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The Preparation I was determined to be better prepared physically than I had been for either the Mont Blanc or Elbrus adventures, where scarce preparation in endurance caused huffing and puffing and ceaseless unspoken dialogue with myself regarding the need to torture myself in such a peculiar manner. In the case of Elbrus, it also caused me to move ahead so slowly that I almost got into a fight on the traverse with Alar Sikk (the only Estonian to have climbed all 7 summits so far), who was chaperoning us and who, I know, really wanted me to just turn around and get the hell off the mountain. So, starting with spring and during the course of the summer 2009, Andres and I participated in all sorts of regular and extra long orienteering events, like The Footprint of the Werewolf and the entire Xdream series. I also went jogging regularly with the goal of doing at least one 9-km session each week. As winter rolled around, it became clear soon that this time, it was no shi**y skiing weather for the next several months, but a serious, snowy, cold, old-fashioned winter. Which of course presented great opportunities for physical preparation. Andres went skiing, I went jogging, and we also went jogging together in all kinds of temperatures. I remember going jogging once at -13ºC, after which a jog at -9ºC felt like a walk on a mild summer day. I also tested the clothing, but of course when you go jogging, pretty much anything is too hot. We also took our equipment rather seriously. I had received a very good sleeping bag as a birthday present, but as it was by a US company, it was sent to my friend's place in Sterling, MA, where it sat until he had a chance to stick it in the mail on January 13th, 2010. The supposed delivery time was 6-7 working days, which meant that I should receive it by January 22nd - the day we were leaving. On January 21st, there was no sight of the bag, so I had already borrowed a back up from a friend, when finally, after an extremely busy workday I discovered that the tracking system claimed the bag having reached Estonia and cleared customs.

 Yippee! Needless to say, I was on its tracks like a bloodhound first thing the next morning, and managed to get it a few hours before the flight. Nice to know that some things just work out sometimes!

The Trip Begins

We started with a five-leg plane ride: Tallinn-Helsinki-Frankfurt-Sao Paolo-Santiago-Mendoza. Everything was uneventful until we reached Frankfurt and had only an hour to get to the other terminal, check in, pass security, and board the plane for Sao Paolo. Anybody who's ever had to deal with the airport in Frankfurt can appreciate the time limitations and the distances to be covered within these. However, as Andres and I had practiced counting down minutes already for several orienteering seasons, the planning teamwork and corresponding actions worked out well: at 37 minutes to the plane take off we had checked in, after which we made a mad dash for security and the gate, which we reached in good time.

The next event of notice was in Santiago, where we had to pass four hours, so we decided to check out one of the lounges. There was snack food and drinks offered, and we used the time to get acquainted with the obscure technical details of my Olympus M Tough camera, which Santa Claus had brought me. Andres practiced taking panoramic shots, the result of which (not so great, but not TOO bad for starters) is presented here.

When flying to Mendoza, we could see Mt. Aconcagua from the plane window, and even attempted to take pictures.

In Mendoza

In Mendoza, a driver sent by the company with whom we had booked the trip, Aymara Travel, met us with a name sign, and we were driven to a hotel located in the central area of the city, where we fell asleep at around 6 PM local time after taking a shower. We were too exhausted even for dinner.

January 24th, 2010 – the official first day of the program

The next day was the official first day of the program, and an equipment check by the mountain guides, plus renting any missing items from a local store was prescribed in the schedule. Andres and I already knew we needed to rent plastic hiking boots - it's relatively pointless to own a pair unless you trek in high altitudes or slushy snow conditions regularly, and to buy hand warmers. We also knew we had everything else necessary, which the guides just confirmed. We also had a chance to meet the rest of the team members:

Melanie (ladies first) a former management consultant who recently took a job with a mining company, and had already tried to summit Aconcagua once, but got stuck in Nido de Condores, the second one of the high camps, for five days, and had to descend due to bad weather. Mel, as it turned put, was the fittest of all (meaning altitude seemingly didn’t affect her fitness a bit) and had the best endurance, having run her share of marathons and going jogging regularly at ~ 1800 m altitude where she lives in CO.

