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Published: December 27th 2008
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I woke up by somebody swearing besides me. It was Pablo, he did not find his mountain sunglasses. You need sunglasses now ? I said. The time was about 02:00, and I had slept about two hours. It was dark inside as well as outside the refugio. And cold. I think there had never been light or heating in that mountain refugio.
There has been a change in weather, Mario said. No wind outside, I make the breakfast now, he said. Hearing that, there was no reason for being in the sleeping bags anymore. We were restless and did a last check of daypacks. Probably for a long day. Personal things which should not be carried to the summit were stowed aside.
I checked the temperature, and made a decision. Better using many thin layers, you are a bit more flexible and sometimes dryer. And it functions well together with a windproof layer for use near the summit. If I came to the summit. I felt that my legs was fine, so there was no reason to worry. A powerful breakfast is very important today, Mario said. We can start walking a bit earlier.
First we met some
rocks. They were big and not icy and soon we met a snowbound part. On with the crampones. We were lucky, we could follow the snowbound part for more than an hour. Much more easy than extremely unstable scoria slopes.
After an hour on snow the gradient began to steepen as we met rocky terrain, some places the ground became looser, often giving way as I stepped. That part was really hard, I could feel it in my legs. I began to be tired. And we had only been in the track for 3 hours. Then we found some layers of volcanic rock which was easier to climb than the loose ground. As the rocks steepened, I really felt it in my legs. And we had some 900 metres more in altitude to climb.
We decided to take a short break every 45 minutes. One of the guys were always lying behind, and we tried to motivate him to carry on. It was Yhum. The day before he told me that he was experienced in climbing. He should go to Aconcagua in January. I could not understand why he got problems. What we did not know at that
time was that he had put some 5-6 kilos extra in his daypack to get some training.
The layers of vulcanic rock did never end. After a while there was ice on the rocks. We had to take away ice by hands or feet before doing our next step. 500 metres left to climb. I began thinking I would not manage. Yhum measured the altitude on his watch. We used a lot of time pr 100 meter. I asked Mario wether we had to pass more sand and volcano stones on our never ending way to the summit. He said no.
Suddenly we met a kind of steep pass on the volcano. After climbing that pass, the wind started blowing, and we thought we could see the top. We saw snow and ice mostly. And some big rocks. I asked for a 5 minutes rest every half hour now. My legs was really bad.
Come on, we said to each other. The last stage before the summit seemed to be a scramble over rock ledges. It leaded up past the impressive seracs of a glacier that descended westward. Suddenly I could see what I thought was the
top. Relax, it seems near, Mario said. But there is another hour. Not easy to decide distances against the horizon .......
We started walking in big Z´s as we came close to the summit because of snow conditions and steepness. It was difficult to measure the steepness at the top. Then suddenly the gradient became less steepy. Now yo have 5 minutes left, Mario said. The summit is in that direction. You can go.
And I can tell you I got fresh legs at once! Everybody had reached the goal! We had used 7,5 hours, about the average time people use, Mario said. The brochure says 7-11 hours. The summit was atypical for a vulcano, it was not topped with a wide caldera. It was small and capped by glacial ice, about 20 times 30 metres.
DOWN AGAIN
The first part down was hard snow, the time was about 12:00, and still pretty cold. We went fast. Then we met the layers of icy volcanic rock again, a gradient of about 45%. We had to climb it with hands and feet. I think we used about the same time down as up there. Some places it
harder to climb down than up. And we had to be careful about the ice.
Then we came to the party with loose ground which nearly killed my legs. The gradient began to steepen again, became looser, and I lost balance many times. This type of earth is a terrible unstable trekking surface on the way down. You get volcanic sand and stones 25 cm up on your legs. It goes through the equipment and into the boots.
Then I saw the red refugio far down the hill, and I thought an hour would be necessary to reach it. But the problem was that the snow had been heated by the sun now ..... and we fell through. I used about 3 hours on that party ....
When I came down to the refugio my knees was completely gone. I sank down on a stone, took off my boots, and leaned back against the mountain wall. I had about 2 decilitres of water in my boots. Anybody heard about Gore Tex?
At the refugio we had a small snack before we started on our way down to the Rangers. Another 7 kilometres and 1100 metres down
to climb. I was down abut 19:30, and "home" at the Puma Hostel about 23:00. There I met Thomas, Santiago and Silvia (from Switzerland).
Santiago should taste wine and welcome me home. First we got a little bit og cheeze, and after 5 minutes we sholuld taste the Malbec/Syrrah. Thats how we do it in BA, he said. And it was good!
Let me say that Silvia went off for the Lanin Volcano the day after, and she managed reaching the top at half the time as we did. But she rented a personal guide who picked her up at the hotel and drove her back again ..... But I can tell she was in a good condition .....
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