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made my plane reservations tonight
you may know this already
Daylight Savings ends in Mexico 10/28, in US 11/4
No wonder I had trouble understanding how I can go from DFW to MEX on a 2.5 hr flight but it lands at the 1.5 hr mark
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Yeah, I found out last year when my watch didn't match up with any clocks in Mexico. Guess I just didn't pay attention to the time the year before.
Received confirmation from Abraham (another MD who was with us last year) that he and (possibly) four friends will be joining us.
It is going to be another fun time.
Bummed that Shin decided not to come down again.
Still waiting on final decisions from Doug, Tracy, Davey. I'm also waiting on word from an old climbing partner who may join us.
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bump
any news?
any other takers?
anything I can do?
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Looks like it'll be 6 of us... Doug won't be able to make it.
Not much to do right now. More in a few weeks.
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Hey, everyone still heading down?
I sure wanted to go, but house repairs got in the way.
Maybe next year.
John
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We'll be down in Mexico City on Saturday.
Six of us.
If I go down next year, it will be a two week motorcycle adventure.
I believe Scully is supposed to head down in '14.
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You guys have a great trip! Look forward to hearing about it. Be safe down there ;-) .......
-cat b.
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We'll be down in Mexico City on Saturday.
Six of us.
If I go down next year, it will be a two week motorcycle adventure.
I believe Scully is supposed to head down in '14. Yes but I won't go down unless you go! One of the things that made the trip so memorable was the fellowship. You, Tracie, Ryan and Carole/Ava....Without this group the trip would have been sosososososo....And they gypsies, that was just the icing on the cake!!! And yes Richard is the greatest mountaineer in the world his Iphone confirmed that with me in Mandarin Chinese!
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Good luck to all who are heading south. I am getting 'back on the mountain' so to speak and this winter will tell the tale (hopefully, a good tale).  Dreaming of Orizaba next year; maybe Doug and Shin will make the 2013 trip...
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Stopped in to check the weather forecast for tomorrow and thought I'd post a quick note:
Doc Lankford did it!
All were succesful on the Big O except Abbas. He picked up a respiratory (sp?) ailment prior to heading to Piedra Grande and had to head back down to Tlachichuca.
Ran into George Dunn at the hotel last night.
Ran into Burchy and Casey at Piedra Grande yesterday as we came down.
Much more later, hopefully from the Doc's perspective.
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Congratulations Richard et al!!!!
Looking forward to reading the report, and can't wait to see the pics!!
Rosie
"What we have done for ourselves alone dies with us; what we have done for others and the world remains and is immortal." Albert Pike
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Here's the team from the USA at the Piedra Grande hut, still able to stand up after just returning from the top of Orizaba. Our wonderful guide Emelio Carlos will be in some of the other great pictures to come later, plus more details. Many thanks to Richard for organizing this great adventure. I am happy to be back home in one piece. Harvey 
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What a day on top!
Not a cloud in the sky!
I want to hear how it was for everyone.
John
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[quote=catpappy] I want to hear how it was for everyone./quote] stay tuned. I did a very long trip report /rough draft tonight. Once I proof read it with my cross-eyed brain, I will post it tomorrow night. meanwhile, the Cheetos truck delivery better watch out for this guy: 
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AWESOME!! Congratulations! It looks like another wonderful trip. That is such beautiful countryside. Looking forward to reading the trip report.
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Here it is - the long story.
2012 Mexican Volcanoes
Harvey Lankford
My journey to the summit of Pico de Orizaba began in 1997 and was completed in 2012, thanks to Richard Piotrowski.
Orizaba (or Citlaltépetl, star-mountain) is the tallest mountain in Mexico, the third tallest in North America after Denali in Alaska and Logan in Canada, and at over 18,000 feet is second only to Kilimanjaro on the world’s list of prominent volcanic peaks. Orizaba is found at the southeastern end of the Trans-Mexican Volcanic Belt, a chain that runs from west to east across Central Mexico. It last erupted in 1846. Its east slopes are pummeled by moist trade winds from the nearby Gulf of Mexico so with adiabatic cooling the mountain is permanently glaciated. The opposite katabatic winds descend the western and northern slopes directly into the face of whatever fools like us happen to be in the way. “If mountains seem hostile, then it is the climber’s fault for venturing upon them. It is he who imposes danger upon himself, not the mountain, which is supremely indifferent as to whether he comes or goes, lives or dies.” (Frank Smythe, The Mountain Vision).
