Saturday, July 19, 2008

19,974 feet...Mt. Huayna Potosi kicked my....

One of the popular hikes to do here in Bolivia is the 6000+ meter Huayna Potosi. It´s extremely popular because of its accessibility - it is rare to find a peak this high, higher than any peak in Europe in fact, that can be scaled within a couple of days. Though the climb requires crampons, ice axes and ropes, it is not super technical. Despite it´s relative accessibility, however, the peak is at almost 20,000 feet which can make things very difficult....

It seemed that most people chose the 3 day tour which basically allows a little more time for acclimatization. When dealing with high altitudes your biggest friend is time - and taking lots of it to acclimatize. The more time you take working your way up a mountain, the better chance you have of escaping altitude sickness. Alternatively, you can convince yourself that you have been there before (Kilimanjaro), live at altitude (Cochabamba is at 2500 m) and have been at a decent altitude (La Paz = 3800 m) for a few days, in order to save the time and money of that 3rd day. Foolishly, as it would turn out, I chose this two day tour and paid heavily.

The first day was great - the weather was beautiful, I felt strong and the scenery was nothing short of spectacular. After some confusion of where we would sleep (all the refugios were full and we didn`t have a reservation for some reason), we were fed and given about 24 inches of padded floor to ¨sleep¨ on. As it turns out, this would be a place to rest my eyes for a few hours instead of actually sleeping. The combination of cramped quarters, a little anxiety and the extreme difficulty of sleeping at 5000+ m prevented even a minutes sleep before the 1am ¨wake-up¨ call. I was happy to be able to get up and finally get out there and climb. Because we were not officially supposed to be in the refugio, we had had the pleasure of having our bread and tea outside in the cold. Brrr. Due to the ease of the previous day`s hike, I was excited for a difficult but rewarding day up to the summit. Ha! After the chilly breakfast, we (my guide and I) put our crampons on, roped ourselves together and started up the mountain after the other 40 or so climbers. While we quickly passed most of them, I think this pace, at this altitude, eventually proved a costly mistake. About midway up one ridge (which was probably the scariest 30 minutes of my life), I started to feel nauseous and extremely lethargic. I was finally able to sit down for a brief `pausa´after making it up the ridge (steeper than any double black I`ve ever skied) where we were at the most 2-3 feet from a 200+ foot drop. Though the guide spoke almost no English, I think he could sense my apprehension when he said ¨trust the crampons¨. From that point on, it was a march of 5 meters followed by a small rest for the final few hundred meters to the top. It was possibly the worst I`ve ever felt in my life. Upon reaching the summit (which I had thought impossible for the past couple hours), I did not even have the energy to smile never mind high-fiving and getting up to take pictures. The descent was a bit easier, though the lethargy and throbbing headache did not disappear until well after I reached the bottom. The entire hike I kept thinking ´this can´t be, I´m normally stronger than this´. Ahh, the beauty of altitude. The good news is that I decided, during this hike, that I truly have no desire to ever try Everest. Like the "never going to run another marathon" proclamation sworn so many times around mile 20, however, I reserve the right to change my mind on this one .















1 comment:

  1. This a great post. Very humbling. I've been there, though sadly at much lower altitudes, like Breckenridge at the Colorado Relay in 2006. I'll run the hills of Durham extra hard for you tomorrow at 5:30am. Altitude, 300 feet.

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