Words from Wik

Sharing my Experiences

Wednesday, September 2, 2009

Kathmandu and Moving to Tibet

My impressions of Kathmandu so far: arriving after 30 hours on the road (or in the air rather), being tired, in a new place, wondering why I am here, being exposed to a foreign culture, all that added together was not fun. The first day and night I was afraid to walk on the street, go to a shop, without being told exactly where to go or actually going with someone. I felt very much out of my element. However, by the next day it was all different, I had a sleep, took some time to walk around and get to know the area, found out the people were not all that bad, etc. So now it’s not that bad of a place! Definitely a decent place to meet and start an expedition.

So what’s been happening in Kathmandu so far with all our group? We’ve been organizing everybody, we’ve had gear checks to make sure everyone has all the right equipment, picking up some last minute items in town, team dinners to get to know the other people, etc. The people in our group are actually split into climbers of two different mountains, 13 of us heading up Cho Oyu and another handful heading up Shishapangma. We’re all climbing with the same company so we will all be travelling to Tibet together and acclimatizing together there in the next couple of days. We had a big group meeting after breakfast today where we went over the details of all the trip into Tibet, some of the interesting details I will
list below:

– We depart tomorrow morning (3rd Sep) at 4:00 am.
– Getting to the border by road can take 4 hours or maybe 20 or more. 4 if the roads are good, and who knows how many if there are washouts (which are likely, we are still in monsoon season here), at which point we have to stop, unload the bus/trucks, carry everything over the washout, load it back into another bus/truck, drive to the next washout point, repeat. Apparently this was done 5 times in one of the previous expeditions, we’ll see how much we have to go through!
– Crossing the border means unloading everything, having porters carry our equipment over a bridge, and loading up new cars/trucks.
– No pictures are allowed to be taken on the border.
– We should be ready to maybe see Tibetans getting arrested/beaten/interrogated for attempting to cross into Nepal illegally. I personally hope none of that goes on while we are there.
– Staying in Tibet means staying at a government-dictated hotel. They tell us where to stay, what to eat. That’s communism. Apparently the hotels there are really bad, dirty, we are told to bring our own
sleeping bags and not use any of their blankets.

Those are the main points that I remember.

I’ll try and post an update from Tibet, apparently we can expect internet access there, and let you know how good/bad it actually was.

On the updating note, I had not anticipated updating this blog during our actual climb, but it might just be possible to send out updates every once in a while, so I will do my best to do just that. In case there are no updates here for a while just know you can always rely on going to www.summitclimbnews.com and getting some of the latest information there. Oh, and by the way, if you don’t want to check here for updates you can sign up to get an email when I post an update, just click on the link at the top right of the main page under Pages titled “Want Email Updates For New Posts?”

Take care and see you soon!

posted by Wiktor at 8:34  

Friday, August 28, 2009

Following along Cho Oyu

This may or may not be my last post before we start going up the mountain, so I wanted to pass along the link for where you can keep track and follow along as we do our climb. You will have to go to the following address:

http://www.summitclimbnews.com/

Then click on the picture beside “Cho Oyu Autumn 2009” or something similar. The link is not up yet but should be up by the first or second of September when we all arrive and meet in Kathmandu. There’s usually an update every day or two, more frequently as we get closer to attempting the summit.

I will try and post an update with a permanent link if I get a chance. Otherwise wish me luck and see you after coming down!

**UPDATE** We are now almost all in Kathmandu, and the site where you can get updates on our progress is here.

posted by Wiktor at 17:02  

Thursday, August 27, 2009

Climbing the next one…

So with just barely having caught up on writing about my last summit on Aconcagua, I am heading off to climb yet another mountain! This one is, believe it or not, is higher than the last one. I’m flying to Kathmandu in Nepal and we’ll drive to China (Tibet) to attempt a climb of the sixth tallest mountain in the world, called Cho Oyu. It’s 8200m tall, 20km west of Everest (aparently you get some good views of Everest from the top!), if you want any more details just check Wikipedia here. I have been getting all my stuff ready in the last few weeks, have been training for months, and just lately (or maybe a long time ago?) I started eating like a pig to gain some weight so that I have more of it to lose while on the mountain.

I will post another entry in the next few days with a link to the SummitClimb News website, where they will post regular updates on our progress as we call in dispatches from a Sat phone while on the mountain. In the meantime, I will post a picture and below it our proposed itinerary, so if you want to know you’ll have a bit of an idea of what I am getting myself into. Enjoy the smileys!

Trying on the gear

Arriving in Kathmandu:

Sep 1) Arrive Kathmandu (1,300 metres/4,300 feet).
Sep 2) Hand over passport to China Embassy, begin processing of Chinese Visa. Training and equipment review at hotel in Kathmandu.
Sep 3) Receive processed visa from Chinese embassy. We may choose to depart Kathmandu for Tibet on this day;

Driving to Basecamp:

Sep 4) Begin Expedition! Bus to Zhangmu, Tibet (2500 metres/8,250 feet); drive to Nyalam (3,750 metres/12,400 feet).
Sep 5) Rest & Acclimatization in Nyalam (3,750 metres/12,400 feet). Walk in the surrounding hills, hang out in the Tashi Amdo teashop. Hotel.
Sep 6) Drive to Tingri at 4,300 meters/14,100 feet. Hotel.
Sep 7) Rest & Acclimatization in Tingri at 3900 metres/12,900 feet. Hotel.
Sep 8) Drive to Chinese Base, 4900 metres/16,000 feet, Camp.
Sep 9) Rest & Acclimatization at Chinese Base.

