Try, Try, and Try again!

Illiniza Norte (the one on the right)

Oh my gosh look at that......!

Iliniza Norte summit shot!

Ski decent

Cotopaxi from Illiniza above the clouds!

Refugio Jose Rivas, Cotopaxi (4800 m)

1 AM Start with our Kiwi Friend Mike.

Iliniza with the cotopaxi shadow looming

If you haven´t read the last post do so BEFORE reading this one, as this is a continuation! By the way, we can´t spell check these things, sorry.

We quickly got to the car part and loaded up our gear. I asked Francisco about the equipment rental, he confirmed that it was a daily rental. About 10 minutes into our 30 minute ride to the campground Francisco said he would give us the equipment for half price if we wanted to give the climb another try. He also said that he knew of a guide that was in the campground that would be taking two tourists up to try to climb as well.
This got the wheels turning... before we left the refugio the nice guarderia there (Wilson) also mentioned that there would be other parties with guides up there that night. Steven and I chatted a bit, going throught the budget and the options. Would we be too tired? It was definitley more money. We did think we knew where the correct route might be....but were we being too focused on the summitt, not appreciating the journey enough? Waffel, waffel...We decided not to do it and to hike in the park for the next couple of days as we had planned, and werode in silence for a bit. Decision made.
Until we pulled into the driveway for the camping area. We had the 10 second, ¨"we probably won´t be here again lets go for it conversation", told Fransico and got our gear back out and said goodbye to him and Mike! We talked to the very arrogant guide that was waiting for his clients. After some negociating he finally agreed to let us ride up with them for a hefty fee and said we would just see how it went hiking tonight... sounding like we would talk more if we needed to follow him or something.

Despite the lack of sleep and the 7 or so hours on the volcano I actually felt better on the slog up to the refugio, a good sign. When we got up there were already several groups up there eating, and Wilson totally hooked us up with soup, popcorn (a typical sidedish with meals here), crackers and dulce de leche...it was great. We passed out for a few hours, and when we got up he fed us again!! There were a total of 6 parties there eating, getting their gear together, including the guide and the German that we passed on Ilinizas.
There was a Swiss guy that I chatted with, told him our story of the night before, and he said there should be no problem making it up with all the groups. I mistook him for a tourist, he was actually a guide! We talked about the route, and he was totally cool about my questions and the idea of going behind him if we needed too, he was the opposite of arrogant guide guy that gave us a ride up.
We both actually slept before the midnight alarm went off. We were the second party up and met the Swiss party and the german guy and his guide on the glacier. The Swiss guy said we could go on ahead or follow other roped teams up. We felt good and were moving well and eventually we were out in front, traversing back and forth across the glacier with the lights of the other groups shining below us. Eventually we got to a wall, it looked like you could go right or left around some crevases.

Other guided groups at Dawn

We waited for the German and guide to catch up, and I said hello and asked right or left. He didn´t answer, whisteling, singing (the guide was a character), and as each party caught up to us he asked in spanish "right or left? Capalitist or socalist? Bush or Castro"! I was thinking I was geting cold and that I would ask the Swiss guide, but decided to wait. When the Swiss guys made it up and recived the same question, the answer was "recto!" or "straight!". The Germans´s guide proceed to go up the wall, kicking steps in with the crampons and using the ice ax.
Lesson learned. From that point on I began to understand that we belonged in the middle or in the rear of these groups and thought more about the alpine climbing ethic. Its different than rock climbing. The parties waited for each other, there was no hurry or thought of faster parties passing at this point, there seemed to be comradare between the guides.
Things got more technical and steep, there were some slopes that we were traversing up that had they been dirt there would have been no way to stay on due to the steepness. There was a crevase to step over.... crazy to look down into those things!
I started feeling sick to my stomach again and stared moving slower. Before the final push had to stop and go to the bathroom, again no fun on a glacier. The last 30 minutes or so I had to stop every 20 feet or so to keep from throwing up, couldn´t really talk, just had to focus on moving and breathing. Steven was a rock star.
We finally made it up at 6:30, 6 1-2 hours after we started up! I just sat on the backpack for a few minutes letting things calm down, looking down at the clouds and at the peaks of other volcanoes poking through. Got up and looked down into the crater of Cotopaxi with some steam coming up (its an active volcano), pretty amazing. It was awesome that we made it, it was carthic and emotional being up there!

