Dispatches

Right now I am on the way out of Lima, Peru, at the Internet Cafe at the airport with time to reflect on another big adventure with MM. Phew, what a trip I am still trying to take it all in. The weather was really iffy - rain in Huaraz, snow in Cuzco and record low temps. It snowed almost every day in one of the strangest weather periods in the Andes for many years. Little was climbed and many mountaineers just got to look at their selected peak then moved to lower levels.

However.....After 2 acclimatization outings, one to a fabulous remote lake surrounded by glaciers tumbling from ice fluted peaks, and another, a 3 day affair with the peak Huamasharaju, where we only narrowly missed the summit to avoid climbing down tricky rock slopes in the dark, we departed Huaraz for a 9 day mini expedition to have a go at Quitaraju and Alpamayo. This commenced with a magic trek from the east side in to the Santa Cruz valley where we had simply stunning views of the most brilliant Andean peaks as we moved slowly higher with each successive day. Great acclimatization was achieved as we crossed Punta Union at 4,800m to drop into the Cruz valley.

Then the fun started. We took no porters to high camp on Alpamayo so lugged up 60 lb packs through the icefall and ice climbed 2, 70 degree pitches with fully loaded sacks to camp. We spent 4 nights there at 17,000 ft as the weather came in and out and on the third night set out at midnight for Quitaraju 6,050m, Alpine grade diff minus and made summit 12 hours later. This is a fantastic face climb of about 3,000 ft with combinations of hard ice/neve/snow. We rappelled down on snow stakes and V threads to below the bergschrund then another snow storm blew in on way back to camp, but we made it there after 18 hours total outing time.

People were climbing the Basque/Italian route on Alpamayo where 8 died last year - we were definitely not on for this route, although a French team got up it - only to say the serac at the top was making all sorts of weird noises I am so pleased with the decisions made to climb only the safe route on Quitaraju, which despite all the bad weather, was judged and found to be in excellent condition to climb. The normal Ferrari route on Alpamayo had not been climbed so far this season. I believe we could have mounted a safe attempt, but I was tired and needed to recover, which would have meant another 2 nights at high camp and still at the mercy of variable weather. So, we bailed to the trek out down the Santa Cruz valley - fabulous hiking with the donkeys carrying all our loads and heavy packs. To cool off near the end of the trek, we plunged into crystal clear rock pools, then returned to Huaraz for Capuchinos, Cerviche, Crepes, etc.

Thanks again MM for a truly safe and memorable experience and adventure. Particular thanks to Shy, our guide, for his very solid and professional guiding every minute of the trip, and of course to those mouth watering gourmet mountain meals he prepared particularly the lamb curries.

Cheers,

Pete Ravey