Moving to Advanced Basecamp:

Sep 10) Walk halfway to advanced base camp, camp at 5100 metres/16,800 feet.
Sep 11) Rest day & Acclimatization at “interim-camp” at 5100 metres/16,800 feet.
Sep 12) Walk to advanced base camp at 5600 metres/18,500 feet. Rest.
Sep 13) Rest & Acclimatization, training, and organization at advanced base camp.

Climbing Cho Oyu:

Sep 14) Walk to camp 1 at 6200 metres/20,450 feet, return to advanced base camp.
Sep 15) Rest in advanced base camp.
Sep 16) Walk to camp 1, Sleep.
Sep 17) Explore the route to Camp 2 at 6700 metres/22,100 feet. Return to advanced base camp.
Sep 18) Rest in advanced base camp.
Sep 19) Rest in advanced base camp.
Sep 20) Walk to camp 1 and sleep there.
Sep 21) Walk to camp 2 and sleep there.
Sep 22) Explore the route to camp 3 at 7400 metres/24,400 feet. Return to advanced base camp. Rest.
Sep 23) Rest in advanced base camp.
Sep 24) Rest in advanced base camp.
Sep 25) Rest in advanced base camp.
Sep 26) Walk to camp 1 and sleep there.
Sep 27) Walk to camp 2 and sleep there.
Sep 28) Walk to camp 3 and sleep there.

Summit Days:

Sep 29) Summit attempt.
Sep 30) Summit attempt.
Oct 1) Summit attempt.
Oct 2) Summit attempt.
Oct 3) Summit attempt, descend to camp 2.

Going Home:

Oct 4) Descend to advanced base camp, pack and prepare to depart.
Oct 5) Final packing, walk down from advanced base camp to Chinese base, drive to Tingri and spend the night.
Oct 6) Drive from Tingri to Kathmandu.
Oct 7) Celebration Banquet. Packing and final shopping in Kathmandu.
Oct 8) Say Good-bye to your new friends, Departure for home.

posted by Wiktor at 19:56  

Tuesday, August 18, 2009

Aconcagua: Descending

When we last left off, we were about to head down the mountain as some weather was coming in. I wanted to follow that post with an in-depth narrative of our descent all the way down the mountain. However, after considering what I wrote on the last post, I just couldn’t write anything that lived up to what I told there. So what follows are some of the pictures worth sharing and a brief description of each. If you want to see bigger pictures make sure to click on one of them to be taken to the gallery and maximise your browser for best quality.

Click for full-size gallery. Ryan leading the way down, and you can see clouds starting to form behind him.

Ryan leading the way down, and you can see the clouds starting to form behind him.

Click for full-size gallery. Me with the other face of Aconcagua visible in the back.

At this point I stopped to have my picture taken with the other face of Aconcagua visible in the back. One thing you’ll notice is that I don’t have my backpack, we had left them a little before the summit, so we are now on the way back to get them. You can see the line of people still making their way up, I am quite sure that we were the first group of people to head down that day.

Click for full-size gallery. One last look at the summit.

After coming down a little more, we take one last look at the summit, where we can still see people posing for pictures or videos before the clouds come and swallow the view up.

Click for full-size gallery. Emil behind Ryan working their way down.

Here we see Emil behind Ryan working their way down, where the clouds in the distance form a nice puffy texture of cotton candy that looks absolutely delicious! One thing I wanted to comment on here, coming down this mountain is a hundred times easier than going up. Now it is true that most climbing accidents happen on the way down, and you have to be very aware and cautious as you go down. That said though, there are no technical sections on this mountain that require that much skill, so it’s basically just a cautious walk down. Just thinking back to being there as it’s happening, the distance covered going down was unbelievably fast (compared to going up). This just shows how difficult it is to be going up at this altitude, the amount of energy required and the difficulty in being so high, as once your body doesn’t need to be huffing and puffing, things become a lot easier.

Click for full-size gallery. We continue to pass people on their way up.

As we descend lower and the clouds come up higher, we continue to pass people on their way up. The ones on this picture will likely still make it to the top, but won’t have any kind of view. We met people further down still, making their way up, that had absolutely no chance of making the summit with the way the weather was coming in.

Click for full-size gallery. Tired, thirsty, cold.

By the time this picture was taken we were well within the weather system, and I had put my camera away. But Emil had his more handy, and shows the painful expression I had on my face from being tired, thirsty, cold, and generally not in a comfort zone. Thirst was the big thing, I was thirsty already on the way up, without enough water to quench it. It’s practically impossible to take as much water up with you as you would want to drink, as you end up losing through sweat and every single high-altitude breath. I had nothing to drink for the last bit of summiting and the entire way down.

Click for full-size gallery. Our camp, shrouded in fog and falling snow.

We finally reached our camp, shrouded in fog and falling snow, but shelter none the less. It was quite a rewarding sight, as we had spent about 11 hours outside going up and down in the cold. I also want to mention the out-of-body feeling that I had on the last part of the way down. From the thirst and tiredness and the cumulative effects of the entire trip, on the way down I felt eerily not inside my own body. I felt as if I was looking down at myself in the third person, as you see me in the picture above, a disconnect between body and mind. Take that for what it’s worth! Once we reached camp 2 we drank, ate, drank, slept, more or less in that order. The thing with these summits is you get back mid-afternoon so there is still half a day of time before the sun sets. We rested and prepared all we needed to pack up and go down the next day, where we would go past camp 1, all the way to base camp.

Click for full-size gallery. A glimpse of the mountain as it peeks out from under the clouds.