Bas - An M&A guy from Holland who had spent a better part of his adult life in London and has the accent to prove it, but who now lives in Switzerland.

Omar - a buddy of both Bas and Mel who trades options for a living. A serious endurance sports fan who runs marathons regularly and has also completed three Ironman competitions.

Imdad, a.k.a. Joe - a neurologist from Southern Cali with a sense of humor so Estonian (read: sarcastic) that he could fit right in, except perhaps for the wee bit too dark a skin color. Joe was also a walking pharmacy - ha had every drug conceivably necessary in the mountains from Aspirin to Viagra (don't get too excited, it's used to improve the blood flow of the lungs in the mountains) to Xanax.

Charlie - a landscaper and overall nice guy from Missouri whom I no doubt managed to insult more than once with my sarcastic comments. He was always a very good sport about it, though.

Vincent - a Frenchman living in Australia who could never disguise as an Australian once he opens his mouth. It's not me being mean, he admits it himself, too. :-)

Hector - a veterinarian from Buenos Aires, who unfortunately we had a hard time communicating with, as he did not really speak much English, and he also left the expedition quite soon, so we don’t know nearly as much about him as some of the other guys.

Andres - my personal radiator/tent-warmer, technical mountaineering expert, and orienteering specialist in case of getting lost. :-) As it later turned out, Andres managed to enter his radiator character so well that he was voted a winner in the category "Most time spent horizontal while not having sex".

Triin - me.

January 25th, 2010 - It's getting a bit more serious

The bus ride to Puente del Inca, which is in the vicinity of the Aconcagua State Park, took some 3 hours. We stayed overnight at the local hostel, enjoying a rather plentiful 3-course meal at the hostel's restaurant, which gave us an opportunity to chat with each other and get to know the new teammates better.

We also got our backpacks ready for the mules, and left the items we didn't need on the mountain in an Aymara Travel storage shed. While duffel bags had been recommended by Aymara Travel, I had just my regular 20-kg backpack, and no extra luggage - after all, we didn't need to carry our own tents, cooking equipment, ropes, harnesses, or carabiners for this trip - all of this was part of the Aymara package. It seemed sensible to protect the backpack in some manner while in transit on the mules. Andres had a special backpack cover for this purpose, using it also during the flight. I had opted for two huge extra-strong plastic bags, originally intended for construction rubbish: one for the way up, the other for the way down. As it later turned out, Andres' backpack cover was abused and torn already in airline luggage handling, and was nearly destroyed by the mule transport ( we had to patch it with duct tape numerous times), while my plastic bags suffered only minor damage and were throw-away material anyway. While not the most eco-friendly option, it was certainly  wallet-friendly and also served the purpose really well. Recommended!

January 26th, 2010 - into the Aconcagua State Park

The next morning we climbed into a bus and drove the 5 minutes, but several hundred meters altitude gain to Horcones, the gate of the park. After a relatively easy 10 km uphill trek, we reached camp Confluencia, 3400m altitude, where we were shocked by a luxurious reception of fresh watermelon, honeydew melon, and various other fruit. Then came the tent pitching exercise, which went OK, minus perhaps the fact that most of the tents, being very old, had a problem or two: a stuck zipper, a rip, etc. The guides did promise new tents for the high camps.

Very shortly after getting the tents up, we heard the ominous sounds of thunder and spent most of the dinner with rain drumming on the food tent, and occasional leaks squeezing in and dripping on our heads, which caused us to play something resembling musical chairs to escape the spots where the rain was leaking through.

While the guides and the kitchen staff continued having a party in the kitchen tent, most of us retired to our tents around 9 PM, as we were somewhat tired from the trek, and the altitude also had its effects. As a matter of fact so much that one of the team members, Hector, was feeling rather bad, and decided to leave us after two nights at the Confluencia. Others were also feeling somewhat under the weather: Bas threw up, and Joe was feeling a bit nauseous, same with Andres to whom I ended up administering fresh ginger for nausea medication next morning.

I was surprisingly warm, not to say sweaty, in my sleeping bag, and I only used one of the two zip-on tops. The down-filled air mattress was really comfy and seemed to reflect the body heat better than anything I had experienced so far. I slept really well.

