At 8:10 AM we began hiking out of our Condoriri base camp with light packs, leaving our duffles to be loaded on the lamas and burros. An hour and a half later we arrived at the reservoir where the bus had dropped us of five days ago waiting for it to arrive, which it did after a short while. Then we waited about 45 minutes longer for our gear to arrive on the lamas. We had decided to return to the hotel in La Paz where we could clean up with a shower, have a good dinner in town and spend comfortable night in beds. The other choice was to make a camp at the foot of Huayna Potosi where we would begin our climb either way. The hotel option easily won out.
Dick Jessor had decided to leave for his home in Colorado feeling good with his success on the first two peaks. The dinner at our favorite Italian restaurant was to be a farewell for Dick and and a chance for each of us to relate to him the importance and inspiration his membership had been to us. At seventy-seven Dick was the senior member of our little troupe. He realized that he had already accomplished and enjoyed more than he had hoped for and his wisdom told him it was time to draw his adventure to an end.
It was also an evening to repack gear into our large packs for our hike straight up to a high camp on Huayna Potosi. This climb would require us to carry all our gear, although we would have cooks to melt snow for water and make dinner and breakfast.
At 7:00 AM the next morning, Garry and I headed down to the only restaurant open at that hour on a Sunday to have some French toast and coffee before our 8:00 departure from the hotel. The bus hauled us once again up to the outer plateau surrounding La Paz where it soon turned down a dusty dirt road and we bounced along for an hour watching Huayna grow steadily larger before us. As we approached the high point where we were to be left off the wind was howling. Looking up at the mountain, snow banners stream and swirl ominously. We discovered the winds above were at least 85 m.p.h. Fortunately we were at a climbers refugio, a little metal roofed building existing for climbers that reminded me of some hostels in Europe, except the plumbing worked in the hostels. The wind, it seemed, was not much less where we were as it was a bit of a struggle to get from the bus to the door of the building. We waited in the chilly main living room furnished with a couple of trestle tables and a few chairs as our guides pondered the situation and discussed conditions with climbers being forced down from the mountain. Through the afternoon a several international parties spent varying amounts of time with us. We learned that the winds had been very high for several days and people were just trying to wait it out.
Our time line was rather short, leaving us a one day waiting window. We could wait overnight and begin our climb up to camp the next morning if the winds abated. After that we would be forced to head back to La Paz as Linda and I had to catch our flights home in two days. As it was, Mark and Andrew decided to get a ride back to La Paz to get food since our unplanned overnight stay here would leave us short. We remained in the living area of refugio slowly burning all available firewood to keep the temperature up to a reasonable comfort range. As the small wood pile dwindled we began eyeing the wooden chairs about the room, but reason prevailed and all chairs remained intact. We were only guests, after all. About 8:00 that evening Mark and Andrew had made their way back bringing with them pizzas and a cake. There was even a bit of warmth left in the pizza. There was simply no doubt left. We had truly amazing guides!
Monday morning I awoke to silence. The wind that had been buffeting the little refugio, and threatening to rip its metal roofing off, was gone. We readied our packs, splitting the roomy, but heavy AAI tents and their hardware into pieces in order to share the load. It was decided that Garry, Tom and myself would share one of the Mountain Hardwear 3 person tents. Our moderately heavy packs not withstanding, hiking 2000' elevation gain up to high camp at 17,300 feet wasn't too bad. Arriving at the usual sheltered niche in the rocks that serves as high camp for most climbers on this route, we discovered all the serviceable flat spots on the rocky ledges sported tents. There was just no place left to place our four tents. I felt like a penguin who had arrived too late at the rookery to find all the little rocks taken. It was becoming clear that the storm had forced the number of people on the mountain attempting the climb normally spread over four days into a crowd all making their summit bid on the same day.
We moved another 200 feet higher on a snowfield above the standard camp area and began hacking out platforms for the five tents with shovels and ice axes. After some dinner we crawled into our sleeping bags. We were getting up at 3:00 AM and would start climbing by 4:00 AM.
During the night I woke numerous times feeling as if I was suffocating. Sleeping at 17,300 feet I learned later that I was experiencing a common problem at altitude for some people, a condition known as the Cheyne-Stokes syndrome. This is when body undergoes an apnea-like state during sleep at altitude where breathing stops for as long as 30 seconds. Blood oxygen levels drop rapidly forcing you to wake gasping for breath. The blood regains normal oxygen levels and you fall back to sleep where the process begins again.
Upon my return home, I read a book about a guy climbing Denali who was experiencing Cheyne-Stokes breathing at 11,000 feet, which made me feel better since I was at 17,300 feet with my similar experience. I forced deep breaths for a moment and fell back into my intermintent sleep repeating the unsettling process many times.
