Feliz Navidad

Sometimes persistence pays; and after almost a week of waiting we finally got good weather for the Cayambe summit attempt. Let me say right now that this was one of the top ten hardest, and top 5 scariest things I’ve ever done. Because of the high avalanche danger we started climbing shortly after midnight and climbed the Espinoza glacier all night long. The glacier approach was rather hairy with a 1000 ft class rock scramble across the moraine with lots of exposure, and of course climbing in full expedition gear with packs and technical snow boots.
I was on a rope teams with our Ecuadorian guide Joshua and Mark Hall, a ship’s captain from Southern CA. We finally got to the technical section of the climb at about 18,000 ft around sunrise. Man was that scary; crevasses everywhere (you could not see them in the dark); and a 45 degree snow ramp leading up the summit pitch. The snow ramp was so steep that we had to use the ice ax in the “assist” position .. that is with the ”pick and not the shovel.” Snow kept balling up in my crampons .. so for every two feet I climbed I slid back one. About 700 feet below the summit there was an enormous crevasse with a single wimpy snow bridge. We set belays, and then had to literally jump onto the bridge (it was 6 feet down into the crevasse) and then climb out on a 50 degree snow and ice slope for 200 feet to gain the summit ridge. I’m certain If I had popped of this wall I would have bounced straight into the crevasse. The terrain was so steep and treacherous that we All forgot to take pictures during the crevasse crossing.
Anyway, we summited at 10:00 AM after climbing all night. There truly is not much air hanging around at 19,000 feet!. Down climbing the summit ridge ramp was even more hair raising than climbing down. The snow was so unstable that we could not set a decent belay anchor; and had to down climb using to old “fall and die” principle. Man I did not like taking that level of risk .. but we had no choice. That WAS THE ONLY WAY DOWN FROM THE SUMMIT. The snow got really soft during our decent from the glacier and it took until 3:00 in the afternoon to get back to the hut. A pretty danged long day.
Taking tomorrow off to rest; then we travel south about 250 miles to Cotopaxi. This is a larger peak, at `19,400 ft; but is “alleged” to be much less technical. I sure hope so.
Everybody have a Merry Christmas.

Cayambe by Moonlight as we depart the Hut.

An angry mountain.

Mark and Jopshua at the Summit.

No My belly isn't that big! .. I had on 5 layers of clothes, Brrrr.

Ice Blocks near the summit .. and a really scary snow bridge.