January 27th, 2010 - acclimatization trek to a lookout near Plaza Francia

For the next day, the program prescribed a day trek to the lookout near Plaza Francia, 12 km up with an altitude gain of 700 meters, and 12 km back down to Confluencia. I must admit that if I hadn't been a member of an organized group with a prescribed program, there would have been major temptation for me to skip, or at least skimp on this activity, which no doubt had a greatly useful acclimatization effect. During the trek, people were chatting about all kinds of things, ranging from what somebody does for a living to great in-detail explanation of options and their use professed by Omar to Charlie.

We had been sermonized by the guides on drinking lots and lots of water, and not just, but to put something in the water to replace the minerals we were losing. We were also told to monitor the color of our pee and make sure it's as close to water-like as possible. Little did we know at that point, that the water in Confluencia is naturally rich in magnesium, which has the effect of causing bloating, flatulence, and even diarrhea. We soon found out though (about the magnesium), and Bas brought up the issue of HAFE, or High Altitude Flatulence Expulsion – a condition supposedly affecting people at high altitudes regardless of the mineral make up of the local water, and supposedly well documented in cyberspace. With the water and the prescription to drink a gallon of it daily, AND to monitor one's pee color, the male pee series at every rest stop next to the hiking trail got started. Too bad I never took any pictures of this, though I'm sure others did. As soon as there was a stop, one of them would walk some 10-20 meters away, whip it out, and sprinkle away. What? They were just monitoring the color of their pee....The two girl hikers, Mel and me, plus the female guide obviously had to be a little more discreet.

I was rather knackered when we got back to the camp (see – being in the company of folks accustomed to the British way of speaking has its effects, too). There was a medical check ahead the same evening to determine who would be fit enough to continue to the base camp at Plaza de Mulas. The night before, we had met two additional members of the team, Aaron and Jono, guys from Australia, who had taken additional acclimatization days and thus had already spent a couple of days at Confluencia. One of them, Jono, is an engineer for a medical device company, and happened to have a pulse oxygen and heart rate meter with him. All of us exitedly took the opportunity to get our reading, and mine was pulse ox 94% and heart rate around 100 - I even took a photo of the reading. For this reason I was not particularly worried - it was already the next day, which meant that the reading should be better, as we would be more acclimatized, and only 85% pulse ox was required for continued ascent. As it turned out, the reading WAS better, 95/89 this time. Omar, the endurance sports guy, managed to cause a commotion in the medical tent with his reading. The pulse ox was probably around 90 (I don't remember exactly), but heart rate 58. The doctor thought that this must surely be an error, and measured again. Still the same. Omar was getting a good laugh, as his normal heart rate is like 37, or so he claims. In the end, all of us were approved for ascent.

While I had used my closed-toe leather sandals to trek up to Confluencia, the guides had strongly recommended that I use the hiking boots for the acclimatization day trek, as the trail would supposedly be a lot rockier. This, however, resulted in the typical (in my case) blisters on my toes and on the soles of my feet, despite the care I had taken to tape my toes and the soles of my feet. Correspondingly, I ignored all recommendations the next day when it was time to hike 20 km (12 miles) up to the base camp at Plaza de Mulas and just used my sandals, which, in my opinion worked just fine and would also have been fine for the day trek. It is totally possible to climb Aconcagua with just two pairs of footwear: either sneakers or similar (in my case, closed-toe sandals) all the way to Plaza de Mulas, and plastic hiking boots from there on. While I was also very skeptical about the need for plastic boots, I was glad I had rented these in Mendoza - not just because these were a lot more comfortable and easier on my toes and soles, but also because they are really nice and warm. While I am by no means a stranger to cold weather: in Estonia, the thermometer had read on average -18C the week before we left, which was also the cause for my initial skepticism regarding the need for plastic boots, it really is so much nicer when your toes are toasty warm, no matter the outside temperature. Plus, should you have to trek in slushy snow, the plastic boots won't get wet, which also means they won't freeze overnight.

