January 13, 2007 - Team Returns to Sea Level

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Leila waits for the team to return to Atacama Camp
On the beach in Chile before we departed.  The entire Bolivian staff posed for
one more group photo.  Oswaldo, Juancho and Joselito left on the bus for Mendoza.
The rest of the guys began their three day drive back to La Paz

It’s 7:30 in the evening on the 13th of January and I’m standing next to the Pacific Ocean.  Martin, Opus (our summiters from yesterday) and the rest of the crew are still behind me on the road in the other four-wheel drive vehicles, so that promised dip in the ocean is yet to come this evening.  But here we are, we made it back to sea level.

It was a long and dusty drive off the high desert at altitudes over 5000m (16,405ft) this morning back down to lower elevation gradually, but here we are.  We stopped off in town and Leila, Klaus and I left about 40 kilos of dusty, dirty mountain clothes at a little laundromat in town and that will be picked up before we leave tomorrow.  It’s only about 20 minutes to the airport where at 2:00 in the afternoon tomorrow we have a flight down to Santiago where we will meet Danny and Carol at the hotel.

Today our Bolivian guides Oswaldo, Juancho and Jose Lito will get on a bus tonight at 10:00pm for Santiago and then on to Mendoza.  The rest of the Bolivian staff are going to take the four-wheel drives back down to La Paz in Bolivia.

For the meantime it’s some seaside relaxation.  Klaus said he is looking for a 750g sirloin steak and I think he might find it tonight.  We had a great time climbing in the high desert of Atacama. There is still lots of climbing to come so stay tuned.

The Ojos del Salado Summit Team
The Ojos del Salado Summit Team

ACONCAGUA
Argentina
22,841 feet
6962 meters

OJOS DEL SALADO
Chile
22,637 feet
6900 meters