More importantly for me, Orizaba was my first mountain taller than California’s Mt. Whitney. When Remi, Frank, and I visited there in January 1997, we went unguided. We joked about how things would go, not knowing that the winter winds would literally sweep us off our feet short of the summit. We had said that our professions and skills would be put to use; Frank was an English major and wrote poetry, I was a physician, and Remi was a Polish Catholic priest. The title of our story was “The Poet, the Physician, and the Priest,” joking that if things went well we had the Poet. If things went poorly, we had the Physician. And, um, if things went really, really badly, we had the Priest. We almost did need Help from above. Actually this year, too.
Many years, 5 continents and many mountains later, I was headed back to Mexico. Why? What happened? How did it go? Here is the trip report. It will start out slowly, and with a lot of grumbling – you might want to skip through some of that, but it turned out beautifully in the long run. After all, Orizaba was the last of the peaks, and the one we really went for. No matter what was to happen, it would be like Charles Houston said in K2 the Savage Mountain, “On great mountains all purpose is concentrated on the single job at hand, yet the summit is but a token of success, and the attempt is worthy in itself.” Why do we do this? There can be no single answer, but the one that sums it up for me is from my favorite mountaineering author Joe Tasker in Savage Arena, “In some ways, going to the mountains is incomprehensible to many people and inexplicable by those who go. The reasons are difficult to unearth and only with those who are similarly drawn is there no need to try to explain.”
It all started with Richard. His online posts on the Whitney Portal Store Message Board (titled WPSMB Mexico Climbs in November) had worked for several years gathering interested climbers from the extended Whitney community to join him in Mexico. I became one of those in 2012. After suffering and healing slowly after a total knee replacement in Nov 2011, I proved myself somewhat in August 2012 by hiking 90 miles in the Sierras with several friends, topping out later with my older son Seth on Whitney and, importantly, getting all the way down in one day. So back home in Virginia, the mountains were calling yet again.
Richard’s plan was to arrive in Mexico City, drive to the hut at Toluca that night, and climb that 15,000+ ft volcano the next day. More on that aggressive schedule later. Next on the peak-bagging tour would be a drive to the huts at La Malinche and hiking its 14,000+ ft but much longer 12 hr round trip. Then, a drive to the town of Tlachichuca at the foot of Orizaba, with perhaps a drive to the observatory at the top of nearby Sierra Negra, then the following day a transfer to the Piedra Grande hut. After a few hours of rest we would begin a midnight start to get us from 14,000 ft to the 18,000+ ft glaciated summit of Orizaba. Whew! A worldwind tour, at least for some of us. All of this was subject to change.
Richard arrived early, sitting patiently for hours at the airport McDonalds. I arrived next, all the way from Virginia by 11:30 am. The others arrive from SoCal later: Abraham, Abbas, Masoud, and Mohsen. The four Iranians kept the party going, chattering away in Farsi, Spanish, or English and generally preventing us from having a dull moment. Their outlook and happiness at just being alive and experiencing the world in even its simplest ways was a lesson to remember. Their comraderie reminded me of this quote from Gaston Rebuffat in Starlight and Storm, “Your climbing companion is the man with whom you will share the good and exacting moments of mountaineering, and many of your finest experiences. The choice of companions is as important as the choice of climb.”
Christobal, our 70 year old driver, jerked us through the Rube Goldberg maze, congestion, and diesel stench of sprawling Mexico City. Once out in the countryside, he was kind to repeatedly offer a banos stop. I think the bushes only got used twice during the whole week. We finally arrived at the low, squat Toluca hut in the forest. More depressingly, there was rain. This was supposed to be the dry season. Here is what famed British explorer Bill Tilman wrote many years ago in Two Mountains and a River, ”In the few days we were there the weather had been neither hot, cloudless, nor settled, and though we were assured by the residents - as one always is - that such conditions had never been known before, the fact remained that they existed then.”
The dreary dark forest was just the start. The hut at 12,000 ft could have been more modern than you would expect considering it was large, perhaps 16 or so private rooms, but it had no electricity, a leaking roof with multiple puddles on the floor, running water but only cold, a central fireplace to gather around, but not much wood, and for six-footers like me there were the second floor rooms designed in mind for the average height Central American Indian of yesteryear. Bang. Ouch. The worst aspect though was the cold and damp 40 F degree hut, watching one’s exhalations condense in the headlamp beam. Going straight to 12,000 feet does make one more sensitive to environmental stresses like lower oxygen pressure and temperature, but in the dark I slipped myself into my inside-out lightweight 20+F sleeping bag. It was a while before I figured that out. Downstairs near the fire one of the guys was snoozing in his behemoth -30 F Marmot Cwm bag. I have one of those, too, but have not used it since the Himalayas. Our chief guide Oso was there, and of course talked with Richard about the plans. The next day we would do the short, easy crater of Toluca.
