Entries from Expedition Dispatches
Dave called from high camp on Ixta at 8:30 a.m. PST. The group reached the summit today and all is well. They are now back at the hut on Ixta after a seven hour round trip climb. Later today they will pack up and descend to the trailhead. They will relax tonight in Puebla and enjoy a rest day tomorrow before heading to Orizaba. The party is very strong and everyone is doing well.
Dispatch received from Dave via email
The alarm on our watch began to beep, letting us know it was time to awake from a restless night's sleep. Out of our toasty sleeping bags and into the cold night high on Ixta we began preparation to climb. An unusual cold snap has embraced this part of Mexico and nipped at our bodies as we started to approach the Ayoloco Glacier. About an hour of hiking up loose scree and talus found our team at the tongue of what was once an impressive glacier careening down the side of the seventh highest peak in North America.
With crampons on our boots, ice axes in-hand, and ropes attaching our teams together we ascended and traversed the hard snow and ice. Our brief glacier climb brought us to the prominent ridge leading us to the summit of the "Sleeping Woman". Aztec legend says Ixtaccihuatl was an Aztec woman who died from a broken heart. Her love, Popo, was an Aztec warrior, allegedly killed in battle. With such devastating news, Ixta ended her life. When Popo returned, he too was broken hearted and created the mountain in her memory. Today, Ixta's profile from the West or East resembles that of a sleeping woman, Ixta, with her feet, knees, breast, and head defined by ridges and rocky peaks.
Our teamed climbed strong and efficiently, reaching the summit in just under 4 hours. We were graced with a brief clearing while on top as we endured the colder temperatures. We won't mention any names (cough, cough...Collin and Marty) but some went bareskin on top for a priceless photo opportunity!
The descent was again well climbed by our team and we reached our high camp in under 3 hours. We hung out at camp watching the clouds roll up and down the slope below us, next to us, and above us. We packed our packs to the brim for the hike down to our wonderful chauffeurs, Regolio and Guiermo. Awaiting us were incredible Mexican tortas, a typical sandwich with meat, cheese, tomatoes, onions, avocados, and mayo- delicious! Of course there was celebratory libations provided to wash down the tasty meal.
Overall, our team did extremely well climbing our first objective, Ixta. This climb can definitely pose challenges in that it is very high in altitude, soon after our arrival to Mexico, and we have to establish a higher camp. We are now resting surrounded by wonderful people, incredible cuisine, and amazing culture here in Puebla.
Not so much to report today. An easy day for all as the weather was perfect and the schedule was delightfully uncluttered. The production teams got some shots of camp life, most went for short walks. Myself and Ed Viesturs carried gear to 19,200 ft, previewing the route to Camp II which we will retrace with the whole gang tomorrow.
Hi. It's Dave and crew calling in from High Camp on Ixta. It is partly cloudy and we are experiencing a bit of a cold snap here in Mexico, but we can see that it is clear toward the summit. We are hoping it will stay that way for our attempt tomorrow. The team is doing really well and we will be getting some food and then settling in for a 3:00 a.m. summit attempt. This has been a fun trip so far and we are excited, feeling good and ready for tomorrow.
No big parties last night, all was quiet at Basecamp until the morning helicopter began what seems to be its morning workout at 7AM, just before the sun hit. We were all up and half-packed by our 8 AM breakfast. Everybody had lots of details to chase down and loads to figure out before our 9:30 AM departure. The production teams used their scouting of the previous day to figure out some nice shots as the guides and climbers chugged higher over now-familiar terrain. We took four hours to make it into our new camp, a bit higher than we'd cached yesterday... concensus seems to put us at around 16,500 ft. We found a place of our own up here, which is actually quite nice. This is a busy mountain in its prime climbing season, so there are almost always other teams around us, coming and going. At our Camp One, though, we've carved out a little privacy by virtue of walking a little farther than most choose to. We had clear skies today and strong sunshine, but we have all transitioned from the cotton clothes, shorts and t-shirts that we wore during the trek in. Now we are in mountain climbing clothing and gaurding against the cold. Even so, the afternoon was very warm and comfortable as we napped in the tents. We did dinner over by Melissa's tent, sitting on our sleeping pads in the pumice and gravel with puffy coats on. The light is just getting good now at 7:30 PM, we are in shadow, but we are high enough now that we can see out of the surrounding valleys and watch the sun set on South America.
Rest/Acclimatization day tomorrow... maybe a carry or two for the guides and some production work for the artistically inclined photographers and filmers, but basically tomorrow will be a day designed to allow our bodies to catch up with our rate of ascent.
