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LSC Ecuador Mountaineering 06
Sunday, April 02, 2006

Hello everyone. Presumably, if you are viewing this page you have been invited to by a member of our Lyndon State College 2006 Ecuador Mountaineering expedition. This expedition dispatch page is intended to update the friends and families of our expedition members. Our hope is that we can share the spirit of our adventures with you. We will be updating this page as regularly as possible given the geographic and technological constraints of our expedition. Please stay tuned for images, text, and audio recordings throughout our ten days here.

Our team members are: Brad Allain, Lauren Jenks, Jameson Kneeland, James Mann, Jon Sanborn, Meg Skidmore, Jason Smith, John DeLeo (faculty), Kelley Rossiter (leader), and Austin Paulson (leader)

We arrived in Quito, Ecuador yesterday after a long day of travel on American Airlines. My friend and longtime in-country partner, Ramiro Donoso, was there to meet us and shepard us to our hotel, The Magic Bean. After a late dinner and welcome we retired for a great nights sleep.

Today, fueled by the best coffee in Ecuador and fresh squeezed juices we commenced with a discussion of Expedition Behavior. Our goal was to identify lines of behavior that would help us all achieve the most from this experience. I’m happy to report that good thought by all team members contributed to the success of this discussion. We really appear to be on the same page and are supportive of both individual and group stated goals.

The afternoon was a great, shared experience learning about the history and culture of the city of Quito and Ecuador in general. We were able to learn a lot from our city tour guide, Gloria, about the colonial architecture, indigenous peoples, religion, economy, and geopolitical situation in her country.

We are all in good health and are allowing our bodies to acclimatize to Quito’s 9000' elevation. Several days of light activities and technical skills training around the Quito area will help us develop more red blood cells for efficient oxygen transportation at higher altitudes. Over the course of the next few days we will climb to higher elevations in the surrounding mountains (upwards of 15,500') to prepare our bodies and minds for a move to a mountain hut at the base of Cotopaxi, our primary climbing objective for this expedition. The amount of usable oxygen per breath at this elevation is 50% of that at normal living elevations, thus the need to acclimatize. After two additional training days on mountain and glacier hazards, roped team travel, cravasse rescue, and work with ice axes, we will attempt to climb to the summit of this 19,448' peak. We will provide updates of these day when possible.

We are grateful to all the support our friends and families have provided to make this expedition possible. We hope that you will enjoy following the experience and sharing in the adventure. Please stay tuned for more. - Austin Paulson

Training Day
Monday, April 03, 2006

"The world is like a book.  Those who don’t travel only read the first page." –Unknown

Hello to all, my name is Jameson, and I’m a student at Lyndon State College who happened to be lucky enough to join Austin, Kelly, and John on this trip. I found this quote looking through a guest book in our hostel, and every day I spend here I find it to be more true.

Our day today began around 8:00am with a glorious breakfast; it’s amazing to think all the fruit we eat probably came from within just a few miles, which certainly explains its delicious taste!

After breakfast we walked roughly a mile to an outdoor climbing gym to practice some skills we’ll be needing on Pinchincha and Cotopaxi mountains. This rock gym was like no other I’ve been to before. The fact that it’s outside and exposed to the elements is a curiosity in itself, but it also has all kinds of fascinating features. The back of the main wall is entirely made of brick, with what some might consider faulty mortaring, but in truth it’s to allow for hand and foot holds. In addition to this, off to the side is a small pyramid-like feature made of stone, likely from a quarry on Pinchincha. It was on this small wall that we did our skills practice today.

Austin and Kelly started us off with an introduction to roped travel. This skill is certainly a handy thing if someone falls in a crevasse. It is also equally frustrating in that it makes for much harder movement because we all have to move together and keep tension on the rope. each person is affected by the movement of everyone else on the rope. After this we split up into two groups. Austin went over crevasse rescue techniques, while Kelly showed us how to ascend a rope if, by chance, we fall into a deep crevasse. When that was all said and done we grabbed some lunch. I don’t know about everyone else, but Brad, Lauren, and I all found some excellent Indian food.

After lunch we all headed over to a tram (arial cable car like a gondola) which would take us a fair bit of the way up to Pinchincha. According to my GPS, the tram took us up to an elevation of roughly 13,000 feet. Considering that Quito is at 9,000 feet, this was enough to get us feeling the altitude. Megan and I were interested in just how much it would help us, so we went for a short run to get ourselves feeling it even more. We were shocked by how much it affected us. After about 50 feet we were short of breath and had to stop. I was still determined to keep running, so I started up once again after I caught my breath. I made it maybe 20 feet that time before I was ready to drop. This was pretty much a continuing trend as I tried to run around. We got some amazing pictures while we were up there. Pinchincha is looking a lot more fun to climb than it did when I was looking at pictures online before the trip. After this we sat around and talked about various things such as altitude sickness symptoms, altitude physiology, and a quick debrief of the skills we had covered earlier in the day.