Summit Glory Shot

Cotopaxi crater

We only had about 10 minutes up there before we had to head back down while the glacier was still hard. Got to check out all the crazy rock and glacial formations on the way down.... the otherworldly aspect of being up there.... this part was really cool, but the views themselves were better the day before when it was more clear! We were SO LUCKY to get both worlds in our two climbs!
Made it down 3 or so hours later, in a daze by the time we made it to the refugio. We learned there that two parties didn´t make it up that day, and that it actaully hadn´t been summitted in 4-5 days! There had been a good bit of new snow, no wonder we didn´t find the path. (even if we had, we would have turned back at the technical stuff)

Thirsty Anyone???

The short version of the next part of the story is that we evenutally went down to the carpark to try to hitch a ride down and Wilson unknown to us had hooked us up with a truck that was taking a couple on a tour, we hopped in with them, zoned out and waited while they did little hikes, picked up our bikes and went to a hostle. We slept 11 hours that night.
We are both so glad we decided to try again. I was totally humbled by the experience and learned a ton.. it was just incredible!

Cotopaxi

Well, we headed to Cotopaxi National Park on the bikes with the intention of trying to climb the volcano. Cotopaxi is the classic image of a volcano cone, glacier dipped, and sits at 19,640. We spoke with a number of guides and several tourists that had climbed it and decided that we could attempt it by ourselves as Steven has some glacier and mountianeering experience; by all reports it was a very straightforward route. It sounded like there was a path in the glacier due to the numbers of parties that climb it.
We camped for free in the office where we rented our equipment, and one of the guides, Francisco, had us to his house down the road for evening coffee (nescafe with a ton of sugar) and converstaion, all in spanish. He lives in a typical cinder-block house, very poor by our standards. The conversation was rich though; we talked about climbing down here, politics, his kids... We learned that all school here requires tuition, there is no free education. Its rough on a lot of parents to even get their kids to elementary school so some just don´t go.
The next morning we met with a Kiwi friend by the name of Mike (he also has some mountianeering experience) who was joining us for the climb up, and we took transport with Francisco to the refugio which is at like 15,500 feet. The 45 mintue hike up to the refugio was pretty hard and got me wondering about the climb to the top! We relaxed in the afternoon and tried to drink tons of liquids in preparation. The only other party up there was a group of three Italian alpineers who totally styled us with real parmasean cheese and some fancy meat that was straight from Itally! Oh, to eat good cheese! They explained that their food was from a particuar town in northern Itally and very distinctive... they had bottles of wine, espresso... I want to go to Italy if all Itallians are like this.
We went to bed at 6. Its hard to sleep that high, I woke up with my heart pounding and gasping for air, its a very disconcerning feeling! We started climbing at around 1 am by headlamp. The stars were out, it was totally calm, and we hit the glacier after about 20 minutes. We roped up and donned our crampons and ice axes and started the slow traverse to the top. There was a well definted trail for the first 2 hours or so but then it became less well defined as there had been some snow over the past few nights and the glacier was windblown; we started to have to look harder for the trail.
The snow glitter in the headlamps, and as you hike glacial walls and the contours of the volcano come out of the shadows as you approach. We could see the headlamps of the Italllians heading up behind us.
As we got higher I got sick to my stomach and had to stop to go to the bathroom twice on the way up, no easy task on a steep glacier with crampons and a harness. Ugh. Its menatlly tough to feel sick as the going is pretty hard. We walk slow, pace ourselves, and stop frequently to breathe.
We kept slowly climbing and eventually encountered an ice wall in front of us and crevases on either side, it looked possible to traverse past them but at this point the trail was far from obvious. We went back down a bit and waited for the Itallians and they weren´t to sure of the route either. We went back up and looked again; at this point the sun was rising so we had a better idea of our surroundings. The sun coming up on the volcano was simply beautiful, the glacier sculps such amazing formations as it moves down the mountain; there are huge walls, caves, ridges, crevases. Its a different world! We could see the peaks of other volcanoes including Ilinizas, pink in the sun.
As the route was not obvious we decided to not push it (we know that this is DEFINITELY not the environment to push anything, we played it super safe) and headed back down, exploring a little and debating a lot about where the route might have been. We all were a little dissappointed that we didn´t make it to the top (and in the inforamation we got about the ease of the routefinding!) but were all super psyched about the experience as a whole, it was so amazing! We made it back to the refugio at around 8, exhausted.
Our ride was picking us up at 10 (Mike had to catch a bus later that morning), so we packed up. The ranger (guarderia) at the refugio said we should try again, we explained that we couldn´t afford to stay another night up there and rent equipment for another day, and that we had to pay for part of the transportation back as that is what we had agreed to do with Mike, logistically its difficult to get around in the park. Of course Steven and I were both thinking about that possiblitiy, but left the refugio and headed down the steep trail to the car park to meet Francisco, accepting that we didn´t make it to the top but that we had a great experience.

Iliniza Norte!

