Volcanoes program! The majority of our team arrived scattered throughout the day yesterday with high spirits and great expectations despite being exhausted from a solid day of airline travel. We met up for the first time as a complete team this morning at Spicy, our hotel restaurant, and enjoyed a pretty good spread of food and decent coffee to boot. After breakfast we headed out on a very informative city tour with our veteran city guide Jorge. Jorge showed us around town while explaining much of the complex cultural past that made Ecuador the country it is today. Our crew climbed the towers of the Basilica, enjoyed sweeping views of the city from the top of the Panecillo, and got to experiment with different physical phenomena on the exact geographic
equator. All of this while beginning our all-important acclimatization process. Cool! We plan on rounding out our first full day in Ecuador with a brief team meeting followed by a team dinner.
More to come as the adventure progresses!
RMI Guides
Billy Nugent,
Katie Bono, and the rest of the gang
On The Map
I once heard the founder of
RMI (Lou Whittaker) tell a group "that climbing mountains is like hitting yourself in the head with a hammer, it only feels good when you stop." And I'm pretty sure that our team actually believes this after today.
Climbing in Ecuador is much different than back in the states. There is no weather forecast to help, no route condition updates, and no reliable rescue if you get in over your head. You pretty much stick your head out the door and decide whether or not you'll make an attempt or not.
As you have most likely
read in the last few dispatches its been pretty windy all week. Today was no different except that it was our summit day. It howled all night and even seemed to shake the 2,000 square-foot building we've been staying in. Some of us slept and others did not and around 10:30 pm
Adam, Jamie and myself put some water on the stove and crossed our fingers that things would get better. After breakfast, hot cocoa and coffee we finished the last of our packing and headed out into the night.
It was windy right outta the gates. The wind was blowing between 30 and 40 mph with higher gust. It was worse right next to the hut and subsided once we got a short distance away. Luckily for us the first hour and a half we were slightly protected by the rock buttress we had to climb around/over. It by no means made it any easier, but it did allow us to reach the glacier safely. We took a short break put on the majority of our gear (all those things we just had to have finally were really needed) and started up the mountain. We were able to climb for about 2.5 hours before we found shelter from the wind in a small rock outcrop. It became very clear that the wind and weather were not improving as we had hoped. Right above the outcrop the winds seemed to be getting much stronger. We decided to forge ahead and see if it was really as bad as it sounded. Sure enough a few feet above the outcrop we were in the thick of it, the wind was fierce and everyone was fight to just stay on their feet. We attempted to move forward but it was quite clear that was not a realistic option. Adam and I estimated the winds to be between 50 to 70 mph and gust were outright ridiculous.
We quickly descended to the outcrop and decided that the risk was too great and everyone was happily in agreement. The team safely descend as the weather continued to deteriorate all the way back to the hut.
We took a short nap, packed up and retreated to our comfy hacienda and hot showers. Everyone is doing well and happy to be out of the weather.
RMI Guide Casey Grom and crew
Up, up and away! Team 3 had a spectacular day carrying gear up to
Camp One at 16,500 feet. We brought up all the food for the upper mountain, fuel for our stoves and a little bit of personal clothing and gear.
It is nice in a weird way to throw on heavier packs and get a taste of thin air. The entire team did great and in reality we probably don't need to take another rest day here at base camp. However, we will.
Tomorrow we will rest and it will only provide every team member a stronger foundation for the upper mountain. There is no doubt a good part of high altitude mountaineering is about fighting the boredom. But as I sit here some team members are playing cribbage and others are playing some other game. The betting stakes Re cough drops and single sheets of toilet paper.
It was nice to see the beautiful views up high on
Aconcagua and we will post more exciting events from base camp and who may be out of toilet paper!
RMI Guide JJ Justman
On The Map
Hello to all following the Ecuadorean skills seminar. As Casey mentioned yesterday, the wind gods in this neck of the woods, or jungle, seem to be a tad upset with
Cayambe the last few days. Last night the gale rocked our hut, shaking windows and spraying dust onto our sleeping bags and equipment all through the bunk room. As I woke my concern shifted quickly not to dirt in my eyes but to Jan who will get his merit badge as the only one to have spent a night in a tent. I don't think too many of us were complaining though because the tent this morning looked very close to flying away. Unfortunately this same wind pattern continued throughout the morning making our projected second attempt at moving to high camp seem a bit detrimental to our actual summit attempt. As much as I wanted to give our team the experience of moving upward and making a high camp, discussions with Casey and Jamie helped me realize the effort needed to move up, pitch tents and get substantial rest was not advantageous to our climb tonight. What another day at the hut did allow us was more valuable training. The opening section to our route directly out of the hut offers impressive rock out croppings ideal for fixed rope travel and rappelling. After our outside time, that was certainly tested by the wind, we retreated back to the hut where we practiced rope coiling, knots and time killing activities. We are now preparing for an early dinner and retirement to our sleeping bags. We look forward to getting up early and gunning for the summit of the equator's highest point.
RMI Guide Adam Knoff
On The Map
After a good trip up the Relinchos Valley yesterday, the team is enjoying a well-earned rest day here at
Plaza Argentina. Our night of good rest rolled into a breakfast of eggs, fried ham, peppers and onions with coffee and hot chocolate, and was thoroughly enjoyed by everyone.
After giving the team time to digest, we all went over to the medical office and got the obligatory physical check-up. Everyone passed with flying colors, and we're now poised and ready for our carry up to
Camp One tomorrow, situated at 16,200'.
While we're living at about 14,000 feet, everyone is feeling tip top and acclimating perfectly. We have beautiful weather and look forward to staging for the move higher on this beautiful mountain.
Keep sending the positive energy!
RMI Aconcagua Expedition and Guides JJ Justman, Garrett Stevens and Geoff Schellens
On The Map
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HOOOOOOORAH! Can’t wait to see the Summit picture! and very happy to get the phone call. Congratulations! Rest now and eat…soon you will return to reality with a super accomplishment and memory. Love, Mom
Posted by: Pat Gray on 1/12/2013 at 9:20 am
Glad to hear the weather is cooperating finally. Hope you were able to summit and if not, I’m sure you are having a blast! I am jealous and next time you can take me along just to be your interpreter!
Love you,
Tia Ginni
Posted by: Ginni Fennema on 1/11/2013 at 8:52 pm
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