Right now the remainder of the night is looking like getting dinner (Brad and I are thinking Thai), shopping for our breakfast and lunch for tomorrow, and then bed. It looks like we're getting up around five in the morning, so we're all hoping for an early lights out. Thanks for keeping up with this, everyone. We really appreciate it and it's definitely fun to share our experience with friends around the world while we're still living it! -Jameson

Acclimatizing on Mt. Pinchincha
Tuesday, April 04, 2006

The day began at 5:30am for our group, a departure from the 8am breakfasts with which we were accustomed. We loaded up a rugged van and headed off without our customary fresh juice from The Magic Bean.

Our goal, hike Pinchincha, a mountain to the west of Quito. Pinchincha stands at 15,500 feet and this hike was more about providing necessary acclimatization rather than bagging the peak. Still we were all eager to test ourselves against the altitude.

The ride up to the trailhead wound through areas of Quito we hadn’t seen before; much of this area was used by indigenous people for agriculture. As such the roads were poorly maintained. Our driver Hugo navigated these thoroughfares masterfully, though on one occasion he had to stop and fill in parts of the road that had washed away. Once we had reached the trailhead we said goodbye to Hugo.

We started hiking almost immediately, there was a cool wind and everyone wanted to get warmed up. The peak was visible during the beginning of our hike. It seemed much nearer than we would come to find it to be. The pace was moderate to slow. I found myself struggling to keep a steady pace.

We worked our way up Pinchincha, stopping to check our pulse every half hour or so. Jameson kept lying about his pulse. He was saying it was 64 when we had been hiking for 2 hours. LIAR!

We reached the peak in 5 hours, and shared hugs. The mountain gods too wanted to welcome us into their lofty ranks. As we began descending they sounded their mythical cymbals, and threw confetti from on high. The decent took about half the time and we were spurred on by the thought of the ride down.

The ride up took 2 hours and the ride down took 12 minutes. How is that possible? Well, Pinchincha has a tram that operates in the afternoon. After Austin negotiated the fare we boarded and rode down.

The area where we got off the tram is an amusement park…and the amusement park had an arcade…and the arcade had two air hockey tables. Naturally, certain members of the group were making jokes about my world ranking, 38th. So I defended air hockey honor. Our group surmised that this air hockey table was the closest to the sun on all of planet earth. The arcade was located 9,800 feet and combined with the Equatorial topographic bulge, I think our claim is safe.

After this excitement we hopped on a bus and headed back into the city. We all were very tired, and we are going to go to bed early because tomorrow we go to Cotopaxi. ~ Jon Sanborn

Off to Cotopaxi
Tuesday, April 04, 2006

We hope you are enjoying keeping track of our adventures. In the morning we will be leaving for the mountains! We have spent the last several days learning skills that will be necessary for safe climbing and have allowed our bodies time to acclimatize to the high altitude. We are ready to begin our primary climb of Cotopaxi, the highest volcano on the equator.

At 19,448' the climb covers an amazing amount of interesting terrain. From our base camp at around 15,500' we will be departing at midnight when the glacial snows will still be frozen and stable. We will be ascending the peak for about an hour before reaching the glacier. Using crampons on our feet and protecting ourselves with ropes and ice axes we will ascend almost 4,000' over the course of 6-8 hours. Upon reaching the summit we will be able to view the surrounding mountains as they poke out above the clouds far below us. The summit is occupied by a large volcanic crater - truly a unique geophysical feature. It will take us another 3 hours to decend back to the hut for a total of 9-12 hours on the go.

We will not be able to add journal entries until Friday. Please stay tuned for our audio journal entry from the summit! Thank you again for sharing this experience with us. - Austin Paulson

On the Glacier
Friday, April 7, 2006

Woah! OK. What day is it? Friday. So Wednesday we took the three-hour ride in a tight but rugged van, stopping along the way at the Supermaxi for our food at the hut. After the long ride through the Cotopaxi National Park we arrived at the parking lot. We strapped on our gear and started up the one-hour hike to the hut at the base of the peak. Immediately we felt the effects of the altitude. We huffed and puffed and finally reached the hut with headaches and lack of hunger. It was pretty dead because of the rainy season and no one had summitted in over two weeks. I made (with the help of John and Brad) a delicious vegetable stir-fry with roasted potatoes and some sautéed chicken. We tried to eat but the altitude made it difficult. We drank tea and Tang to keep hydrated and called it an early night, although many of us had a hard time sleeping because our hearts were beating much faster than usual.

