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Published: August 20th 2010
Posing With The Accomplishment
The old folks posing with the Warmi Wanusca (Dead Woman's Pass) sign, 4215 meters!Monday, August 16th
We woke up around 5:30am and chilled until about 6am when our guide gave us a wake up call, followed by the cook delivering hot coca tea and hot water, soap, and toilet paper for washing before breakfast. We were asked to repack our stuff before going to breakfast so the porters could take down our tent and our porter could load up our stuff. Breakfast was hot Quaker oatmeal, bread with butter or jam, and crepes/pancakes filled with jam and chocolate. Delicious! After breakfast, we began the climb from Hell! Originally the guide had planned for us to stop for lunch at a site just after Dead Woman's Pass (Warmiwanusqa), but since we were making such good time, he asked if we'd like to wait for lunch until we reached tonight's campsite. That meant we had to finish the big climb, and then go down for another hour or so. We agreed, and almost wished we hadn't, since we didn't reach the campsite until 2pm, starving besides being tired. Today's climb was indescribable. You can't imagine how steep we climbed, and for hours on end! Add to that the fact that we started at almost 13,000
One of the Supermen
First night campsite with everyone getting ready to tackle Dead Woman's Pass feet and ended at almost 14,000 feet. The last few hundred yards were "puff, puff, walk a bit, take a break, puff, puff...". Reaching the top was such a relief and an accomplishment. One young lady that struggled more than most, actually cried when she finally made it. We took some photos at the top, plus our guide took video of our last climb, then after a rest, we headed down. The campsite for our second night was at Pacamayo, but it took us over an hour of knee wrenching, ankle-stressing time to get there. Manoli was so happy to smell food cooking as we got close. Soon after stowing our gear, the staff served us a nice lunch of pasta with cheese, salad, chicken breast and rice. For dessert we had warm pineapple pudding. We finished eating and ladi down for a nap. Around 5pm our guide told us that our "snack" was ready. The snack consisted of popcorn, fried wonton with caramel sauce topping, and hot drinks. By the time we'd finished our leisurely snack, dinner was served. Tonight we had soup with vermicelli, cauliflower cake, fried yucca, stuffed peppers, and the ever-present rice, this time with peppers
Breakfast Day 2
Breakfast Day 2 and our guide Frank and cheese. By the time we finished dinner, it was around 7pm, so we traipsed down to the toilets, then to our tent.
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Jo
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Congratulations!
Wow! What an accomplishment! You two ought to be very proud of yourselves for what you did. There aren't many people our age who would even attempt it, much less be able to finish it. It sounds as if they fed you very well along the way! What an adventure! You'll be reliving this one for years to come.