The next morning did not dawn. More like gloomed. Our spirits were low. But we left anyway. This was just a training/acclimatizing day. Christobal was our guide, both driving to the car park at 13,000 ft were there were regular families and tourists, and then led the way on the easy trail to the lower side of the crater. After dropping down a few hundred feet, we began the climb up to the 15,000 ft other side. By now it was barely visible in the fog, drizzle, and dusting of snow. I was slow, clearly not acclimatized. As Tilman’s partner Eric Shipton observed in Upon That Mountain, “One man acclimatises quickly, another slowly…The whole process appears to be analogous to sea-sickness about which predictions are impossible.” Richard kindly stayed with me at the back, me huffing and puffing, Richard with his permanent state of high altitude-ness. When I finally reached the others at the crest, I offered to go back down on my own. The others could go ahead and “enjoy” the fog -hrouded, slick-rock scramble to the true summit hidden in the clouds. That would take another two hours. I just need to get to thicker air. And so I plunge-stepped down the scree off to the side of the trail to the crater floor, back up the small incline on the other side, and waited 2 hours for the other happy campers to return. My heart rate and respiratory rate would just need more time and more Diamox. Mostly time. I knew my body.
The weather also needed more time. Christobal drove us to the 40 or so huts of La Malinche. It is said to be an Olympic training facility, but that is a gross exaggeration. It was far nicer than Toluca, but still dark, dank, and depressing. We wondered if our week in Mexico would be a bust. However, the hut was a step up, in at least some ways. It was dorm style, our bunks close to each other, with electricity, a restaurant, and a shop. I discovered that the gift shop even sold firewood so we had heat. Good plumbing, though, we did not have. The place stunk like sewer gas. Mexican design appropriately includes S- or P- drain designs for sinks and toilets, but no water seal method in the shower. Despite keeping the bathroom door closed and the window open, we were nearly asphyxiated. Add that to the oppressive rain, we decided to skip the next day’s plan to climb La Malinche. It would be a mud-slog. The only happy person seemed to be Christobal, taking his 70 yr old legs on their daily morning run for an hour.
Richard went into plan B mode, and made all the right decisions. By now, we had already picked up Emilio, our 34 year old guide for the rest of the trip, rather than Oso – the boss. Personally, I was happy about that. Emilio had just finished a trip with a rappel into a 900 foot deep hole, then jumared back up. His next trip was with us, to be followed with a second-in-a-row climb of Orizaba with another group. The plan became this: go on to Tlachichuca at 8,000 feet and spend a night in the hotel, have a restaurant dinner with Richard’s favorite, Mirabel. We all enjoyed that, plus strolling around in the small town, complete with freshly killed chickens (heads on), boiling vats of pig intestines, and whatever fruits and vegetable were in season. Above all of course, was corn. The end-of –season cornstacks (like haystacks) were everywhere. The only change from my 1997 visit was the smell of natural gas. That fuel is used all over Mexico and the small amount of mercaptan (that is added to make leak detection easier) gave everywhere a faint rotten- egg smell. Add that to the diesel fumes in large towns, the lousy plumbing, and the sulfur smell on the tops of volcanoes, then you get the idea that having a stuffy nose might be a good thing.
The next day we sorted our gear, leaving behind some items at the hotel, and lurched up the hill for 2 long hours in 4-wheel drive vehicles. I forget the drivers name, Joachin I think, but with that bouncing dusty job his perpetual smile and good nature could have only been fueled by Tequila. The hut was the same as 1997 but with three new changes; the windblown corrugated roof had been replaced with concrete slabs, pit toilets were placed nearby (none before), and there was an addition for food storage that no one ever seemed to use. The biggest improvement was that opening the big wooden door only took a finger rather than four strong arms of two people during the winds of 1997. There were only a few other occupants. A British woman was waiting for several Germans and her husband to return. She had only been part way up before altitude-effect turned her back. The others straggled in at various times-we gave them cheers, and they gave us good news about conditions up high. I began to feel optimistic. Richard and I went for an acclimatization hike- he of course faster and farther than I, but reaching about 15,500 ft I knew that time had finally solved my acclimatization problem. Back down, we settled in for the night, a great dinner was cooked by Emilio, and all was quiet around the lofts. There a three levels in “the barn” with wooden platforms that might accommodate as many as 60 people. I’d say about 24 might be the reasonable max. With only about 10 or so, we and the few others had the place to ourselves. Just us and the clear dark sky. Stars twinkled the promise of a good day.
