5-9
We took a bus to Machachi where we waited for our guide at a charming country B&B called PapaGayo (hmm..that´s what I can call my dad). While waiting, Elisha and I were asked to be in a short film that the filmakers were going to be using to promote tourism in Ecuador. Sadly, we didn´t have any lines; however, we wore these crazy llama chaps and trotted around on horses through the farm making sure to have good posture and smile.
When our guide Ignacio (Nacho) arrived, we drove by land cruiser into the high elevation Cotopaxi National Park. It¨s a stark, treeless high altitude national park. We drove up pretty high to the Cotopaxi trailhead and then hiked for just an hour to get to the Cotopaxi Refugio (hut) at about 16,000ft. After lunch and a nap, we hiked up to the glacier to practice glacier travel techniques with crampons and ice axes. I had been having some diarrhea throughout the day and during this training I started to feel quite bad. When we got back to the refugio I vomited. I didn´t think it was altitude sickness as we had acclimitized and we weren´t even that high up, so I figured it must be food poisoning. I was definitely feeling quite bad and when I went to bed at 6pm sans dinner, I figured that my chances for even attempting the summit were low. I was expecting Elisha and the guide to go up without me.
5-10
I slept pretty well throughout the night and remember having a dream where Lucas was climbing some mountain while puking. I am not as touch as Lucas, but maybe the dream was telling me to give it a go. When I woke up at 12am, my stomach was feeling better, and I decided to give it a go. We departed at 1:30 am (supposed to leave at 1am, but Nacho was sleeping heavily and we had to wake him)
The first 1.5 hours was up a steep scree field until we reached the glacier from where we donned our crampons, took out our ice axes, and roped up to each and our guide as safety in case of a fall down a mountain or into a crevasse. After putting on our gear, we crossed a large crevasse field where we meandered around crevasses and crossed some nerve wracking ice bridges over deep crevasses. At one point we even had to jump across a 4 foot crevasse.
After that we entered an area of a collapsed glacier which made from some difficult and fun ascents and descents of ice structures where full use of crampons and ice pick were necessary. From there it was mainly steep up until we reached a knife point ridgeline at which point we witnessed a beautiful sunrise! We continued up steeply from there with lots of difficulty due to fatigue and altitude (my lungs and stomach felt like how I feel right after running a 5k as fast as I can, but it felt like this even after some rest!) until we reached the summit (5897m/19,347ft) at 7:30am. The summit had outstanding views down towards the valley below and out across lots of Ecuador´s huge glaciated volcanoes, including Chimboroso, Cayembe, Illinizi North and South, and Sangay. We could also see the erupting and puffing Tungarahua volcano. We of course could see into the crater of Cotopaxi which had fumeroles and was steaming. Everynow and then we could get a whiff of sulfuric gas.
We were the last group to leave (by 1/2 an hour) bu the 2nd to arrive at the summit. Only 3 of the 4 groups that left that morning reached the summit. We spent a little time on the summit to rest (but nearly impossible to catch our breaths) eat, drink, and take photos. We then headed back down the difficult descent, especially since the snow was softening up and sticking to our crampon. But going through the glacier, especially the collapsed portion and the crevasse fields were breathtaking! We arrived back at the refugio where we rested a bit before heading back down to the Land Cruiser and back to Machachi. From there Nacho drove us in his car to Quito.
This was my 5th peak in the 6000m range (Mera Peak in Nepal, Amphulapcha in Nepal, Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, and Huayna Potosi in Bolivia), but definitely the toughest. In part bc it was definitely the most technical. But also in part bc apart from Kili it was the one that I was least acclimated for and also likely bc I had had food poisoning less than 6 hours before the summit attempt. I am very proud of Elisha for making it up! She said it was maybe the toughest thing she has ever done and she has run an untrained for Marathon in 10 degrees Fahrenheit in Antarctica.
Back in Quito, we finalized our Galapagos plans. I tooke Elisha out for a "fancy" (for us) birthday dinner (we had been traveling on her birthday before and Quito had some variety of restaurants other than purely Ecuadorian set meals) at an Indian restaurant run by a nice Pakistani guy. We then had summit celebration cocktails at our hostel´s bar.
5-11
We took a taxi to the airport in order to fly to the Galapagos. From the airport, we had our best distant view of the perfectly shaped cone of Cotopaxi as the sun rose and turned it orange and pink. We went through all the rigamarole of flying to the galapagos: paying the fees and having your bags checked for any potential invasive species. We then boarded the plane to Guayaquil. From the plane we had sweet views of lots of the volcanoes including cotopaxi which we had been on the summit of a mere 24 hours earlier.
