| Peak(s): |
Aconcagua - 22841 |
| Date Posted: | 01/31/2017 |
| Modified: | 05/03/2020 |
| Date Climbed: | 01/16/2017 |
| Author: | I Man |
| Additional Members: | LynnKH |
| Peak(s): |
Aconcagua - 22841 |
| Date Posted: | 01/31/2017 |
| Modified: | 05/03/2020 |
| Date Climbed: | 01/16/2017 |
| Author: | I Man |
| Additional Members: | LynnKH |
| Climbing Aconcagua, Lazy AF Style |
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Aconcagua: #TeamOriginalLynn / Lazy AF '17In January 2017, Lynn Hall and I traveled to South America to attempt to summit Cerro Aconcagua, the tallest mountain on the continent, and outside of Asia at 22,841' / 6,962m. The idea was hatched late, only a few months before, and any potential additional teammates bailed before too long. Lynn and I have been close friends for almost 5 years, and we were happy to go on as a team of 2. We decided to leave shortly after New Years and travel through Santiago (I chose to fly American Airlines, and they don't fly to Mendoza - plus I always welcome the opportunity to see new places).      BE CAREFUL AT THE BUS STATION!!!!! I had heard this before, but it didn't matter. We thought we were being attentive, but my backpack disappeared anyway, along with $1500 cash, my phone, camera, InReach Satellite messenger, Gameboy, and sentimental items including irreplaceable items from my late sister. It was devastating and I almost went home. However, we pressed on with the help of a kind group of women from Washington State who gave me an extra iPhone they were traveling with. I also spoke to at least a half dozen others that were robbed at some point in Santiago. That being said, upon returning, I feel strongly that Chile is an amazing and affluent country with much to offer. Roughly 8 hours after leaving Santiago, sans my backpack, and a multi hour hassle at the border, we arrived in Mendoza. We stayed at the Backpackers Travel Hostel and had a very busy day on January 6th getting permit, mules and supplies. We joked that we hoped the climb would not be as difficult. On January 7th we took the public bus from Mendoza to Penitentes. Concerning Aconcagua: In the past I had always said 'never' when asked if I'd climb Aconcagua. Its not so much that my sentiment changed, more that my circumstances did. Time is no longer a limiting factor, and I did not have to do this trip instead of another. I am still going to do my two big trips this year, and got to travel to a new part of the world, climb to a new altitude PR with a close friend and above all else, get a relatively safe and stress free expedition in during winter in the northern hemisphere without having to prepare much. All in all this climb was what I expected, over-crowded, over-guided, DIRTY and technically extremely easy. It really is a big scree pile similar to a Colorado 14er, just 9,000ft higher. However, it is a mountain that 10's of thousands of climbed and an experience, something to have in common with many other climbers around the world. It IS the tallest mountain outside of Asia and it IS extremely safe and forgiving compared to any other mountain of its height in the world. It had the most developed and comfortable basecamp I had ever experienced and a collection of trekkers and hikers from all over the world. I would highly recommend this peak to anyone looking to get to extreme altitude or practice their big mountain skills in a very forgiving environment. Having now done both, I would say that Denali is more difficult than Aconcagua by several magnitudes. A comparison would not be helpful, even the altitude on Denali feels the same as that of Aconcagua. Finally, Peru's Huascaran Sur (6,768m) is only 600ft lower, but much more difficult, enjoyable and rewarding IMO (Not to mention much cheaper!) Schedule that worked for us: Day 1: Penitentes Day 2: Approach to Plaza de Mulas, attempted i-Murder Day 3: Rest Day 4: Carry to Nido Day 5: Rest Day 6: C. Bonete / Carry to Nido Day 7: Rest Day 8: Move to Nido Day 9: Rest Day 10: Summit Day 11: Return to BC Day 12: Hike out Followed by 2 weeks of additional climbing and tourism in Argentina and Chile!     The first major departure from tradition was the decision to skip Confluencia (around 11,000ft) and go all the way from Horcones to Plaza de Mulas in a single day. We chose this for a simple reason, we did not want to carry a pack and the distance from the TH to Confluencia is very short (it took us around 90 minutes or less to arrive). We expected that the second day, Confluencia to Plaza de Mulas with a pack would be pretty debilitating. Many other teams that we spoke with identified that as one of the more difficult days of the trip. We chose to pay an extra $100 and have a second mule so that we could cover the 26/27k in a single day with only a day pack. It took between 7 and 8 hours to reach basecamp from the trailhead. We had to