Today's agenda was a carry of group and personal gear to Camp II (18,000ft) and this is personally one of my favorite days. After our carry and move to Camp I the terrain eases off a bit and becomes less cumbersome to Camp II. As the trail leaves Camp I we slowly switchback our way up the South side of a broad basin. At about 17,000ft the route hooks North and heads for a col (low spot) in between Aconcagua and fellow neighboring peak Cerro Ameghino. Once through the col the Northern expanse of the Andes unfolds and we are greeted with views of ancient glaciers and 6,000 meter peaks. The view stays much the same all the way to Camp II and the team wasn't complaining!
Everyone did great with the new altitude today though and we are now currently re-hydrating and recouping with some hot soups and a siesta before dinner. Tomorrow's agenda: REST DAY!
Stay tuned!
RMI Guide Steve Gately and Team
Well well well! Here we are at Casa de Piedra at 11,000' plus feet. For those of you that no habla espanol, Casa de Piedra is Spanish for The house of...Piedra (God bless you Chris Farley).
Team 4 had a beautiful walk into our second trekking camp. And of course as we looked up the Relinchos valley we had our first great view of Aconcagua. It is always breezy here at this camp so we are hunkered in for the time being. Tomorrow Base Camo!!
RMI Guide JJ Justman & Team
Go Sue! Everything’s under control here. Enjoy and be safe!
Posted by: Linda on 1/9/2015 at 9:00 am
Robert, Joe, and Sue,
Pole Pole!
I can’t wait to read more of these blog entries, and imagine the incredible terrain through which you must be hiking. I’m thinking of you every day, and will be waiving from the lowly slopes of Mt Hood on a summit attempt tomorrow night. I can’t believe it has been almost a year since Kili… Happy early birthday to both of you ladies!
XoXo
Sarah
Greetings from South America!
This is the RMI Expeditions Alpamayo team making our inaugural check-in from the Peruvian city of Huarez. After spending most of yesterday on planes, the team had a brief layover in Lima last night before catching a shuttle up into the mountains today. With a dinner of Alpaca steaks, we are currently nestling into bed and getting excited about the days to come.
RMI Guide Eric Frank & Team
The team is still stuck at 17,000' in blizzard conditions. Has been snowing continuously and winds blowing around 30 mph or so. The group is doing well; they have plenty of food and fuel and are just hanging out until the weather gets better. They will see how the weather looks in the morning. Dave will give us a call tomorrow with an update.
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.
The Ecuador Seminar team got to shake off the final bit of jet leg today, with the main focus of the day being acclimatization. Many of our team broke altitude records today during our hike to the summit on Rucu Pichincha (15,354’). A moderate hike, the team gained around 2500’ through grasslands up to the rocky, scrambly summit. The rest of the day will be spent resting and relaxing, allowing our bodies to adapt now that we’re back at lower elevations. We plan to culminate the evening with a nice team dinner at a local restaurant and perhaps a soak in the hotel hot tub. Tomorrow, the team heads to Laguna Cuicocha, our next acclimatization hike before heading to the Caymbe hut. Spirits are high and the team is stoked to get on their first major objective.
Tuesday, June 18, 2019 - 9:21 PM PT
Our team enjoyed a rest day today, sleeping in and indulging in a cheesy breakfast scramble brunch. The day started out sunny and we were able to dry gear and charge electronics, but by the afternoon it was snowing lightly.
Tomorrow we plan to carry a cache of food and fuel to ~13,600' around Windy Corner and then return to our current camp. That's the plan at least. Stay tuned.
RMI Guide Mike Walter
On vacation and did the flight around Denali on this day and saw you guys as tiny dots below. So inspiring and breathtaking! Godspeed to you all and will be watching your progress now back in Texas!
Posted by: Rebecca on 6/20/2019 at 5:06 pm
Thank you for the daily updates. It’s really neat to read about your progress…I feel part of the journey! :) Hi to Casey. Enjoy your experience!
After packing our packs, organizing our tents, and eating lunch, we were ready to head uphill. Unfortunately though, we have been stalled at Base Camp. Our team members at High Camp radioed down that they need more time and rope to fix the route. They said the route is a bit icy and not great snow, but they seem optimistic that we will be able to give it a whirl in a few days. Till then we will continuing hanging out at Base Camp, practicing more with the girls and going on hikes. It's a good thing it's so pretty here and one can easily occupy themselves.
Happy Halloween!
RMI Guide Hannah Smith
Acclimatization by Ski Doo is one advantage of having skis here on Mt. Elbrus. For a little morning activity on our rest day, we caught a snowmobile ride to 15,000', and climbed up to 16,000' in steady winds. We actually had some visibility on our descent this time and were able to enjoy the turns a bit more than yesterday's whiteout run.
We spent the afternoon making preparations for an alpine start in the morning. If the forecast verifies, we'll have a nice clearing trend throughout the morning and hopefully summitable conditions. We're feeling psyched and ready.
RMI Guide Tyler Reid
Hey Everyone,
This is Team 4. This is JJ, Steve, and Gonzalo and our great climbing team at Leñas, our first trekking camp. I'm sending a Google message. It's tough camp to get email out, but we had a great day walking in. Actually, it was cloudy skies thought it was gonna rain for a bit but it held off. Now we are in the beautiful sunshine here. We're making an assado dinner with the cowboys under an open camp fire. And we're actually watching as I speak Team 2 led by Walter Hailes walking in. It's his crew we wanna give a big congratulations to for a great job done up there making the summit! We will be providing dispatches now on a daily basis let you know how things are going. So far it's all smiles, giggles, and laughs. People were doing really, really well and we are keeping spirits high. We are going to have another great dinner and enjoy another beautiful walk here in the Vacas Valley tomorrow. Thanks for following along. Tell your friends, tell your family and everyone else to follow along.
We will see you later on, bye bye.
RMI Guide JJ Justman
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Go Sue! Everything’s under control here. Enjoy and be safe!
Posted by: Linda on 1/9/2015 at 9:00 am
Robert, Joe, and Sue,
Pole Pole!
I can’t wait to read more of these blog entries, and imagine the incredible terrain through which you must be hiking. I’m thinking of you every day, and will be waiving from the lowly slopes of Mt Hood on a summit attempt tomorrow night. I can’t believe it has been almost a year since Kili… Happy early birthday to both of you ladies!
XoXo
Sarah
Posted by: Sarah on 1/8/2015 at 11:37 pm
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