Thursday Nov 8. The group headed up for an acclimatization hike. I had not intended to go again for fear of overdoing my still-gimpy legs. However, I was feeling better and better. This was not exactly Nepal, but as Wilfrid Noyce wrote in To The Unknown Mountain, “ One pleasure of Himalayan climbing lies for me in doing with ease what has, some days before, been done only with great pain and groaning.” Emelio wanted to check out in daylight the entrance to the Labyrinth so that’s where we climbed to. Abbas did not go. He had developed a hacking cough and was using an inhaler. Had we been in the Khumbu area of Everest, we would have called this the ‘Khumbu cough’, an occupational hazard of those of us who breathe thin air. He would have to give up his dream shot; weather conditions last year, medical conditions this year. He took it in stride, never complaining one bit. He would ride back to town at 8,000 ft where the cough would be shaken out of him by either the jeep, the rest, the thicker air, the inhaler, the Tequila, or some of all of the above.
Friday Nov 9 – early start for the summit
“That virtue is its own reward we were beginning to learn, for in the matter of early starts we found there was no other.” (Eric Shipton, Nanda Devi) . This rule if not the quote is known to all of us. Emelio’s alarm rang at midnight. Not that many of us needed it. I had laid there for hours, perhaps napping 2 of the hours since the sun had set. Our midnight breakfast done, and final gear packed, we headed up by headlamp.
The only decision I had agonized about was over- or under-dressing. In 1997, it was so windy that it was a no-brainer. We needed everything we had then. This time, with temps in the 20s, and practically no wind, little would be needed. Richard and I had discussed this. The way to stay warm and dry is to stay cool and dry. Too many clothes while climbing makes you sweat, get wet, then get cold. All I had on was this; For the bottom: single layer leather boots (not fabric) with liner and wool socks, gaiters, old-style strap-on steel crampons, single layer nylon pants, single layer rain paints. I did not wear or take long underwear bottoms but did carry my double fleece windbloc side-zip pants, just in case. The winds behaved so I did not need them. I never considering my three-layer mountaineering bibs so they were back home in Virginia. For the top: my favorite Aconcagua synthetic t-shirt, a regular Mountain Hardware casual shirt and lightweight parka. I carried but never put on my Nano Puff jacket. I did not even carry my silk long underwear top, or my North Face lined mountaineering jacket (some of the guys did) . For the head: A single layer fleece balaclava, and a baseball cap to keep the LED headlamp glare out of my eyes. I carried but did not use a Peruvian style hat/ear flaps but occasionally pulled up my parka hood when mild winds blew up. I use my regular eyeglasses at night, Julbo glacier glasses in the day, but never need my tinted ski-goggles for either wind or strong UV protection. For the hands: Started out with regular fleece gloves, later switched when holding the cold steel of the ice ax to liner gloves plus simple mitts. I carried heavier gloves with gauntlets but never needed them . For the stomach: I can live all day on the 600-800 calories of Tang in the two liters of Nalgene bottles. I ate very little of the snacks and none of the sandwich that was provided. High altitude robs me of appetite. “My heart and lungs might be acclimatized to 17,700 feet, but not so my digestion.” (Frank Smythe, Camp Six).
Gradually, the angles of the night slipped by. One by one, various rocks seen during the day would appear in the circular light of our beams. After about 2 hrs, we reached the end of the rock and scree. I suppose one could call that first part a class 2 climb. At the Labyrinth, the snows of 1997 were long-ago melted away. We had actually practiced glacier travel and ice-ax arrest in that area. Now, with crampons attached, Emelio led us upwards through small channels (canaletas) to the beginning of the actual Jamapa glacier itself. It was still dark. The moon had not quite risen yet, but above and unseen I could feel the presence of the mountain looming above us. “It seemed to look down with cold indifference on me, mere puny man”(NE Odell in EF Norton, The Fight for Everest 1924).