sleep at the refugio at Penitentes and wait to leave early the next morning. We used the outfitter Lanko Atlas Montanas and had a great experience. We would use them again and recommend them to others. They are large enough to provide good service, but small enough to actually pay attention (some of the outfitters are huge and ridiculous, pretty sure one of them 'Aconcagua VIsion' keeps a T Rex in their main tent). We chose to go with basic service (only mules) and we did not book anything in advance. After arriving at BC, our resident WiFi addict (Lynn) took me on a hike to the old hotel, which was over a mile round trip, by the time we returned to the tent I was feeling horrific, probably the worst I have ever felt at altitude. Even if the effort had been moderate, we had still gone all the way to 14k in a single day and covered almost 20 miles.        We rested the next day to acclimatize and hung out with other teams. Over the trip we met many amazing people from around the world, one of the best parts of expedition climbing in my opinion. We had intended another day of rest, but we were feeling good and anxious to get started. On day 3 we headed up the mountain with some gear and a loose plan of reaching Nido. We figured we could start with Canada, and then see how we were feeling. We knew we didn't want to deal with setting up camp at Canada and that in an ideal situation, we would establish Camp 1 at Nido (Traditional Camp 2, 5400m). We made it to Canada in a couple hours and decided to keep going. Lynn was feeling a little less acclimatized and decided to drop back while I made the carry to Nido. I caught up with her on the way down, not more than 200m away from Nido, and we descended together.         Happy with our progress, we took a rest day on day 4. I was fantasizing about attempting Cuerno, as it looked gorgeous, fun and enticing, but there were some hurdles. For one, it was illegal and I came to find out it carried a fine of $1,000USD if caught attempting, and second I did not have any way to contact the outside world if I got into trouble. I realized it was not a good idea, and instead chose to climb C. Bonete, an easy peak that just crested 5,000m. It would serve as an acclimatization hike while Lynn made another carry to Nido. I climbed with a new friend from Quebec, Xavier. All in all it was a really nice outing, very similar to a 14er here in Colorado, just a 17er. Lynn had great success and by the end of the 5th day we had enough gear at Nido to think about making moves, and think we did...often.      As usual, we used a combination of weather sources to make our decisions, mostly the forecast posted by LANKO and information from mountain-forecast. Other than a wind event on Saturday night, it seemed pretty clear to summit most days. We decided to move up on Saturday, our 7th day since leaving the TH. Again our packs weren't that heavy at all and our plan seemed to be working. After 3.5 hours I was setting up our tent at Nido. Lynn followed soon after. Now we were climbing a mountain, things were about to get fun! The wind was as promised Saturday night, but nothing the old EV2 (a veteran of "Brogan") couldn't handle. By mid Sunday morning, conditions were improving. One of my goals for the trip had been to possibly attempt the Polish Glacier Direct (Steep Snow, AI2-3), and I had even gone as far as to drag ice tools and a helmet up there (as well as tethers and a lightweight harness). I started walking around the mountain, enjoying solitude and amazing views, but eventually got bored. There were so many reasons not to continue, and not many to continue. I figured my best bet was still to talk with a team who had done it, as the unknowns were many the option was getting less and less attractive. It turns out I would get my chance to get info, and while at first it seemed promising, on further analysis it was a no go. The first piece of info was that there was a LOT of snow, over a foot of trail breaking - the next was that there was no ice and the overall angle was pretty low. TO me this meant high risk (danger of falling into a crevasse), high cardio effort (trail breaking) and not that fun (no ice, low angle). I instantly abandoned by plan (this was actually on the summit! The team was a team of 6 from Chile, good for them for pulling off a route that many write off as 'permanently out of condition').  