Here we catch a glimpse of the mountain as it peeks out from under the clouds, the last look we would get from that high up.

Click for full-size gallery. This part was not a walk in the park, mainly since we had to carry down in one go what we had carried up in several trips.

On the way down to base camp we passed camp 1 and spent one day descending what had taken us 6 days to ascend. On the picture above you can see that even this part was not a walk in the park, mainly since we had to carry down in one go what we had carried up in several trips. My bag was never fuller or heavier than on this day, you can see that my 95 litre bag is filled over capacity and the top compartment is extended to cover the top.

Once we got to base camp we passed on the normal camp meals and went to a “restaurant” for the most delicious plate of lasagna I have ever had! I ate every last crumb, licked up every last bit of grease from the plate. That’s the kind of appetite we all had for “normal” food!

Click for full-size gallery. This is the start of a day during which we would walk 33 kilometers.

In the picture above we are about 20 meters into our trip from base camp to the lower camps. One difference you can see from previous base camp pictures is the amount of snow all around. This was the weather system we were in at the top, that it left snow all around the mountain. This is the start of a day during which we would walk 33 kilometers to the first camp we stayed at, Las Lenas (with the flush porcelain toilets!)

Click for full-size gallery. We took off our hikers and crossed this gentle-looking stream.

On this 33 kilometer day we would have to take off our hikers and cross this gentle-looking stream that was really not that gentle. But the feet sure felt good after their first wash in a couple of weeks!

Click for full-size gallery. The point where we crossed the stream on mules almost two weeks ago.

Here we get to the point where we crossed the stream on mules almost two weeks ago. After crossing (this time on foot) we sat in the sun, let our feet dry, and relaxed while having lunch. After this stop the weather became bad again (as it had the first time we came to this spot two weeks prior, the beginning and end of our weather trend), and the rest of the way was a little more wet and windy.

Click for full-size gallery. Last picture of the trip, the after picture.

Last picture of the trip, the “after” picture. Emil, Ryan, Kerry, and myself, with everyone that can grow facial hair showing it off proudly! While you can’t really see it in this picture, when I looked at myself in the mirror later that day I did not recognize myself. I had aged 10 years in two weeks. Also when taking a shower that day was the first time I noticed how much weight I had lost. It was the first time in my life I could actually feel all my ab muscles. I did not weigh myself so I cannot even guess how much I weighed, but I had an enormous appetite for months after (I was still eating big probably long after I had gained it all back!)

So that’s the story of Aconcagua 2009. Hope it shed some light on how exactly these trips look and feel. Take care, until the next mountain!

posted by Wiktor at 17:00  

Tuesday, August 11, 2009

Mountain Climbing Brain Damage

Another break from Aconcagua reporting, here is an article I found interesting on high-altitude mountaineering and brain damage. I will admit I was not too surprised by it as I’ve met many people that have mentioned this, however it’s interesting to see that it can be scientifically verified.

A new study of professional mountain climbers shows that high-altitude climbing causes a subtle loss of brain cells and motor function.
On scans, the climbers showed a reduction in both white and gray matter in various parts of the brain.
Six of the nine climbers had lower than average scores on the Digit Symbol test, which measures executive functions. Three out of nine scored lower than average on memory tests, while four scored below average on a visual-motor function test. The study authors noted that the results “are most likely to be due to progressive, subtle brain insults caused by repeated high-altitude exposure.”

To see the full article click here.

posted by Wiktor at 18:15  

Saturday, July 4, 2009

Aconcagua: Summit Attempts

When I last left off on the latest post, we had arrived at Camp 2 and were preparing for our summit attempt. Just to give you a little background, we had spent the day before carrying equipment to camp 2, the current day moving to camp 2, and then we just found out that the plan was to go the very next day and make a summit attempt. Now this was exactly what I didn’t want. The two days of walking up to camp 2 had tired me out, and making a summit attempt involved waking up at 2:00 or 3:00 in the morning, so we wouldn’t even get a good night’s sleep. However, according to Ryan it was the best thing to do, that spending idle time at camp 2 is worse in the end than getting to the top and being free to go home. I was not quite convinced at that point, but what could I do, the decision had been made to try for the summit the next day.

To make sure I was good to go when summit time came, I ate a nice big dehydrated meal, one of the worst meals I have ever had! It made my stomach semi-upset, and I had one of the worst nights of recent memory because 1) the meal did not agree with me and I had gas all night that kept me up, 2) it was the first night at a new high altitude which meant vivid dreams and bad quality sleep, 3) this would be night number 10 in a row sleeping in a tent in a sleeping bag on a thin foam pad in the cold (I had to cover my legs with my down jacket to stay warm, this was over top of my sleeping bag that was “aparently” rated to -40C), and 4) I was constantly waking up and thinking “is it time to get up yet? did I oversleep?” All that added up to a truly bad night, where I think I may have slept a couple hours max.

Anyways, early morning rolls along (I think the plan was to wake up at 2:30, leave at 3:30), I feel like total crap, I have a headache that could be from any one of the problems I listed above, but what can I do, the summit awaits! We eat some breakfast, start putting on all our gear, and we hit the road! Now at this time of the night it is very cold, I wish I could tell you the temperature but I didn’t know it. It had to be below -20C or even colder perhaps. Basically, it was REALLY cold, I think it felt like -35 or something. The problem with me telling you what it felt like is that after spending 10 nights sleeping in the cold and completely living in the cold and eating less than one should, you feel colder than you would normally. So I want to tell you it was -35C when really it was probably closer to -20/-25 C.