January 28th, 2010 - to Plaza de Mulas

The next morning we got our stuff ready, took down and packed the tents for the mules, bid farewell to Hector, as well as Jono, who had hurt his back shortly before the trip and didn’t think moving further up would be a good idea. We also said good-bye to the flushing toilets (I had read horror stories in people's blogs about the toilets-to-come, which supposedly consisted of little more than a huge hole and barely something to hold onto in order to prevent a bath in a lagoon of feces amidst the windy night) and started the approximately 20-kilometer uphill hike to Plaza de Mulas. The distance sounded worse than it turned out to be, as a large portion of it was on totally flat and unrocky ground. Nevertheless, it took some 8 hours, including the breaks, and everybody was tired upon arriving, and somewhat disappointed to find out that there was another 500 or so meters of uphill distance to the Aymara campsite after getting to the entrance of Plaza de Mulas. The main comforting thought was that the next day would be a rest day!

Upon arrival in the Aymara camp, we were once again greeted with a table set with fresh fruit inside a large food tent, and lots of Tang to drink - this time of Plaza de Mulas water, which would not cause as violent outbursts of HAFE, or at least so we hoped. However, it seemed that the kitchen staff had their plans regarding HAFE: we were served copious amounts of delicious lentil stew for dinner. If nothing had done me in thus far, now I could really feel it.

Before dinner, while the sun was still out, all of us attempted to pay homage to good hygiene. Some opted for the $10 USD showers available, Andres and I washed and rinsed each other down with a pitcher and water available in the big blue plastic tank, which only source of heating was the sun, and which, as we found out already the next morning, would regularly freeze overnight.

During dinner, rumors of a particularly spectacular party to be held by the guides and porters started to circulate. Our guide Betty was to perform her dance routine with flying fireballs, the other guide, Pablo, was to demonstrate the Tango, and then a dance party was to ensue. While Andres was practicing his horizontal position in the tent, I certainly wanted to take part in it all. Betty's performance was nice indeed, I succeeded in coaxing Pablo to show a few steps of Argentine Tango to Raimond Valgre's "Erika" squeaking off my Treo, which Mel finished off with a spectacular wrap-the-leg-and-tilt position, and then we all headed to the kitchen tent, which was already in party mode: head lamps in flashing mode being used as disco lights, and a ceiling light decorated with a pink rubber glove to give it proper party appearance. After a few music pieces and a Conga line initiated by Betty, Andres also appeared at the party, and we danced to a few songs, which caused Mel the next morning to circulate rumors of us REALLY being able to dance. Ha-ha – thank you, Mel!!!!

The night itself was uneventful except for my fight with HAFE. Luckily, the toilets turned out to be totally adequate - not half as scary as feared.

January 29th, 2010 - resting day

We spent the resting day reading, chatting, sleeping, eating, and getting another check up by the doctor whose office is located near the Plaza de Mulas entrance, where Omar managed to cause excitement once again with his hear rate reading. It was also recommended that we move about a bit, and thus a short, 20-minute trek to the world's highest hotel on the other side of the coloir was suggested by the guides. As people were excited about the possibility of possibly ordering real coffee with real milk, most of our team happily trekked down. The only trouble on the way was crossing the rapid-flowing mountain stream, about 5 meters wide, which was greatly aided by the bridge-like contraption put there by some kind souls, but which nevertheless proved a bit tricky, and required pulling together all remaining personal stores of balance and courage. We had also hoped for internet access at the hotel, but it turned out that the internet was not working. Oh well...As it turned put, the coffee, while real, was still served with milk powder. So at least two disappointments. On the more sunny side, though, I discovered a JK Alpiklubi T-shirt hanging in the ceiling among all of the other pieces of fabric left by climbers. It was signed by Alar Sikk and a few others.

As for the internet, I used it later when we were back at Plaza de Mulas, at the world's highest art gallery: an artist, Miguel Doura, has set up a gallery of his paintings in a large tent there, and also lives in the place for the entire summer season. He also offers internet and telecommunication services, and runs the web site Aconcaguanow.com. The price was not exactly cheap: $10 USD for 15 minutes, but at least I could catch up on the latest emails, and post a note to Facebook.