The rest of the day on Sunday was spent melting snow for water, drinking the water and trying to eat. Of course I didn't really eat anything at all, but unfortunately that is how I roll at altitude. We discussed a start time at great length, with lots of info from other climbers who had previously made the summit from Nido. It was important to Lynn and I that we were on top together, and eventually we settled on a split start time, she would start at 5am and I would start between 7 & 8am, whenever the sun warmed the tent up enough haha. We went to bed with very high spirits, ready to make our first attempt on the summit. It was a windy night, but the tent often exaggerates the severity, and Lynn was up and moving on schedule. I laid in my bag and dozed off, but by 7am the excitement was too much. I got up and got situated and started moving by 730am, the sun was up, but we were still in the shadow. Compared to other big mountains it was really quite nice out and I quickly found the well worn trail up to Coldera (high camp) and was on my way. At Berlin I was treated to my first rays of sun, and met up with Tomas and his girlfriend, a duo from the Czech Republic that we had been on schedule with. It was only another 10 minutes to Coldera, which was much more sheltered and a better camp spot overall; this led us to call Coldera (Camp Mistake) and Berlin (Camp YUUUGE Mistake). The trail continues on a gentle rise out of the high camp and towards the summit, it was quite pleasant out. A few hundred meters up I caught up with Lynn, she was hiking with Oliver, a solo British climber that we had met the previous night. Conditions were wonderful here, we were still below Indepencia and out of the wind. There is a small, old wooden hut right before the start of the traverse and I decided to cache my puffy jacket and pants here. The 'traverse' had a little bit of snow, but did not come close to requiring crampons. Once above the small snowfield the wind hit with full fury and the next hour or so were quite uncomfortable, so much so that I began to worry if I had made an error in judgement leaving my warmest clothes. Above 21,000ft the going is slow, this was only the second time I had been this high before. I was quite happy to take shelter out of the wind in a large cave like area below the Candletta; many guided teams were resting here. The time was 1pm.      I always get a kick out of the name of the final gully as it is the same name as the infamous deadly icefall on Huascaran, anyway, the 'Candletta' is a final gully of roughly 1,000ft to the summit. It is steep and loose, dangerous and time consuming. It is the sight of the largest 3 ring circus I have ever seen in the mountains, and I don't think I will begin to get started on what I saw. There was some snow early on, but mostly it was just a steep, probably Class 2+ gully. I wish i had worn a helmet. It was mostly sheltered from the wind, but very very high and the going was slow. Just before 4pm we reached the top.      The wind wasn't so bad, which was a nice surprise, and the views were incredible. The South Face was spectacular. We spent only about 10 minutes on top, I really took time to enjoy the views (something I had been unable to do on Denali last spring) and then we were on our way down. The lower we got, the faster we moved, but the feet hurt with the double boots on. We were back at the tent before dark and in bed without dinner. All day I had drank only 1L of water, if that, and ate maybe a dozen jolly ranchers, so typical for me. At least I did not puke until chugging water back at the tent, that didn't stay down too long. The next morning we carried down and shouldered by far the largest packs of the trip. I was in full blown traveling salesman mode, with the tent and a duffel bag strapped on the outside of my pack. Luckily the going was easy and I was back at basecamp in under 2 hours. The next day we completed the full trek out to the trailhead and by midnight were happily in a hotel in Mendoza. The rest of the month was spent exploring and also attempting another peak near Santiago. Overall the trip was about what I had expected and I am very glad I went for a variety of reasons. Applying our style and experience really made a huge difference in our success. We watched many other teams fail, or make completely baffling decisions. At one point on the morning that we were leaving, it was sunny out and warm. We saw someone walk by the tent in 8000m boots and a full Gore-tex suit getting ready to go up to Canada. "I've just seen an astronaut," said Lynn. I can't possibly understand why people wear double boots or get dressed up like they are ready to summit Denali when it is shorts and t-shirt weather out. We also realized that most people were sleeping on cots, getting three meals a day served to them using a special bathroom with a lock and key. "Uhh...what is it...exactly....that you do here...?" we would wonder, "Do you plan to climb?" Glad I went, happy to see two new countries and meet so many great people, all while getting a new altitude personal record. Looking forward to the future, next stop Alaska Range this april. Thanks to Lynn for being an awesome companion and a strong partner. Go #TeamOriginalLynn!  Thumbnails for uploaded photos (click to open slideshow): 
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