At this point in the climb, we switchbacked left and right. Personally, I would have preferred longer switchbacks to reduce the times that we had to change direction. I had problems with that, in part because I was rusty, and part because my leg strength would never be back to what it was before the total knee surgery. With the extensive rehab, I had dutifully gained my flexibility from a postop bend of 70 degrees to a maximum 130, as good as anyone gets, but still problematic and short of normal. Furthermore, my right leg quad strength that had dropped postop to 30% may have now only gotten back to 80%. Maybe. This would continue to be a problem, along with general deconditioning and age. But for now, going up depended on hamstring strength, so I kept the pace okay. Emelio was patient, often pointing out areas of ice to be extra careful on. Stamping the crampons down and especially planting the spike end of the ice ax were important here, and as we shall see, even more on the descent.
In the night, all that mattered was the next step. “You forget about time. It is as if the whole dimension ceases to exist up here.” (Kurt Diemberger, The Endless Knot). Kurt was talking about the brain-stunned effects of extreme altitude, but some of the thin air here, the nighttime sensory deprivation, the monotony, and whatever else had similar effects as well. There was not much talking. I had spoken much earlier about my estimate of moonrise time. When it finally happened, the yellow and orange glow in the east went unnoticed until Emelio reminded me of what I had suggested.. About the only other conversation was from Richard. As the fastest man on the planet, he was appropriately in the sweep position at the back of the line. He exhorted us once (just once!) to get moving because he was cold. Again, his preference and mine was to dress lightly and modify body temperature with exercise level. Not much later, the sun solved the problem. The crescent moon’s convex side of course was pointing straight down into the bands of orange, pink, and gold. “From our vantage point we watched the pageant of …sun and rising moon, beyond the means of a painter, either in words or colour.” (HW Tilman, The Ascent of Nanda Devi). The promise of a new day lifted our spirits. We had gone from listless grumps soldiering up the hill, and now, “When the sun’s rays at last reached us, we all felt as if we had undergone some kind of a redemption.” (Kurt Diemberger, Summits and Secrets.)
It was time to turn off the headlamps. How much farther to go? Who knows? It did not matter. We were not in the same league as this next climber/writer, but “My only adversary is the slope, time no longer exists. I consist of tiredness and exertion.” (Reinhold Messner, The Crystal Horizon). One… step… at… a… time. Several of us commented that it suddenly and surprisingly seemed like we were finally there. The summit ridge was an easy slope, but my tired hamstrings could only push me at a snails’ pace. “We could look directly up at the summit. Now the culmination of our mountaineering careers was going to be a trudge…. Just a walk - a walk in the sky.” (Nicholas Clinch, A Walk in the Sky). A faint whiff of sulfur let me know Orizaba was still alive. And so was I. So were we all. The flags and cameras came out. The muted celebration began.
I laid down on the small spot of snowless gravel at the top. The situation was different for me, “I had not the very least feeling of exultation on achievement: the reward was far greater.” (Tom Longstaff, This My Voyage). You see, 2012 had been a tough year. My older son and I had taken my father’s picture to the top of Whitney 5 months after his death. Now, just one week after my brothers wife had died, I was carrying Judy’s picture to the top of this mountain. My celebration and tears were not for my victory over this damned rock and snow, but for her life and love. Requiescat in pace.
But I shall go down from this airy space, this swift white peace,
this stinging exultation;
For once I stood
In the white windy presence of eternity.
Eunice Tietjens, “The Most Sacred Mountain”
“Suddenly the mountain had been climbed and all our attentions were focused in the opposite direction.” (Joe Tasker, Savage Arena). Joe was right, but I hoped that my outcome would not be like his. He and Pete Boardman were lost high on the Northeast Ridge of Everest in 1982. Their mountaineering accomplishments and beautiful books set the standard. The Boardman-Tasker Award is given yearly in their honor for mountaineering literature. Joe, in particular, was the best. It was no surprise to me that the first year of the prize there was… no award. There was simply nothing written that was good enough.