We walk along, working our way up. We can see little fireflies ahead shining on the route that we will be taking, and some other little lights following us as well; they are actually other groups ahead and behind us, working as we are, their lights dwarfed by the blackness all around.

Click for full-size gallery. A brief break to warm up the feet.

We had a brief stop at around the time the sky was starting to light up; Kerry’s feet were starting to feel cold, he didn’t put any warmers inside his boots before starting out. One of us had extras and Ryan helped him out so that it would go quicker.

Click for full-size gallery. The orange light of day start to peek its way through.

Looking back at the snowy route that we had followed, we see the orange light of day start to peek its way through, though never soon enough for our already cold bodies.

Click for full-size gallery.

Emil managed to grab a decent shot of me as we sat there; my face mask is down at my neck, and my hood is off. The hood from my down jacket was on/off as my thermostat depending on how hot or cold I felt.

Brief break done we continue on, one small step at a time, each breath a little less satisfying than we would want. This continued on for another couple of hours until we reached a very windy point on the mountain. We started walking along a very exposed section with a strong cross-wind, and at Ryan’s advice we turned back; it was a part better left for when the wind calmed down a little. So we joined a couple of other groups and started to wait!

Click for full-size gallery. Looking up at part of the summit.

On the above picture we are looking up at part of the summit, along with the clouds moving past at a very high speed. This is where we waited, as we were out of the direct wind but still had a good view of the summit to see how the clouds and wind were behaving. On the bottom of the picture you can just barely see me, sitting down on the ground, my mask on my face, my hood on, trying everything to stay warm. At first I was standing and walking, moving around to try to stay warm. Eventually I became too tired to keep moving, yet too cold to sit down. It makes you realize how difficult it is to stop on a climb like this and do nothing. Your clothing is only meant to keep you warm while you are working and creating lots of body heat. It cannot keep you warm when you sit down and rest.

I can’t remember how long we stayed here and waited. I think it was less than an hour. Eventually the other group went down, and we still waited. Then it was time for us to make a decision: I voted we go down, as to me there was no point in standing there and waiting. I was getting colder and weaker, and if we were to suddenly rush off for the top I had my doubts about my ability to make it. The wait at this spot was just the latest in a series of things making my day a difficult one. And that’s what Ryan suggested as well, and so that’s what we did. Attempt number one on January 17th was abandoned and we set off the way we came, back down to the relative comfort of our tents.

Click for full-size gallery. The blessed sight of our tents waiting for us after a very long day.

The way down was relatively uneventful in the grand scheme of things. The clouds that had constantly been blowing by the summit had started to work their way down, and so part of the way down we walked through these clouds and the snow they were depositing on us. At least we knew that turning back had been the right choice. There was no way we could have made the summit in that kind of weather. Above we see the blessed sight of our tents waiting for us after a very long day, and it wasn’t even 10:00 in the morning yet!

The rest of the day was spent eating and drinking, trying to get our energy up for the next attempt. The plan was as follows: we wake up at 3:00 am again and see if the weather is good enough to attempt another summit push.

I wasn’t sure anymore what would be better, to stay and rest or to go and get it over with. The headache I had had in the morning had not gone away, it was always there reminding me that I am in a place where you shouldn’t be for very long. Ryan’s advice about not staying at Camp 2 any longer than necessary was starting to make sense.

As night came the weather had not improved, and it definitely made the night quite interesting. The snow was still falling, and the wind was still howling and blowing. All night the wind would blow snow under the tent fly and the snow would sit packed along the inner fabric of the tent. As we slept our breath would condense and freeze on the inner walls of the tent, where the snow was sitting on the other side. Then every time the wind slapped the tent around we would be rewarded with tiny icicles made from our own breath raining down on our faces and sleeping bags. It was literally snowing inside our tent every time the wind shook it. It made for another night with little sleep; the only good thing about it was my thought that “with this weather we definitely won’t be attempting another summit push, so maybe we’ll get some longer sleep and we’ll all do better on the following day.” As 3:00 am rolled along that was indeed the case, we would not be doing another summit push today. It would be a day of rest!

Day of rest came, and it was good to take a break. However my headache was still there, and having only two painkillers left (that I wanted to save for the next summit push), I ended up having to take is as it came. This headache made everything that much more difficult, eating was harder, going to the bathroom was harder, going outside the tent to walk around or take some pictures was harder. Somehow I was not acclimatising as well up here as I had on some of the lower elevations (Camp 2 is at 5900 m).

Click for full-size gallery. Looking up at the route we would take on our way up.

Above you can see a shot similar to the one I posted in the last post, looking up at the route we would take on our way up. The difference here is that the night’s snow storm had made the entire mountain side white, and the route is no longer visible on its own; all we can see is the group of climbers heading up and blazing a trail.

Without any other big events, night came and we planned to push for the summit again the next day. I think it was still snowing for part of the night, but the wind was not blowing as intense as the night before. I was feeling actually decent once 3:00 am came around! I still had the headache but I put my last two painkillers to work on that.

The day started off the same way as the one a few nights back. There was a bit more traffic, as everyone was taking this opportunity to try the summit; the bad weather had prevented anybody from summiting in the last two days. The only change in our group was that Kerry was not feeling in quite the same shape as on our first attempt. He was already feeling cold as we were setting out, and a little while into the trip he was getting cold in his extremities. Before the sun had had a chance to peek over the horizon, and while we were still within sight of our tents, he made the decision to turn back and left the three of us to try and reach the summit. Asking him about it later he had no regrets about turning back, he was just not feeling up to it; I wonder if I would have been smart enough to make that same choice were I in his shoes. I guess I have to be glad that the headache was the worst of my ailments at this altitude. But it also confirmed to me Ryan’s advice that you want to spend as little time as possible in the highest camps, as Kerry would have made the summit on the first attempt had the weather given us that opportunity.