January 30th, 2010 - acclimatization trek to Camp Canada

Never mind Camp Canada, the highlight of this day was certainly a toilet falling over during breakfast, with a porter inside. Apparently the chopper, which was taking away the filled toilet tanks, managed to somehow brush against the guy wires of the toilet in question, ripping one or more of them, and as the wind was quite strong, there went the toilet flying off its base, landing on the door, so the poor porter, after regaining consciousness, could only wave through the sh*t-hole. In about 10 seconds, there was a swarm of people around the shiny toilet cabin, which was lifted up in order for the porter to escape. We all had to use alternative toilets for the time being, but the added benefit later in the day turned out to be the fact that somebody had cleaned the toilet in question rather thoroughly.

At 10 o'clock, after grabbing lunch sandwiches and random junk food items consisting of wafers, crackers, cookies, candy, transfat-reeking chocolatey patties, and such (for about the fifth time I was thinking to myself that these people - i.e. Argentineans - need a serious lecture in healthy nutrition), we headed out. My lunch consisted of only the sandwich, and some Tang, as I'm unable to eat any of the above-mentioned junk without getting a gagging sensation in my throat and eventually throwing up - a problem in this neck of the woods, as I later came to discover.

The slope up was quite steep, 40 degrees at least, and occasionally more like 55. This has its good sides, too: you gain altitude fast, even though the path we took was rather sinusoid. We reached Camp Canada, which is at around 4900 m altitude (a little over 500 m altitude gain) in a little over three hours, which also included a 40-minute break. I was feeling great, and had so far not exhibited any signs of being affected by altitude - all of this without a single Kili beer. (This is a reference to a huge roadside ad we saw in Tanzania, which stated: "Acclimatize today. Have a cold Kilimanjaro beer!") Andres was slightly tired, and exhibited his disgruntledness with my generally good feeling, because usually when we participate in all the orienteering events and such, it's the other way around: me huffing, puffing, with pulse in the red, and generally looking like I'm about to kick the bucket. This time though, upon reaching Camp Canada, he was once again showing off his horizontal position.

When we got back down to Plaza de Mulas later in the afternoon, rumors about impending inclement weather were circulating around camp. All of us were worried, since the forecast promised close to a week of high winds and low temperatures, and we simply didn't have enough time to wait it out. We brought this up with the guides, and they promised to look up an official forecast, and come up with a plan by the next day. It was also suggested by us that we skip the following rest day, but the guides did not want to hear about that, reasoning that we'd probably not acclimatize properly, and also be too tired. Oh well, there wasn't much to do but wait.

January 31st, 2010 - a very busy rest day

Already the day before, when we got back from the Camp Canada trek and were washing off, the guides approached us and informed us that a National Geographic film crew was in the camp, and they possibly also wanted to interview members of our team, and to film a few people going about their daily activities, such as washing for example. This was for later though, the morning activities prescribed an exercise in crampon usage on the Los Penitentes Glacier, which is one of the glaciers surrounding the Plaza de Mulas camp site.

Los Penitentes was fun, but also very beautiful with a mountain stream foaming down on one side of it. The people who had brought their cameras (unlike us) managed to get some very nice photos.

After lunch, some people used the Internet, some were spending their time in the food tent, chatting or reading, and some just rested in the sleeping tents.

In the late afternoon, the NatGeo crew showed up. They did a long interview with Mel, some other, shorter, interviews, filmed Omar washing, and also Andres and me washing. We all had to sign lengthy release forms in Spanish.

Right before dinner, we had to make yet another trip to the doctor’s office near the Plaza de Mulas Camp entrance, a third visit to the doctor in all. All of us were approved for ascent.I don’t know who came up with the idea, but on the way back, most men got free plastic bottles of expired milk from the grocery store on the way, to use as pee bottles higher up. This got me thinking. It had been plenty unpleasant to wrestle myself out of the tent in the middle of a cold night to walk to the toilet. Higher up, the conditions would be worse, and there would be no official toilets, only a tent for doing your “number 2”, or evacuating your bowels, as Joe put it. Yet even if I wanted to, I wouldn’t be able to use the milk bottles – their opening was just too narrow. Then it came to mind that I had a plastic Isostar sports drink container with me, with a screw-on cap to boot. If I took the drink powder out, I’d be able to use the container, need be. Yes!!!

