Ty here, a guilty blog slacker trying to atone for his laziness by posting a few notes about some experiences several thousand miles north in Ecuador back around the new year. Anyhow, here it is, entitled:
Chimborazo, or How Rose Learned to Climb Steep Ice at 18,000 Feet in the Middle of the Night.
After two months surfing and lounging in Canoa (at sea level, clearly) and a brief but lovely stay in Baños (a little higher than Canoa at least), we decided we were pretty acclimatized and ready to climb the highest volcano in Ecuador, the mighty Chimborazo. So we bused down to Riobamba, rented some basic climbing gear (plastic boots, helmets, mountian axes, four titanium ice screws, a rope, and two incredibly poor fitting balaclavas), bought a mountain of tasty food, and started upward. The bus deposited us at the Chimborazo turnoff at 4,000 meters (that is something like 12,000 feet to our American readers) and we started walking uphill. A French/Morroccan girl in jeans (I lent her my jacket as it was chilly) accompanied us as we walked up the road to a refugio at 4,800 meters (no luck with the hitchhiking), where we had a snack and drank a coca tea.
Then we tromped up a trail to the upper refugio at 5,000 meters, meeting a group descending carrying in a litter an unfortunate Colombian climber with a broken leg - not the most encouraging sight. But Colombians are notoriously poor ice climbers (no offense meant to our Colombian readership) so we forged on, enjoying some intermittent gorgeous views of our objective. Warming conditions on Chimborazo have left the standard route kind of a mess, with the first section of the climb consisting of rubble-strewn ledge systems winding through some menacing looking seracs, so it is safest climbed at night, and descended very early before things start to heat up too much. The plan was to see how we felt at the upper refugio, watch the weather, and then attempt the climb either that night or the next.
Upon reaching the upper refugio, perhaps inspired by the views of the peak, our companion from the hike informed us that she planned to attempt the climb with us, in spite of her utter lack of climbing experience fact that her warmest piece of clothing was my jacket. Luckily we were able to convince her, with the help of the refugio guardian and the persistent cold (even in the "heat" of the afternoon), of the ill-advisability of that plan.
At the upper refugio our health and spirits, which had been high all morning, started to slip, By late afternoon Rose and I both had splitting headaches, racing pulses, and (worst of all) powerful nausea that destroyed our generally robust appetites. We hunkered down in our sleeping bags in the refugio and tried unsuccessfully to get a little sleep. Just before nightfall, we staggered up the hill a few hundred yards and pitched camp. Our prospects looked grim - we decided to try to wake up at 10 PM and climb if we miraculously felt better, or else spend the night and either hang out the next day hoping for improving health, or descend in search of our missing appetites.
At 10 PM, after a few hours of restless sleep, we woke up feeling shockingly good. Our headaches had both receded to manageable proportions and we were able to choke down a little granola and drink some water before gearing up and starting up the peak, our path illuminated by the feeble blue light of our little LED headlamps.
The first section of the climb went smoothly though somewhat slowly due to the rubble-strewn nature of the terrain, the pitch darkness, and the fact that we strayed a bit off route and encountered several pitches of fairly steep ice. Luckily we had the trusty titanium ice screws, and Rose turned out to be a natural born ice climber, scampering gracefully up the ice pitches. I didn´t have the heart to tell her how much easier steep ice is with two ice axes (not to mention a little daylight)...
The moon came out as we reached the main glacier, but a cold wind started blowing too, which made things less pleasant as we had to don our ill-fitting balaclavas, which functioned better as blindfolds. We slogged endlessly up the glacier, which was pretty icy with only a thin crust of snow, and watched the sky lighten at dawn at over 19,000 feet. As we climbed our nausea and headaches returned, and our water bottles froze in our packs. Nine o´clock found us above 20,000 feet, but totally knackered and not moving very fast. So after some frigid deliberation (we were still in the shade), we decided the smartest thing to do was to forgo the summit and descend through the shooting gallery that is the lower part of the route before the sun loosened things up too much.
The descent went smoothly and safely, though it was a heck of a lot of work in our weakened state, and we collapsed in our tent for an uncomfortable nap. Our headaches and nausea persisted until we were back in Riobamba and able to choke some water down. I set a new personal record for time without eating - 19 hours! We were so spent that we managed to sleep through all the new years celebrations, which included (so they tell us) fireworks and lots of torched papier maiche likenesses of 2007 public figures.
Anyhow, now we are heading to Aconcagua (just kidding!). Check out the photos below that we coaxed out of our cold and malfunctioning camera up on the volcano.
Ciao,
Ty