Click for full-size gallery. A look back at the groups following us.

Once the sun had come out it was starting to look like quite a beautiful day. The picture above shows a look back at the groups following us. As you can see, already at this altitude there is the feeling of being on top of the world! Every mountain in view is well below, and we are left to just cling to the side of the mountain we are on.

While the view was definitely striking, I found myself thinking about other things on the way up. Mainly the thought that kept coming back into my head was “Why am I doing this again? Why did I just spend two weeks (and who knows how much still) of my life living on a mountain in a tent? Am I doing this to work my ass off, reach the top of some piece of rock, and stand there for half an hour? Is that really worth all the time, effort, and x thousand dollars?” These thought were going through my head now, but they deterred me only slightly. That happens when you are close to your physical and mental limit, when you look at the amount still left to climb, when you think of how nice it would be to turn around. In effect it’s all those weeks spent preparing, training, acclimatising that keep you going, the thought that “Well, I’ve made it this far, I can’t turn back with just a few hours to go.” But the temptation is there. Or maybe it’s not really a temptation to quit and turn back, but to never, ever, repeat anything like this. I felt the same way when I climbed Huayna Potosi in Bolivia, I said to myself “Wik, you’ve just gone through so much to stand on a piece of rock for a few minutes. It’s not worth it. Never do it again, it wasn’t even fun.” Yet here I was doing it again, asking myself why I hadn’t listened to myself from my first experience? Now let me digress a little and answer that question. After climbing the mountain in Bolivia I really felt that I never want to do anything like it in my life. It really was an experience I was unprepared for, untrained both physically and mentally, but most importantly I was severely lacking in experience. If I knew back in Bolivia what I know now about climbing mountains I would have had a much easier time. But such is life, you have to learn lessons, many of them the hard way. There are people all around us trying to give us advice, share the lessons they learned the hard way with us so that we don’t have to learn them the hard way. And now I am not just talking about climbing mountains, but life in general. How many times have we made mistakes in our lives, learned from them, only to realize it was the same kind of advice that people were giving us all along? I like to say, wise is the man who can learn from other people’s mistakes. I highly doubt there are many mistakes out there that have not yet been made by someone. But there are two ways to react to those tough lessons that life throws at us. The first is to learn from it, take it for the experience it is, and make sure you don’t put yourself into those same kind of situations again. The other way is to also learn from it, take it for the experience it is, but take it a step further, know that since you came out of it, you are now prepared to go through something like it again, maybe something even more severe. Now I write this with the theme of mountain climbing, that’s what this whole thing is about. But apply it to whatever you may need it to apply to in your life right now. Do you let bad things, bad experiences, stop you from doing anything in the future? Or do you come to the conclusion (sooner or later, doesn’t have to be right away) that all it was was a preparation for taking on even tougher things? That’s a lesson I learned; feel free to learn it on your own if you want.

As you can see, there’s a lot of time for thinking and analyzing life and philosophy when you have all this time to walk up a mountain. I think it’s a great opportunity to learn about oneself. Maybe that’s why I enjoy climbing mountains so much, you learn about yourself more than you think was there to learn.

Alright, getting back on track with the mountain climb. We were still working our way up the mountain, and there was still (what seemed like) a long way to go. At one point very close to the top we passed a group of climbers from the Argentinian military. They were on their way up to remove a body from near the summit. This had been a gentleman who had attempted to climb the mountain; just meters from reaching the summit he went into cardiac arrest and died. I don’t think we were aware of all those details as we climbed, but we got some advice from Ryan to NOT look at the body. If we were going to pass it on the way up, the best thing to do was to not look at it, as it can be quite haunting. Luckily the body was not on our route up.

With little further events, on January 19 2009, after spending 7 hours and 15 minutes climbing up, we made the summit of Aconcagua! 6962 meters above sea level! Top of the Americas, the western hemisphere, and the southern hemisphere!

Click for full-size gallery. Posing the victorious pose.

Posing the victorious pose with my ice axe in the air!

Click for full-size gallery. Ryan and me at the top.

Ryan and me at the top. Much credit for us making the top goes to Ryan Waters, our guide and more on this trip. There are a lot of specific examples I could give you of why, but just take my word for it.

Click for full-size gallery. The cross I am holding is the sign of Aconcagua's summit.

I had brought with me a flag of Canada and Poland, and flew them both together at the summit. The cross I am holding in my other hand is at the summit all the time, it is the sign of Aconcagua’s summit. A picture with it means you made it to the top.

Click for full-size gallery. The clouds and the mountains surrounding us are so low.

Looking the other way, the clouds and the mountains surrounding us are so low, it really feels like the top of the world. We didn’t have that clear a view of the mountains below, but it was still magnificent, more than we could ask for!

Click for full-size gallery. Ryan calling in the news that we had made the summit.

Trying to stay low to stay out of the wind, we see Ryan calling in the news that we had made the summit! Emil is also taking a break and sitting down. I think I spent the entire time on the summit walking around, taking pictures, trying to get it all in. I am not sure if I even sat down at all, that’s how exciting it was! It also got cold when sitting so that may have had something to do with it!

Click for full-size gallery. American mountain guides promoting Eddie Bauer's latest line of mountaineering gear.