During dinner, the guides: Betty, Pepe, and Pablo showed up to present their master plan. Basically they gave us two options: the official one, which prescribed going up to Camp Canada the following day, staying a night there (the weather would get bad overnight), then going further up to Nido de Condores, staying there either a day or two in strong winds and bad weather, then going up to Camp Cholera and trying to summit from there, weather permitting. The other option, originally suggested by us, was to go as high as possible the next day, and preferably even on the rest day – for which it was now too late, and to try to summit from there the coming night. The guides agreed, that the second option would be better, given the circumstances. We had discussed the second option among us in detail, and all voted for that. We thought that the chances of at least a few people reaching the summit would be greater, if we didn’t first have to suffer through several days and nights of cold and wind.

February 1st – up to Nido de Condores

The morning was quite uneventful, as we all followed our familiar routines of getting up and out of the warm sleeping bags, brushing teeth with the ice-covered water in the blue plastic water tank, using the toilet and shivering in the blasts cold morning wind while waiting in line for it, etc. The tents had to be down and ready to be carried up by porters before breakfast, so we all scrambled to get that task out of the way, with frozen hands and the wind doing everything it could to undermine our efforts. The night before, we had discussed the options of hiring porters for our stuff as well. Joe, Charlie, Andres, and I had decided to share a porter, which meant that each of us would be able to lighten our load by 5 kg, and carry 12-15 kg instead of 17-20. It wouldn’t be cheap  - the price of a porter to take a 20-kg load up to Nido de Condores was $180 USD, but we figured that a lighter load would help us conserve energy and increase our chances of summiting. At breakfast, Joe announced that he had decided to not ascend, and would be heading down to Puente del Inca instead. So now we had to decide what to do – would we instead share a porter between the three of us? As it turned out, this was a better idea anyway, as each of us needed to lighten our load by about 6-7 kg anyway – this way we could get rid of all the stuff we didn’t need on the trek up, like sleeping bags and mats, some warm clothes, some meds, etc, while still keeping everything we’d need immediate access to, like crampons, thermoses, down jackets, etc. We got our backpacks ready, grabbed our lunches – again consisting of sandwiches and various junk food items, which I didn’t bother with, and headed out around 10 o’clock.

It took us about 5 and a half hours to get to Nido de Condores, which welcomed us with a pleasant afternoon sunshine and nearly windless conditions. The hardest part of the ascent for me was the hour or so right after Camp Canada, where the terrain was very steep, plus, since we left Camp Canada in a sort of hurry for some reason, I was unable to properly adjust my backpack, the straps of which were bothering me until we had a rest stop and I was able to shed the pack and adjust the straps like I needed to.

Immediately upon arrival we got going on the tent raising exercise. This time, most of the tents were indeed new. Yay! (Which got me wondering why exactly we HAD to have the old tents down ASAP at Plaza de Mulas – maybe they just wanted to instill some discipline into us.) When the tents were up, it was pure pleasure to lie down in the tents and bask in the warmth of the remaining afternoon sun, while our guides were getting busy cooking dinner. A delicious one it was, of tortellini with a nice tomato-cream sauce.

With the altitude, food and exhaustion from the trek up having their effects, we retired to our sleeping bags around 7PM. I set the alarm for 2AM to have ample time before the 4AM departure, took an aspirin and an ibuprofen for the first time during the entire trek, mainly as a preventative measure, and dozed off next to my personal radiator Andres, who had moved very little during the entire stay at Nido.

February 2nd – towards the summit

I woke up about 15 minutes before the alarm. The guides were up already, trying to heat water for our breakfast. The first thing I did was to check the little thermometer I had hung in the ceiling of the tent: -3ºC. As I got dressed and went out to use the open air bathroom located ahead and some 15m above on the rocks, I hung the thermometer outside to check the outside temperature. While it was not particularly windy around the tents, above on the rocks I could feel how the wind had an evil plan to literally dismantle me.