The hour arrived and Juan brought oatmeal to our tent. I didn't know if it was the early hour or the altitude, but I had to force myself eat the slushy mixture of oatmeal and canned fruit even though it tasted pretty good.
Then I began the process of getting dressed in the frosty tent. I pulled my boot liners out of my sleeping bag and put on my Gore-Tex pants, fleece, down coat, shell and finally my Lowa Extreme outer boots and gaiters. I left Garry and Tom struggling with their clothes in the tent and sat down on the upper edge of our carved platform to put on my crampons so I could move safely on the hard, steep snowfield we were perched on. It was clear and quite cold and windy. I could feel my fingers and toes getting cold, making me anxious to get going. Garry, Tom and I clipped into Andrew's rope and began our steady trudge up the mountain. Craig, Jeanine and Linda were on Mark's rope with Scott and Liz on the third rope with Juan.
Soon the going got steeper and we began passing by large ice cliffs. The first hour passed as I gazed at the familiar pool of light before me in the snow while the dull routine calculation on where best to place my foot repeated itself time and time again in my mind. Off to either side I occasionally could make out the dark shadows of crevasses as we moved slowly upward. The wind grew stronger as we gained exposure on the higher slopes. On our first rest stop, I decided to add a layer of down which I had removed just before we began. My toes and hands were remaining cold long after they normally would have warmed from the exertion. It was definitely a penetrating cold up here and the reduced oxygen was, no doubt, having an effect on my body's ability to rewarm itself. Looking back from our position on the southern flanks of Huayna, the lights of La Paz far below were beautiful. Looking in other directions around us the moonlit peaks shown silently.
We came upon a snow bridge that had deteriorated to form a 20 inch gap over the huge crevasse it had once completely spanned. One by one we made gentle lunges up and across the gap to the higher side. Looking down into the yawning blue ice just to my right it seemed to open wider and wider below into an endless black casm. Other snow bridges were more solid as we made our way slowly up to a final flat snowfield below the 500 foot high east headwall. As was anticipated, the headwall clearly showed the large number of climbers the storm had forced into an attempt this day. There were more than 30 people on the ice above us!
We decided to leave packs here to climb the steep ice with only what we would need to stay warm for a few minutes on the summit. As we sat waitng for a couple of groups to move a bit higher, Andrew radioed down to the other teams and discovered that Scott and Liz had turned back in the night. Liz had gotten too cold on the frigid climb through the nighttime hours and they had decided to return to camp and wait for us to return. The look on Andrew's face when he heard of the turn around spoke clearly that he was quite upset. Mark and Andrew had a real commitment to having everyone succeed. Once again I knew we were lucky to have such caring guides.
Then it was our turn and Andrew set our belay. I soon found myself pressure breathing as I labored to kick my front points and jam my ice ax into the hard ice below 14 inches of rotten crumbling snow. We struggled for more than hour to gain the three pitches of the final 500 feet. Softball sized hunks of ice were constantly raining down on us. My head was jarred several times as a piece of ice smashed onto the top of my helmet. I was absolutely exhausted as I scrambled the last few feet up to the narrow ridge of snow. It was 10:15 AM and I was on top of my first 6000 meter peak!
Our summit stay amounted to brief congratulations and a few pictures. Andrew and Mark were clearly worried about the deteriorating conditions as the sun warmed the snow on the headwall below us and they wanted to get started down it right away. It was indeed treacherous as we struggled to get crampon points to bite into the ice beneath the crumbling, softening snow on the steep surface. At one point I slipped several feet until my left crampon grabbed while at the same instant a point on the crampon from my airborne right boot just poked Tom's gloved hand, luckily with no damage done. My thighs were screaming for rest, but there was no stopping until we reached the base of the headwall. Once safe at it's base I looked back up the ice slope to appreciate it's deceptive easy appearance.
After that it was just a long march down, first back to our high camp, and then back down to the refugio. I was among the first back, sitting on a rock waiting for everyone else to stumble in. From my spot I could view from above some stone steps leading up to the refugio and the parking area for the bus. I knew I was drained and it was an effort to haul myself and my pack up that last little rise of steps. As I watch the others trickle in and one after the other move ponderously up those steps, it appeared to me that this mountain had drained all available energy from each of us.
Once back in La Paz and invigorated by the soothing luxury of a shower, we were ready for another farewell dinner, this time for Linda and myself Linda was departing for Seattle early the next morning and I was leaving to head back to Lansing early the next evening.
Oh, and Craig proposed to Jeanine...
--Gary