Above what you see is a group of mountain guides and some clients making a bit of a promotional video on the summit of Aconcagua. It was a group of American mountain guides promoting Eddie Bauer’s latest line of mountaineering gear called First Ascent. The guides are quite famous in mountaineering circles (in the US anyways); one of them was Ed Viesturs, the only American to have summited all fourteen 8000+ meter peaks without oxygen. He was also in the IMAX movie about Everest that was filmed in 1996. Dave Hahn was another, he went on later that year to summit Everest for the eleventh time, more than any non-sherpa in history. I have been trying to find some video footage from that group (since I could maybe find myself in some of the shots ;-)) but all I have seen from it is their web page here.

Click for full-size gallery. A picture of Iván Berdeja tucked into the cross.

One of the last pictures from the summit is the one of the cross I spoke of above, the sign of Aconcagua’s summit. What I want to point out here is that I left a picture of Iván Berdeja tucked into the cross, after having written a little note about him on the back. He is a mountain guide who helped me set up my climb in Bolivia, and he later died while guiding for another group. I mentioned it here in a previous post, and it was an absolute honor to make it to the top and be able to do what I was asked.

Click for full-size gallery. Ryan leading the way down.

That was about all the time we had on the summit. We spent just under half an hour on the top, and it flew by like no time at all. The one thing that reminded us how long we had been on the summit was how cold we were getting. The last picture you see here is Ryan leading the way down, and you can see that we are headed directly into the clouds that are coming in. It made me realize the age-old saying, that when you reach the summit you are only half way there, you still have to get off the mountain.

So stay tuned for the next installment where we head into the clouds and try to make our way all the way back down.

posted by Wiktor at 22:28  

Saturday, June 6, 2009

Aconcagua: The High Camps

Once we reached base camp we had a day of rest, and we used it to go visit the camp doctor. Everybody that wants to ascend to the summit needs to see this doctor, who will measure your pulse, blood pressure, listen to your breathing, and all that needs to be done to make sure you are acclimatizing well. This doctor has the power to tell you that you are not allowed to go any further, and there were people that had to stay longer at base camp before they were allowed to continue (and even some that made it no further at all).

Going higher after base camp involves staying at two “high” camps before reaching the summit. The idea was to reach each camp with some gear, dump it, and then go back down to sleep, before going back up and staying for good. This “climb high sleep low” idea is a good way to acclimatize to altitude.

Looking back at base camp on the way to Camp 1.

This first picture is looking back at base camp on the way to camp 1. While it’s a pretty big place considering how much effort it takes to get things there, it is dwarfed by the surrounding mountains once you go up a little higher.

Emil and myself taking a break; notice the boots we are wearing, these weigh about 1.5 kg EACH BOOT!

Climbing to these high camps is much different than the type of hiking I am used to in Canada. In Canada I usually only go on day trips, travel light, and go up and down pretty quickly. Here we are carrying much more weight (both on our backs and in the gear we are wearing), we walk slowly, taking small yet determined steps, focusing on breathing, etc. In the above picture you can see Emil and myself taking a break; my pack was so heavy that every time we stopped and I took it off, I felt like I could flap my arms and fly away! Also notice the boots we are wearing, these weigh about 1.5 kg EACH BOOT!

Me resting beside some penitentes, by far the most interesting feature I have seen on any mountain.

The above picture shows me resting beside some penitentes, by far the most interesting feature I have seen on any mountain. Basically it’s what look like upside-down icicles, but are right in the snow we walk through. The picture below shows a whole mountain side full of penitentes, and we had to make our route right through it. Having to blaze a new trail through these things would be very difficult and time-consuming, but luckily there was already a trail we could follow.

A whole mountain side full of penitentes.

Below you can see me among these penitentes as we are descending to base camp after having dumped some stuff at camp 1. And yes, those are flip-flops I have strapped to my backpack, I was using them as high as camp 1 to give the old feet a break from closed shoes!

Me among the penitentes as we are descending to base camp.

Camp 1, 5000m. It is staying at this camp that made me appreciate all the things I took for granted at base camp. I guess this would be a good time to introduce the ‘human waste strategy’ that the parks has in place.

Camp 1 with the little line of tents, and where the person in red is heading up is where the 'bathroom' is.

In all the camps below camp 1 there have always been outhouses, and the waste from them was flown out by helicopter to make sure it doesn’t start building up inside the park. I must admit that it’s good to know the money I paid for my permit is going toward things like that. At the first stop Las Lenas they even had porcelain toilets that flushed! But that is a long way down from camp 1… Anyways, as part of the permitting process, everyone receives two bags that they need to later return, or get fined. One is for garbage, the other one is for ‘number two’. So, once at camp one and above, going to the bathroom for number two involves squatting over a plastic bag. Now I will not get into too much detail but just imagine trying to go when there is heavy wind threatening to blow the bag away.

Just to comment on the picture above, what you see is camp 1 with the little line of tents, and where the person in red (who happens to be Kerry from our expedition) is heading up is where the ‘bathroom’ is. You will have to take my word for it that it is one of the most beautiful views from a bathroom that I have ever seen!

We did have some adventures at camp 1, mainly involving waking up to a tent that had flooded overnight and then frozen, and I had to use my ice axe to pick out my bag that had been left just outside overnight.

Looking up to more or less where camp 2 should be, at the top of the saddle and then a little to the left.

On to camp 2. The picture above shows the view looking up to more or less where camp 2 should be, at the top of the saddle and then a little to the left, behind those two jagged teeth sticking up. Above those we can see the Polish glacier, which is an alternate route, more direct but also much more technical, longer, and pretty much only for those hard to the core.