We spent the next day practicing some technical skills that we would need for the long climb later that night. We picked our rope teams and practiced walking together roped up with our crampons on. This was something I had never done before and I found it frustrating, especially since I had very little energy. We quit early and headed back to the hut to eat and take a nap before dinner.

After a quick pizza dinner and a short three-hour nap, we woke up at 11:30pm to start up Cotopaxi. When I woke up I felt great and was ready to get as close to the summit as possible. The first 45 minutes went fast and, when we reached the glacier, we roped up our teams. Austin and John were tied in front of and behind me. We reached a steep section and decided we didn't need our crampons because the snow was so deep. I was still feeling good although I needed to pee. This would be difficult and dangerous because I would need to take off my harness (something the boys don't have to deal with) and the hill was so steep that I could fall down. We continued up and my stomach began to hurt and every step took a toll on my bladder. Also, John was starting to lose energy as well so Austin made the decision to turn around.

We didn’t make it to the top but we still reached 17,500 ft, which is higher that I have ever been in my life. At first I was disappointed for not reaching the summit or at least going as far a possible. After more thought, I realized I had worked hard, as did the rest of the group, and this whole trip has been full of new skills and amazing culture. I think the summit was never the main goal for me. I wanted the experience, which has been amazing and will continue to be with our trip to the market in Otavalo tomorrow. - Lauren Jenks

Summit Day, Cotopaxi
Friday, April 07, 2006

I have been very interested in climbing Cotopaxi for a year and a half. When I saw that LSC would be offering this trip I could not pass it up. My biggest worry was how I was going to react to the altitude. I do a lot of climbing in the White Mountains but the Whites do not offer either high altitude mountaineering or glaciers, my main recreational interests. Cotopaxi was to be my first test. I trained very hard as I did not want to fail. I believe this training paid off because Jameson and I were chosen to be on the lead team and to climb with the local guide named Wilson. I believe I was also put on this team because I felt strong and was showing no signs of altitude illness at all. The fact that the altitude was not affecting me at all made me very happy.

I am choosing to write about today the day of the climb because it is the most important day of the trip for me. We started climbing at about 12:30 in the morning. I was very nervous. I know that bad snow conditions make travel very dangerous, but I was nervous mostly because I knew this could affect my chance at the summit. There was even some talk about turning back right in the beginning of the climb. Fortunately this did not happen.

First you have to walk about a half hour to get on the glacier. At this point you rope into your team and start a three-hour ascent up a 40 to 45 degree slope. Our group had three rope teams and unfortunately we were the only team to make it past this very tough section. This section was difficult and our guide needed to take a break as he had the grueling job of breaking trail through the rough terrain. With the snow conditions this was tougher than usual. At this point we met a French team who came up behind us and let us know the rest of our group had turned around. We felt strong and decided to continue.

The next part of the trip was amazing. For a two to three hour period we meandered through a winter wonderland of crevasses and hanging seracs. It was my first experience in this terrain and I fell in love with it immediately. Unfortunately the snow was getting softer by the minute, which was creating a very dangerous situation for us. Finally we arrived at the Yanascha Wall, which leads to the summit of Cotopaxi. This slope is at an intense 55-degree angle and snow conditions have to be optimum to climb it. It is also at 19,200 feet and is just three hundred vertical feet from the summit. Wilson taught me my favorite mountaineering phrase, "Cumbre Morta". This means summit or die. He uses it to encourage you when you are close to the summit. At this point it felt like I could jump up and touch the summit, but with the snow conditions and the 55 degree slope he told us that the phrase "Cumbre Morta" would be literal, not encouraging, and there was no way we could climb the last three hundred feet to the summit. I have never had three hundred feet feel so far away.

Despite not making the last three hundred feet it was my happiest moment in the mountains to date. I knew that Jameson and I would have reached the summit permitting the right conditions. I knew that it was not a lack in our physical fitness or our mountaineering skills. We had what it took to get to the summit and we were so close that we could taste it. At this point it clicked to me that this is why I love mountaineering and why it is such a great sport. There are so many obstacles and different variables that contribute to the success of obtaining a summit and that’s why it is dangerous and exciting. With out these elements there would be no joy in victory. As I was post holing down the mountain in waist deep snow all I could think of is when would I be back to conquer those last three hundred feet. - James Mann