When back down at the tent, I checked the temperature, and it wasn’t as bad as expected – only –10ºC (=14ºF). Since I had filled the thermos with hot water the night before, I didn’t immediately need a refill, but went on to try and create a breakfast out of the items in the sack of stuff given to each tent the night before. This was somewhat of a challenge, as most of the items were deemed not edible by me. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not usually all that picky about food, just that I cannot eat sweets as a main course, or it will not have a pretty ending. Finally, I managed to mix together some instant oatmeal, salt and water, and shove the resulting nasty-looking goop down my throat. Thank goodness for the unlimited supply of Tang, or it would not have gotten past my uvula.

Andres had asked for ibuprofen earlier, but still showed no signs of willingness to get up and move about. Finally he confessed that he would prefer to stay in the tent. This was, after all, already his personal altitude record.

I got myself ready, put the crampons on and slipped a pair of hand warmers inside the down mittens, and waited for the rest of the crew to assemble. There were altogether five people going for the summit from our group: Mel, Omar, Aaron, Vincent and me, plus the guides of course. Another group joined us, and we all headed up the rather steep and icy slope towards Berlin/Cholera. The night was pleasant: the sky was star-filled, and the waning moon still nearly full. The higher we got, the windier the conditions got, though. By the time we reached Camp Cholera about 2,5 hours later, we were all shivering from the cold to some degree. I got my down jacket out of the backpack, and put it on. Our guide Pepe proceeded to remove the piece of plywood  covering the entrance of the wooden hut in Camp Cholera, and we all piled into the hut, where we discovered to our surprise that it was already inhabited! Even more surprising, it was a woman sleeping in there, alone. I’m sure the entire affair must have been quite a shock for her: some 20 people squeezing into the small hut all of a sudden at 6:30 in the morning.

We rested for almost an hour I think – time flies when yo are nice and warm, resting and having hot tea. As we were heading back out, Aaron and Vincent decided that they would turn around, as decided several people from the other group. We said good bye and our female guide, Betty, headed down with them. The rest of us took a direction upwards. The wind was now getting nastier and nastier. I finally covered my face with the balaclava completely, and put on ski goggles. Still the wind was a nuisance. I tried to pretend that I was on a yacht and dealing with a storm on the sea, sans getting wet from waves. The wind was very bad, whirling up loose snow, and causing the trail ahead to get completely snowed in in less than 10 seconds. At some point, Pablo was leading and decided to take a strange turn off the path, into deep snow. I didn’t get this, it was really difficult to move ahead. Soon we got to a nook in the rocks and decided to rest there and drink some tea/have a snack. The other group moved on, and so it was just the five of us: Mel, Omar, me, plus the guides Pepe and Pablo.

We still moved ahead – the plan was to get to Independencia, and then decide whether the traverse was safe enough given the weather. The pace was a bit too fast for me, so I was falling behind. However, I knew from past experiences that if allowed to go at my own pace, I could keep going practically forever. At some point, very close to the ridge on top of which Independencia is located, we could see a bunch of people turning around above us near the ridge. We stopped, as I had to tie my crampon extensions, and Omar was contemplating turning back. We discussed what to do – the guides apparently weren’t sure I could do it, and if Omar wanted to go back, there would be only one guide for both Mel and me, which would not be good if one of us then got too exhausted. I told Pepe that I definitely could keep going, I just needed a bite of something to eat, preferably NOT sweets, and to go at my own pace, which is a bit slower, but not THAT much slower. However, I was also concerned. What would happen if I did get tired? That would mean ruining Mel’s chances of summiting. I showed Pepe my comfortable pace, and he finally agreed that it would suffice. However, that still did not eliminate the problem of having two people with potentially very different ability and only one guide.