The process of going up the mountain at these higher elevations

The next picture above does a great job showing the process of going up the mountain at these higher elevations. Notice how small my steps are, just one foot right in front of the other. Head down, not really looking at the view, just concentrating on walking, on breathing, on moving forward. In the back on the right you can see camp 1 in the background, which once again does not get appreciated until reaching the one higher.

Three days worth of walking are all visible in this picture

On this next picture above we can see about three days worth of walking. The valley in the background was the last day of hiking to get to base camp. Then there’s the walk from base camp to camp one, of which we only see camp one in the background. Then there’s the route we’re on right now, from camp one to camp two, with the trail clearly visible.

Camp 2!

Finally, camp 2! We reached it for the first time on January 15, 2009, just to drop some stuff off, and the second time a day later, to stay as long as necessary to make the summit. You can see the snow line going up and to the right, this is the route for the summit attempt. Or there’s the alternate route on the left, straight up the Polish glacier, but I did not see one single person try to go up that way in all the time we spent at camp 2.

A little clowning around at Camp 2.

And finally just a little clowning around at camp 2, enjoying the view that was once again better than at the previous camp. Already I felt like it was the top of the world, but there was still over 1000 vertical meters to go.

Make sure to stay tuned for the next installment, as we push to the summit…

posted by Wiktor at 20:28  

Friday, May 29, 2009

I am a climber

Or at least I would like to think so. Taking a break from my Aconcagua posts, here’s something interesting I stumbled upon. I found a really interesting article about climbers and their personalities, here’s a bit of an excerpt:

… The personality of climbers was quite different to that of average people. Climbers scored higher in the areas of Novelty-Seeking and Self-Directedness and lower on Harm-Avoidance. What this suggests is that climbers generally enjoy exploring unfamiliar places and situations. They are easily bored, try to avoid monotony and so tend to be quick-tempered, excitable and impulsive. They enjoy new experiences and seek out thrills and adventures, even if other people think that they are a waste of time. Climbers therefore also participate in other adventure sports, such as mountain biking. When confronted with uncertainty and risk climbers tend to be confident and relaxed. Difficult situations are often seen by climbers as a challenge or an opportunity. They are less responsive to danger and this can lead to foolhardy optimism. Climbers also have good self-esteem and self-reliance and therefore tend to be high-achievers…

… An interesting observation of serious risk-taking sports people is that despite frequent near misses and accidents, they continue to participate in adventure sports. This persistence in the face of trauma is in my view quite unique. … The researchers commented that the level of trauma experienced by the mountaineers was similar to that experienced by fire-fighter and army personnel, yet they had only 10-20% the rate of psychological disturbance. Only 3% of mountaineers developed Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, whereas rates in firefighters are up to 20%…

Some interesting reading in my mind, read the full article here. Stay tuned for more from Aconcagua!

posted by Wiktor at 17:28  

Sunday, May 10, 2009

Aconcagua: Base Camp and Hanging Around

After three straight days of hiking (covered in my previous post) we reached base camp, which you can see in the picture below. When we first got here, I had a headache, was tired from all the hiking, a little bit hungry, and really needed a rest to get used to the altitude. So at first base camp was not an ideal place to be; walking around and doing anything was slow and required lots of effort. In the end, after coming down to be BACK here, it was such a luxurious place when compared to the higher camps (more on that in the next post).

Base Camp - Plaza Argentina

Below is our more ‘permanent’ tent that we used for a kitchen and dining center, and also as the place to hang out, listen to music, chat about the latest news and events (among other things: discussions about Obama when we realized he would get sworn in while we were somewhere on the mountain).

Dining Tent

A lot of time on the mountain was spent idle, just sitting around and letting our bodies acclimatize to the conditions. Below you can see me just hanging around in our tent, on my way in or out.

Hanging Out

So what did we do during this idle time? I seem to get asked that question a lot. Well for one, we slept a lot, which was 10+ hours, or from dusk til dawn on most days for me, and for everybody else I am quite sure; one of the main reasons for that was that once the sun set you did not want to be outside your sleeping bag. Also later on when I had nothing else to do I thought: “what a better way to kill time than to sleep late into the day?” And also, how often in life do I get to REALLY sleep as much as I want? 🙂

I also had some books to read, and John Grisham’s books definitely are a good way to pass the time. Below you can see Emil hanging out with his music, and the books beside him are mine, one a Grisham and the other being Mountaineering: The Freedom of the Hills.

Emil and his Music

I also had my iPod with me, which was great for chilling out, however with it I learned one of the first things about altitude: hard drives do not work at altitude. At about base camp my (hard drive based) iPod worked sporadically, and Ryan our guide confirmed that it happens to most ipods, and that if I try to use it at even higher elevations I could damage it for good. So, it stayed at base camp, and for my next high-altitude expedition I will look into flash-based models.

This might be a good time to bring up the other things I learned first hand about life at altitude:

– I had really vivid, realistic, not-enjoyable dreams. That was not too fun, and apparently it’s not all that uncommon either. They did go away once I acclimatized, and then came back once we went higher.

– People have a lot more gas at altitude, and trust me I experienced that first hand. I won’t get into the details here but there were some funny (and also some not-funny) stories about that.

