Berg Adventures International: 2005 Aconcagua and Ojos del Salado Expedition Cybercast

It’s January 13th and as I report to you I’m looking across the glacier at the colorful sprawl of Plaza de Mulas, the Aconcagua base camp. The team arrived here yesterday after a very long day; it took more than 10.5 hours to walk from Confluencia up to this point. The team packs and organizes our gear and food for higher Now at 14,500 feet (4420m), you’ll remember that this is the elevation we spent a great deal of time at and above on our Ojos del Salado climb. So believe me our team is looking a lot better than most of the other climbers who are at this point trying to climb Aconcagua.

This is quite different from Ojos because of all the people and the support. The doctors here at Plaza des Mulas wanted to interview the team to see how they are doing. They went down there with Leila who knows all the Park Wardens and Doctors here on the mountain very well and met with some of the other teams. Our team after that spent time packing and organizing loads to be carried to the three camps higher than base camp that will allow us to attempt Aconcagua. Right now as I speak Oswaldo and Juancho are doing carries up to the higher camps.

So it’s a rest day for us, the entire team in my opinion looking great. Roger reports he is sleeping better every night and he’s finally gotten a very keen appetite not having eaten well earlier on in the trip.

Mules loaded with our duffels head towards Plaza de Mulas So here we are in great position to advance on Aconcagua. One more thing I should report on this day is that the sky is perfectly clear; it’s the best weather you can imagine. We talked to a German group who had attempted the summit about 3 days ago and actually made it in very bad weather. If we have weather like I’m seeing today on our summit day a few days from now believe me we’ll be happy because we’ll have perfect conditions. The mountain will dictate that and we’ll be ready for what comes, we’ll take our time, continue to acclimatize and enjoy living on Aconcagua. It’s a beautiful and enjoyable place.