We headed down in ideal conditions. Emelio reminded us to be careful. I think that I did well as long as I concentrated on each and every single step. It was not until later that I made a mistake. About the midsection of the glacier, the angle lessens enough that glissading is possible. Two of the guys went sliding on their butts, controlling (they hoped) their descent speed with their ice axes. Judging by the groove carved in the snow, others had done it. Richard correctly admonished them for keeping their crampons on. A snagged crampon while descending fast could mean a snapped ankle or a slashed shin. Emelio should have pointed this out to them as well. So while Richard and I stood there watching all of this, I must have let go of my concentration . Either my footing slipped, or when I moved I snagged a front point on a side strap. In a flash, I was headed down the slope, fortunately feet first and on my stomach. I obviously had not had my ax spike jammed in the snow deep enough, or held on tight enough, or reflexively jammed it in further in full arrest. There was no pain, no fear, no perception that I was rocketing away, just sliding down ‘in slow motion’ with my ax dangling from my wrist by the leash that Emelio had given me at the very start. Thank you, Emelio. I now had the pick of the ice ax sunken into the soft snow, cutting a furrow so-to- speak, so this kept me lined up straight and prevented tumbling. That would have been catastrophic. I bumped partially into one guy, finally coming to rest right next to Emelio. If this had happened higher up, I might have died. Here in this midsection, I might have broken bones. Had we been further over to the east on the icier part of the glacier, then I would have been gone forever as happened to a woman earlier this year. The only casualty was watching my second liter of Tang rolling down the glacier. I thought I would never see it again, but when we finally reached gentle terrain at the foot of the glacier and the top of the Labyrinth, Richard found it among the rocks exactly where he predicted he would. We still had a bit of icy patch to go through on this final canaleta. I was getting tired at this point, slipped again, but did a proper and immediate ax arrest. The key is concentration. “It may be difficult for the non-climber to appreciate the intense mental effort such a descent calls for. This was no chess game where the board could be reset.” (Malcom Slesser, With Friends in High Places)
Now the crampons were off and I thought I would be light as a feather, Nope. The legs were rubber. Richard thought we might be down to the hut by 1 pm, but that is not my speed. I am slow normally, and tired today, and predicted 2. It later became 2:30. Normally a brief skid on scree or ball bearing gravel over stone would be controllable with good quad strength. Mine were gone. I had to inch down the rocky slopes like an old man on a creaky staircase. “Everything I’ve ever learnt must now help me down. If I relax my discipline slightly, I shall trip and fall.” (Peter Boardman, Sacred Summits). I encouraged the other guys to go ahead. But no, they avoided this mistake: “It is common in mountaineering, to the point of being standard practice, for the keep-together discipline of climbing to become unraveled when approaching the home stretch.”
( Holzel &Salkeld, The Mystery of Mallory and Irvine). I especially appreciated the extra support of Masoud who walked just ahead of me, planting his ice ax in the dirt or scree, or anywhere where I might buckle my knees and slip. That way, if I did slide, I could use his ax as a stopping point. This was put to use several times, along with a variety of rolls, squats, and flops. Eventually, though, we all made it down. To show my appreciation to Masoud, I gave him my best attempt at his cultures’ three kisses on the cheeks that males do. Just for you Masoud! No one else! Abbas came up the path a short way to greet us. His lungs had healed quickly in the thick 8,000 ft air of Tlachichuca and he made the first half of the brain-sloshing 4 hour round trip drive just to rejoin the team at the hut. He could have stayed in town. That was his act of love and brotherhood. Now all of us would be back to town together – the bone-jarring 4-wheel drive to safety, warmth, food, celebration, and life renewed. “We were more than ready to turn our backs on this dead world of ice and rock and reach out towards the life-giving earth.”(John Hunt, The Ascent of Everest)
Our final day included a trip to the Teotihuacan Pyramid of Sun north of Mexico City. I felt sorry for Richard, being a tourist is not the same as climbing a mountain. That is what he does and that is what he is. Masoud and I climbed up the pyramid. At first, I did not think my sore legs would stand it. It was hard to imagine that in 500 AD 175,000 people lived here. It was hard to imagine that a few of us lived on the top of Orizaba for a few minutes. It was a special journey in life for me. I joked to people before I left that I wanted to see what had changed the most since 1997, the mountain or me. The answer is pretty easy to guess, but I must conclude this story with what surely Richard feels, and I feel to a different extent:
Once a mountaineer has climbed so high, for the rest of his life he dreams of returning.
Peter Boardman, Sacred Summits
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Joined: Jul 2009
Posts: 556
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Joined: Jul 2009
Posts: 556 |
Excellent read Harvey! Congratulations to all! This Mehico thing is definitely becoming an annual event. Looks like Richard really started something.
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Joined: Apr 2010
Posts: 708
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Joined: Apr 2010
Posts: 708 |
Wonderful trip report!
I admit that I did wonder, when I first started reading, if I'd need to resort to Google Translate again. "Adiabatic cooling"? "Katabatic"? Oh right, English.
In any event, congratulations!
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