– Loss of appetite. I had heard about this, but didn’t realize the effects of it until the trip was over. At higher altitudes you don’t eat much, partly because the food is not that good or interesting, partly because you have had that same type of food every day for a week already, partly because you’re busy hiking or just living. And I didn’t think too much of it at the time, after all there were some days that we just sat around and rested, so if I’m not hungry that means I couldn’t possibly be burning that many calories! Then once I got down and took my first shower (after 15 days on the mountain without a shower, my personal best!!) I realized how much weight I had lost, as washing and feeling my stomach I realized that for the first time in my life I had lost the ‘spare tire’ around my waist and could feel all my muscles! (Lesson: if you want to lose weight go climb a mountain for a few weeks. Results guaranteed.)

Day Hike from Base Camp

One of the days at base camp we took a little hike away from the normal routes of where we came from and where we were going. That was just to keep our legs active, as days of rest can yield some tight muscles when it comes time to need them. Below you can see me enjoying some of the topography of the area around base camp.

Day Hike from Base Camp

Another way to pass the time was to sit in the tent and relax, maybe drink some tea, which we did a lot of in the higher camps where we did not have our dining tent, and our sleeping tents were all the shelter we had.

Relaxing in the Tent

I also made sure to pray every day, as I have learned that mental strength is more of what gets a person to the top than physical strength. I would say a Rosary every day, and on some tough days of walking I would find myself praying as I’m going up, taking my mind off the burden at hand.

Nothing to do...

By the end of the summit push, when I had read all my books, my iPod was waiting at base camp, the weather outside was too bad to go and talk to people, I would just lay in my sleeping bag and do absolutely nothing. I think there was one day like that, when I can remember looking at my watch, thinking “I have about 8 hours left before I go to sleep with absolutely nothing to do”, and I literally spent that day laying there and just thinking, the first day of my life in a VERY long time where I did absolutely nothing, because there was absolutely nothing to do.

Alright, now that I’ve filled your head with what our idle time looked like, stay tuned for my next entry, when I’ll talk about the trips from base camp to the high camps.

posted by Wiktor at 20:17  

Saturday, March 14, 2009

Aconcagua: Days 1-3, Hike to Base Camp

Hotel in Mendoza, preparing to leave

Our start in Mendoza can be seen above, as we get our stuff ready to pack in the trucks. For some background I just wanted to introduce the people that will show up in the pictures. Our guide was Ryan from the US, who has summited Mount Everest several times, and Aconcagua ‘about 7 times or so’, to put it in his words! He was guiding our group of three, which included Emil from Sweden, the youngest of our party, Kerry from Scotland, the oldest of our party, and myself! We got to know each other pretty well on this climb, which is one of those nice things about trips like these. If you want additional info on hiking distances and elevations, refer to my previous post.

Punta de Vacas, the 'before' picture

Alright, first let’s show the ‘before’ picture above, as we prepare to finally depart and start walking. The hike to the top of Aconcagua starts at Punta de Vacas (Point of Cows, as we walk beside the river ‘Cows’ (vacas) on the first day!), where we carry just what we need for the day and have mules carry the rest. The route is quite scenic, with some nice views and beautiful colors along the way.

On the first day of hiking

We start ahead of the mules, and while we were taking our lunch break they passed us, and would be waiting at our first camp for us. The ‘mulers’ as they are called, the guys that lead the mules up and down the mountain, are quite nice, and every night that they camp on the way to Base Camp (BC) they have a big barbecue with great Argentinian meats of all kinds! And they usually share some with whoever needs a little extra nourishment!

The Mulers and the Mules

The way was pretty easy, just trail hiking really, but there were some tricky points like crossing cracked glaciers that made it just interesting enough!

A dirty old glacier

The first night was spent at Las Lenas (2700m, which is high enough to make it part of our acclimatization), and was pretty uneventful, just hanging around the campsite and getting to know the other climbers, talking to the mulers, learning how to put up a tent correctly, and getting that first sleep on the uncomfortable mattress.

Staying warm the first night and taking pictures

The second day we hiked a little bit further, and spent the second night at Casa de Piedra (House of Rock), named such because there is a huge rock which has been party hollowed out and is used as a hut by the Mulers.

Casa de Piedra

This evening was a little bit more eventful in that we had a bit of a snow storm come in, a preview of what we would face on the parts higher up the mountain. Below are the tents we slept in, two people in each.

The snow falls on our camp

The third day the hiking was a little more difficult at times, starting off with crossing a river (which we luckily got to do on mule-back thanks to the Mulers, as the other option was to take off shoes and wade through ice-cold glacier water, which was not an attractive option on a cold morning after a snow storm).

River crossing on muleback

Also, the route was party on the side of a valley/canyon (that can be seen in the picture below), and made for some steep sections where good footing was critical. So on the picture below you can see our route, we started the third day at the end of the river valley behind me, and walked along and above the river.

The valley we walked on the third day

The Mulers on their way to BC, with Aconcagua in the background.

The Mulers leading the way to  Base Camp

From this point we also had a good view ahead at the mountain we were going to summit. This is really the first and last good view we had of the mountain as a whole, as when we got closer you couldn’t quite see it the same way. So I’ll use it to point out the route we followed, refer to that when I am talking about the higher camps in later posts (you may need to click on the image and pull it up in the gallery to see detail about the route we followed).

Aconcagua, and the route that would take us to the top

My typical mountain climbing dress: Waterproof/windproof yet breathable shell, polarized sunglasses, hat to protect from sun with a bandanna to have ear/neck protection, and my trademark Adidas pants.

Aconcagua and myself

After hiking about 5 hours each of the three days, we finally reached our destination, Base Camp called Plaza Argentina at 4200 m above sea level. And from this point on I will continue in the next post…

Plaza Argentina, otherwise known as Base Camp

posted by Wiktor at 21:58  
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