We took a bus to Machachi where we waited for our guide at a charming country B&B called PapaGayo (hmm..that´s what I can call my dad). While waiting, Elisha and I were asked to be in a short film that the filmakers were going to be using to promote tourism in Ecuador. Sadly, we didn´t have any lines; however, we wore these crazy llama chaps and trotted around on horses through the farm making sure to have good posture and smile.
When our guide Ignacio (Nacho) arrived, we drove by land cruiser into the high elevation Cotopaxi National Park. It¨s a stark, treeless high altitude national park. We drove up pretty high to the Cotopaxi trailhead and then hiked for just an hour to get to the Cotopaxi Refugio (hut) at about 16,000ft. After lunch and a nap, we hiked up to the glacier to practice glacier travel techniques with crampons and ice axes. I had been having some diarrhea throughout the day and during this training I started to feel quite bad. When we got back to the refugio I vomited. I didn´t think it was altitude sickness as we had acclimitized and we weren´t even that high up, so I figured it must be food poisoning. I was definitely feeling quite bad and when I went to bed at 6pm sans dinner, I figured that my chances for even attempting the summit were low. I was expecting Elisha and the guide to go up without me.
5-10
I slept pretty well throughout the night and remember having a dream where Lucas was climbing some mountain while puking. I am not as touch as Lucas, but maybe the dream was telling me to give it a go. When I woke up at 12am, my stomach was feeling better, and I decided to give it a go. We departed at 1:30 am (supposed to leave at 1am, but Nacho was sleeping heavily and we had to wake him)
The first 1.5 hours was up a steep scree field until we reached the glacier from where we donned our crampons, took out our ice axes, and roped up to each and our guide as safety in case of a fall down a mountain or into a crevasse. After putting on our gear, we crossed a large crevasse field where we meandered around crevasses and crossed some nerve wracking ice bridges over deep crevasses. At one point we even had to jump across a 4 foot crevasse.
After that we entered an area of a collapsed glacier which made from some difficult and fun ascents and descents of ice structures where full use of crampons and ice pick were necessary. From there it was mainly steep up until we reached a knife point ridgeline at which point we witnessed a beautiful sunrise! We continued up steeply from there with lots of difficulty due to fatigue and altitude (my lungs and stomach felt like how I feel right after running a 5k as fast as I can, but it felt like this even after some rest!) until we reached the summit (5897m/19,347ft) at 7:30am. The summit had outstanding views down towards the valley below and out across lots of Ecuador´s huge glaciated volcanoes, including Chimboroso, Cayembe, Illinizi North and South, and Sangay. We could also see the erupting and puffing Tungarahua volcano. We of course could see into the crater of Cotopaxi which had fumeroles and was steaming. Everynow and then we could get a whiff of sulfuric gas.
We were the last group to leave (by 1/2 an hour) bu the 2nd to arrive at the summit. Only 3 of the 4 groups that left that morning reached the summit. We spent a little time on the summit to rest (but nearly impossible to catch our breaths) eat, drink, and take photos. We then headed back down the difficult descent, especially since the snow was softening up and sticking to our crampon. But going through the glacier, especially the collapsed portion and the crevasse fields were breathtaking! We arrived back at the refugio where we rested a bit before heading back down to the Land Cruiser and back to Machachi. From there Nacho drove us in his car to Quito.
This was my 5th peak in the 6000m range (Mera Peak in Nepal, Amphulapcha in Nepal, Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, and Huayna Potosi in Bolivia), but definitely the toughest. In part bc it was definitely the most technical. But also in part bc apart from Kili it was the one that I was least acclimated for and also likely bc I had had food poisoning less than 6 hours before the summit attempt. I am very proud of Elisha for making it up! She said it was maybe the toughest thing she has ever done and she has run an untrained for Marathon in 10 degrees Fahrenheit in Antarctica.
Back in Quito, we finalized our Galapagos plans. I tooke Elisha out for a "fancy" (for us) birthday dinner (we had been traveling on her birthday before and Quito had some variety of restaurants other than purely Ecuadorian set meals) at an Indian restaurant run by a nice Pakistani guy. We then had summit celebration cocktails at our hostel´s bar.
5-11
We took a taxi to the airport in order to fly to the Galapagos. From the airport, we had our best distant view of the perfectly shaped cone of Cotopaxi as the sun rose and turned it orange and pink. We went through all the rigamarole of flying to the galapagos: paying the fees and having your bags checked for any potential invasive species. We then boarded the plane to Guayaquil. From the plane we had sweet views of lots of the volcanoes including cotopaxi which we had been on the summit of a mere 24 hours earlier.
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