\nDay 2<\/strong> \u00e2\u20ac\u201c All of our fellow climbers arrive in Mendoza clean and shiny and ready to climb. Gear-check that afternoon and a \u00e2\u20ac\u0153get to know each other\u00e2\u20ac\u009d dinner that night. Steak and wine is the way to go in Argentina!
\nDay 3<\/strong> \u00e2\u20ac\u201c We walked to the permit office in Mendoza to take care of a little business. Permits- check!\u00c2\u00a0 The National Park does a great job of checking in and tracking all climbers on the mountain.
\nDay 4<\/strong> \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Load up \u00e2\u20ac\u201c it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s time to go to Penetentes. This is the jumping off point and last call
\nDay 5<\/strong>\u00c2\u00a0 – Let the journey begin! Started the 3 day hike into Basecamp. Great day that ended with some grilled beef at camp. Perfect!\u00c2\u00a0 Beautiful walking in a spectacular valley. Everyone feeling really good.
\nDay 6<\/strong> \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Day 2 of the hike to BC. Another great weather day and our first view of the mountain.\u00c2\u00a0 Most of us were stunned when we saw the mountain for the first time, very high, very big, very rugged, incredibly beautiful.
\nDay 7<\/strong> \u00e2\u20ac\u201c The day started off with a COLD walk across some glacially fed streams! Brrr. The trail got a bit tougher today but nothing the team couldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t handle. We pulled into Basecamp in the early afternoon ready for the rest day the following day.
\nDay 8<\/strong> \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Rest day. Basecamp life moves a bit slower, but there was plenty to do. A short hike for some and long naps for others. The dining tent was great and the meals were awesome. Salad with tomatoes and avocados \u00e2\u20ac\u201c who saw that coming? Silver Joe\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s coffee brewed every morning in a French press, thanks Greg!
\nDay 9<\/strong> \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Carry to C1 at 16,000 feet. We loaded up all the personal gear that wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t needed at BC into our packs along with our group load and made our first pilgrimage to C1. Not a huge day distance wise but our first big challenge vertically. The trail through the penetentes, while faster than the scree slope, proved quite the challenge with the loads and the lack of 0\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s!
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\nDay 11<\/strong> \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Carry to C2 at 18,000. Heavy loads again but a reasonable day distance wise with some vertical gain and traversing through the wind to camp. Arrived in camp, made the drop, took a break, and went right back down to C1 for the night.
\nDay 12<\/strong> \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Move to C2. Packed up camp and made for our new digs at C2. Second windy day in a row but that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s normal for Aconcagua. We set up shop on one side of the water source and called it home. Quesadillas anyone?
\nDay 13<\/strong> \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Carry to C3 (19,500) aka Cholera Camp. Tough day with a heavy load. We didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t cover a ton of distance but we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re getting up pretty high at this point. After a short steep incline to start the day, the trail lengthens out before a steep section right before camp. Dropped our gear, piled rocks on top and back down we went.
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\nDay 15<\/strong> \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Move to C3. A cold and windy day! Made the move to C3. A little faster than the day before and everybody\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s feeling reasonable which is good for 19,500ft!\u00c2\u00a0 Ate as much as we could and hopped in the sleeping bags early in preparation for our summit bid.
\nDay 16<\/strong> \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Summit day! Cold night and a 5am wake up call got us out of the tent moving pretty quickly! A perfect summit day for the folks that made the top! Congratulations to Mark, Jim, Ann, Mike, Ian, Tim and Larry (ok and Mike and Greg too!)!!
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\nDay 18<\/strong> \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Pancakes, coffee and an 18 mile walk! Started at 9:30 and arrived at the trail head at 4\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6we were moving pretty quick \u00e2\u20ac\u201c the awaiting beers and showers back in Mendoza were quite the motivation. Ate and drank like kings in Penetentes as we waited for the mules to bring the rest of our gear down\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 loaded the van and trailer up and we were back in Mendoza 3 hours later. In the shower by 1am!
\nDay 19<\/strong> \u00e2\u20ac\u201c A restful day in the beautiful town of Mendoza. Sleep, eat, shop, clean and wrap it up with the celebration dinner Argentinean style which means a late reservation, several courses and some great wines to match! The prefect ending to an incredible two weeks on the mountain.
\nDay 20<\/strong> \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Some folks headed for the airport while others took a day to check out some wineries and relax one last day before re-entry into the real world\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6
\nDay 21<\/strong> \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Home\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6.and ready to be there!A great trip and some great new friends!<\/p>\n
A special thanks to IMG Guides Mike Hamill and Greg Vernovage as well as our local Aconcagua guide Tincho – these guys worked their tails off and deserve some recognition – not too much though or it’ll go to their heads!<\/p>\n
Tye Chapman
\nOperations Manager<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
February 23, 2010 Believe it or not the folks here at IMG let me out of the office long enough join our most recent Aconcagua Expedition! Below is a peek into our trip… Day 1 \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Mike, Greg and I sort group gear, hit the grocery store to shop for local specialties to bring on […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[92],"class_list":["post-221","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-aconcagua","tag-snow-anchors"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mountainguides.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/221","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mountainguides.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mountainguides.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mountainguides.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mountainguides.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=221"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mountainguides.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/221\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mountainguides.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=221"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mountainguides.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=221"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mountainguides.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=221"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}