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Winds and Snow
Tuesday, February 1, 2000
 Burleson | |
 Hear Todd's Call from Aconcagua |
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It's Todd. I'm up on Aconcagua now and I'm at Camp and decided to do some cybercasting. I know Willi came down and you got that info that he hit the Polacas and the normal route. We're at Camp I right now, kind of in a blizzard but not too bad. It's been blowing snow and probably around 30-40 mile-an-hour gusts. Things are great on the mountain, we've got a group down below of 10 people. So, I'm going to go up and climb the route and then come back down and guide with the rest of the group. We'll keep giving you cybercasts day to day and let you know how things are going. I hope everything's good there and that's all from Aconcagua, bye-bye.
Hi, Mountain Zone, it's Todd again up at Camp I, at 16,200ft. I gave you a short cybercast just a few minutes ago, but I thought I'd tune you in on what we've been doing. Cathy and I have come up in the last four days...three days to walk up to the mountain. A beautiful trek in, long days, but the first two days were small elevation gain, with about five hours of walking each day. It was beautiful terrain. A couple of river crossings where we were fortunate to have mules, so we could get on the top of those. Sounds like another man going up on a mule, the other day, fell off and got his foot caught in the stirrup and the mule kicked him in the head. But he's doing okay from what I understand.
We've checked in and went up to our Base Camp, an Alpine Ascents Base Camp. It's fantastic. It was all decked out, and it's my first time up here. I've only climbed Aconcagua once, and that was in 1989. So, it's great for me to come back up and see what all of the guides are doing.
It's been just beautiful weather this year, as I know you know from Willi's cybercasts, but it sounds like it is changing a bit. In the last three days, we've had afternoon snow flurries with not much accumulation; it melts off right away. But we've moved up today to 16.2, and it is snowing and blowing outside. It's blowing hard enough now though that it's blowing it all off the mountain...[transmission fails].
But just to fill you in again, we are up at 16.2. We are going to hopefully carry to 19.2 tomorrow, if the weather's good. We'll come back down and then maybe move up the next day. Big jump, but we're feeling good. We spent four days at 14,000, in Base. So, we got a pretty good base there — did one carry already up to 16.2 before we moved up. Otherwise, we'll take a rest day here and also, you know, we're subject to the weather.
We've got Allen Carbert and Jose Luis, from Ecuador, both guides for Alpine Ascents, they have a group of 10 down at 14 that just rolled in last night. And so, my goal is to climb with Cathy, summit the peak, and come back down and guide with them for a bit. Wally Berg is coming in with Al Hanna, they're getting prepared. Al's heading off to Everest, as most people may know, this spring, so they're coming in to climb Aconcagua again. And they both should be up here about the 8th of February and then we have another group coming in on the 16th, or excuse me be in Base Camp on the 11th and another in Base Camp on the 16th.
So, we're doing lots of climbing, and Willi Prittie will be leading one of those and Neil McCarthy will be and some of those other guides will be bringing in the other trip. We will let you know, keep you informed about what's going on in the mountains. Things have been busy: a few rescues, a lot of summits, and things are good. I hope everything's good in America, bye-bye.
—Alpine Ascents Founder Todd Burleson, reporting for MountainZone.com
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