When the descending group reached us, the guides of the two groups conferred in rapid Spanish, and an immediate decision to also turn around and descend was made by our guides. It would not be safe on the traverse. We felt defeated, but there wasn’t much to do. Cannot do anything about the whims of nature. We took some photos of the turnaround spot and headed back down. The descent was rapid, although I am notoriously slow on the descent compared to the others – I don’t understand what it is with me. I’m being extra careful, and still falling on my butt now and then, while the others seem to be able to almost glide down without any problems. We took a rest at camp Berlin, where I finally had a chance to eat something not sweet – I dug out the stash of dried sausage I had brought along. Feeling somewhat stronger, we continued down. Mel and Omar along with Pepe dashed down quite a bit faster, I stumbled along with Pablo. I think it was around 1 in the afternoon when I reached Nido de Condores, where the sun was still shining like the afternoon before, but the conditions were considerably more windy. Everybody else was already packing up tents for the descent to Plaza de Mulas. I was barely given 10 minutes to catch my breath, but no decent food to eat (I was still starving and enraged about the lack of anything else but dried fruit, cookies and wafers). Betty, who could identify with my misery, claiming that she couldn’t eat any of the junk either, produced a chunk of cheese out of a communal food sack, off which I nibbled a bit. This helped, though not nearly enough. The only thing keeping me going was a promise made by the guides that down at Plaza de Mulas, hamburgers and coke would be awaiting. Of course, now I also had to cary my full 20 kilos, but it was not so bad on the way down. Again though, I had trouble moving fast. The others sped way past me, I was stumbling on along the icy path. Finally I got so frustrated that I decided to put on my crampons, which aided greatly with my stability and speed of moving down. Yay! I was even able to pass Andres, who, like me, seemed to be rather on the cautious side when descending – at least compared to the others.

The coke and hamburgers was a treat indeed! Normally I don’t drink coke, classifying it to the unbearable junk category, but on special occasions like these, it’s the perfect complement to the burgers. The sun was shining, it was nice and warm inside the food tent....what else can you wish for? Except perhaps having summited...

February 3rd – to the park gate, Puente del Inca, and back to Mendoza

For the very last time we went through the too familiar routine of packing up our stuff – this time for the mules, taking down the tents, having breakfast, grabbing a lunch pack, and assembling to set out. We checked out at the ranger’s office at Plaza de Mulas gate and headed down in rather good spirits. While we hadn’t summited, everybody was happy to return to civilization. The trek down to the park gate was expected to take 6-8 hours. Even with a strong wind whirling up sand and dust, we were moving at a good speed. Luckily, the wind was from behind, but it still blasted the dust everywhere. We were looking at the people going in the opposite direction with regret – they had the wind in their face!

The plan was to have a short rest break at Ibanes, and a longer one in Camp Confluencia. Having set out at quarter past 10 in the morning, we reached Confluencia around 3PM. It was remarkably different there – the sun was shining warmly, and the wind was nearly non-existent. We rested for almost an hour, and Betty managed to wizard up some fresh fruit for us again, even though it apparently wasn’t part of the program at this point any more. For the last time, we had a chance to enjoy the HAFE-causing Confluencia water, and flushing toilets on a mountain.

Omar got impatient enough during the rest break to decide to run down. The rest of us just walked, some fast, some, like Andres and me, rather leisurely. There wasn’t any hurry anyway. The guides stayed behind to chat with the Confluencia staff, so we knew that as long as they were behind us, there was little reason to rush. Some 200 meters from the Aconcagua park gate, Betty finally caught up with us, and we reached the rest of the group, already waiting, at around 5:20PM, which meant that we had taken an hour and 20 minutes to get there from Confluencia. Omar’s run had taken 45 minutes.

Soon, Pablo and Pepe showed up, but we still had to wait for a transfer bus to take us to Puente del Inca, where we were to wait for the mules who’d be carrying our backpacks. Eventually the bus came, we piled in, and zoomed to Puente del Inca, where we all headed happily to the little restaurant for beer and food.

The wait for the mules turned out to be rather long. The sun was already setting and it was getting windy and cold outside, so we had just crammed ourselves into the restaurant, when the guides heard on their radio that the mules had arrived. The bus took us to the mule corral, where we found our luggage right in the middle of it all, with the mules walking around, eating, etc. Once again I was glad about my plastic bag trick.

With the luggage claimed and loaded, we were able to take off for Mendoza, where we arrived around midnight at the hotel, dusty and tired. 

Andres Vesilind, Triin Tammearu