The clouds cleared with sunset last night, but enough of them stuck around to make the moonrise spectacular through bright pillows of distant cumulus with lightning bolts adding to the show. It was an easy night at basecamp although it was somewhat curious -so far up a mountain- to be serenaded by latin hip-hop and rap tunes well into the evening as a dance party -presumably held for some returning and victorious summit climbers- went on for hours, long after we'd all climbed into our sleeping bags and clicked off the headlights. This didn't seem to adversly effect anyone's mood in the morning though. All seemed to have gotten the neccessary rest. We were excited for the day's climbing. Heavy loads were shouldered after a great breakfast. We hit the trail in bright sunshine at around 9 AM and made steady progress up on narrow trails of broken rock and volcanic dirt. Without much trouble at all, we crossed the "East Glacier" on piles of rocky rubble and enjoyed some great views of the Polish Glacier above. We'd prepared ourselves for six hours of uphill toil if that was what it would take to get food, fuel and gear to our planned site for Camp One, but in the end, we did it in much less time as all were feeling good and enjoying the exercise. Peter, Ed and Melissa, our veterans of previous Aconcagua climbs, were each happy to see that a good portion of our route today was snow covered. Our photographers and videographers were charmed with the nature of that snow cover since we walked for some time up a steep track through neve-penitente. Intense sunlight on the snow surface, with the addition of a little dirt blown onto that snow from surrounding ridges had formed its surface into a series of eight-foot high pinnacles. Artistically wonderful, such snow formations would be tough to travel through without the established track. Jake Norton could often be spied wedged between pinnacles with his camera pointed through the jagged openings onto the trail. Kent Harvey, Thom Pollard and Gerry Moffat set up ambush after ambush to capture images of our climbers, seemingly climbing the back of a great white porcupine. Rachel broke her altitude record as she came smiling into the site of our intended gear dump at 16,304 ft. Ever gracious, she thanked Chad and Seth for their guidance and hints while Tim, Andrew, Clark and Kelly were doing high fives and fist bumps with the rest of the guide team. We were already caching the gear at 1 PM and enjoying a look at the route ahead. Peter scouted a bit higher to find the perfect place for our tents following tomorrow's move. Melissa pointed out the ever-so-close sites for Camps II and III (those sites are not far distance-wise, but each represents a significant gain in altitude and so we all know that we'll be taking our time to get up to what we can now easily see... acclimatization is a slow but essential process to avoid altitude illness) We eventually left a gear cache and beat feet down the path and penitentes. We passed dozens of slowly trudging heavily laden upward-bound climbers... perhaps they were attendees of last night's dance party and thus on a late schedule for rising and seizing the day. Our work was all done by 3:30 PM as we pulled off boots back in basecamp and enjoyed the afternoon sun.
Tomorrow, if all goes well, we'll report in from Camp One.
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Categories: Expedition Dispatches Mexico
Hey everyone. Hope all is well...
A quiet Sunday morning graced Mexico City as our team headed out towards La Malinche.
As we furthered ourselves from the capitol's carbon footprint, we stopped at a great vista of both Popo and Ixta, our first climbing objective.
We reached the resort of Malintzi and headed out for our first acclimatizing hike. We walked through pine forests and then up a broad slope to a ridge. Here we enjoyed the views of the surrounding valley.
A wonderful Mexican dinner awaits our group now...Tomorrow we head to Ixta. Everyone is excited for our first climb!
Dave Hahn reporting from Today was our planned rest day. All is well and all are feeling good. We enjoyed a calm night with a huge moon that kept Jake Norton out snapping pictures until quite late. There were a few minor headaches reported and some of the normal insomnia that comes with a first night at real altitude, but for the most part our team was bright-eyed and ready for action today. That action consisted of a relaxed breakfast and then a few sessions of organizing gear and supplies for going higher. The event of the morning was Seth Waterfall's arrival with the last of our cargo. Production people dove into cases full of new gadgets and guides sorted a few more bags of upper-mountain gear and all were happy to see Seth who'd come in at an accelerated pace to catch up with us.
Basecamp is a fairly elaborate village of tents with a few semi-permanent structures thrown in for park and medical personnel. There are about five outfitters here with independent "kitchens" and communications set-ups along with dining tents and latrines for their customers and staff. We set up the RMI tents within a stone's throw of our own outfitter -Grajales Expeditions, and they've been taking great care of us. Peter, Ed and Chad worked today to help our climbers choose what to carry higher while Melissa made contact with the park rangers and finalized the permitting process.
We became aware of an intense and sad story which had played out high on Aconcagua during the days of our trek in. A team of five had apparently been caught out in the open near the summit and had needed to endure several days of extremly bad weather before a rescue party could reach them. From what we are hearing, the rescue effort was massive, with perhaps fifty people trying to get to the stranded team from both sides of the mountain. Ultimately, there were three survivors and tragically, two deaths. Our entire team was saddened and sobered by this news, but our guide team was particularly saddened to learn that we'd lost a friend and colleague in the accident. Federico Campanini guided his own programs internationally, but on Mount Rainier he'd become one of RMI's hardest working and most dependable guides over the past three summers. We have each spent the past days and nights thinking of his skill, strength and competence as a guide... but also of his unfailing good humor and friendly nature. He will be missed. Our best wishes go to his family.
Our plan for tomorrow is to carry loads to 16,000 ft and to then return for a final night at basecamp before moving up. We'll hope the weather improves some as today finished with a fair bit of cloud and and some light snow on Basecamp. All for now, we'll let you know how things go tomorrow... new heights and new sights.
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Categories: Expedition Dispatches Mexico
Our climbing team has assembled under a full moon in Mexico City. Some bags are on the relaxed program and will eventually find their way to our possession. Our rooms are situated with grand views of the Zocalo in the Centro Historico of the capital city. Across the way, the Presidential palace. To the left, the Cathedral Metropolitan. In the middle, a 100ft faux Christmas tree and an ice skating rink the size of two hockey rinks. After a meeting in the hotel lobby, we headed down Ave 5 de Mayo, up Motolina, and further down Ave. Tacuba to the famed Cafe Tacuba. As we ate, traditional Mexican musicians serenaded us with folk songs on their string ensemble.
With full bellies we will hit the sack as we prepare to head out of this beautiful, historic, 25 million strong capital to La Malinche for a great acclimatization hike. We'll check in tomorrow!
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Categories: Expedition Dispatches Aconcagua
We had a little weather last night with snow a few thousand feet above us. It was a pleasant suprise this morning as we woke up to clear and beautiful skies. This is my eighth trip on Aconcagua and we had the fastest trek that I have ever experienced. This was quite impressive since we were taking the time to take video and photos on the way to Trek Camp Two. This evening everyone is doing very well as we have finished dinner and are settled in for the night. We are heading to the Basecamp tomorrow, which is located at 13,800 ft. Good night from all of us.
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