Yesterday was a great day, we climbed Ilinizas Norte, a 16,800 ft peak! It was awesome!

It was a little bit in coming.... Steven ate some bad ceviche and that slowed us down for a couple of days due to the need to be close to a bathroom, then we thought we had transport from the hostle to the trailhead for $20 bucks only upon departure found out it was 50$ and had to bail on that. We biked on back roads, dirt and cobblestone to El Chuapi, the town closest to the trailhead. From there we found transport up for 8 bucks the next morning in a camionetta, a truck that locals uses for where busses dont go.
We had to help the driver pushstart the truck to get going in the morning, then halfway up we proceeded to stop at a farmers to get water for the radiator, then we couldnt make it up a muddy section due to the rear wheel drive despite several attemps. We backed out and took an alternate route and finally made it up to the trailhead.
The hiking was awesome. We had views of Cotopaxi to the east, a snow-covered volcano cone, and twin peaks ahead of us. We were both feeling the altitude at first, but after a couple of hours I guess we got used to it because the going got quite a bit easier. By the time we made it up to the snow we were moving pretty well, kickstepping and picking our route up the mountian. It was the first time for me hiking up a mountain through snow like this, it was surprising and cool how the snow keeps you on the steeper slopes and how you can pick your route up. (Steven kinda does this as he is the more expereinced one with this type of climbing)There was some scrambling around to get to the top, and we were there! It was such a great experience... we are so lucky to be able to do what we are doing.
On the way down we took a different route and "skiied" down a snow field making for a very fast descent. As it turns out it was too fast, I got a brutal headache that lasted for several hours; lesson learned to go slower with these altitudes. Hiked throught alpine flower fields and back to the trailhead where our camionetta was waiting, he was there an hour earlier than we told him!
We are in the park of Cotopaxi now and are going to attempt to climb it tomorrow with a Kiwi that we met that has some mountaineering experience. We got all our gear and will head up from the refuge at midnight and hope to make it to the summit (somewhere around 19,000 I think) by dawn. Im super psyched!

Life in Granny Gear!

A few more words on volunteering..it was interesting on many fronts. The reserve definitely does good work; the focus in on conservation and reforestation of the canopy to preserve important trees as well as habitat for the endangered Andean speckled bear. In addition to the reserve land they have an organic garden, a tree nursery, and a worm garden (we spent a day working with the worms), and they spend some time higher up in the forest looking for bear signs and collecting poop that gets sent to the states for analysis.
There is one guy, Milton, who lives near the reserve (we made the 20 min walk down to his house for lunch daily) and pretty much runs the show. He works with the volunteers and does all the work with the help of one hired guy. His wife cooks for the volunteers. By Ecuadorian standards, the volunteers pay a lot of money to be able to live and work there and get three meals a day. The thing is, it doesn't seem like much of the money at all goes to Milton and his family or the worker or to putting money back into projects at the reserve, most seems to go to the owner who lives in Quito. Seems this happens with a lot of the reserves and volunteer places down here.

Good work still happens due to Milton's committment, but it’s unfortunate that the community and the reserve don't benefit more. Another interesting thing is all the water from the showers, dishes, ect go straight into the river. It’s this way everywhere, but was still shocking to find it at a reserve! There is no connection at all for folks here that this might be a bad thing in the long run, its been this way and they haven't seen any bad effects. Some of the local artesians do make natural soap but this is marketed only for tourists and too expensive for the locals to buy. So much potential, but pretty much impossible to change in two weeks. There are also the all to common issues with mining wanting to come into this pristine area, some people want it for the jobs. There is a ton of poverty in the area, but everyone has a garden and a water source, no one is hungry. The mining would provide short term income but destroy some of the natural resources that allow them to sustain themselves despite the poverty.... there are some in the community that are trying to provide education about this.
It was a good experience, we learned a ton and spent our time surrounded by mountain lushness; got to play some volleyball (they take it very seriously here, it is s common as soccer in the parks and in the town square on market days is played usually for money there, big crowds come and watch), milk a cow, feed worms bamboo sawdust, hike to waterfalls, and ate a lot of popcorn (its a side dish with dinner here).

Granny gear
We had a short day when we left on the bikes as there are natural thermal pools a couple of hours outside of the reserve and we had to stop! Its such a luxury to sit in hot water and feel really clean for the first time on the trip, looking up a green mountainsides! Cush! We camped for free at a hospijade and the owner drew us a map of how to get where we wanted to go as our map was wrong. We were on dirt roads in pretty remote areas for the next three days, we did manage to get a little lost once but otherwise we made it!

Biking. Here. Is. Hard. There really aren't flat sections, or even rolling sections. You either go straight up, or straight down. We spent literally hours each day in granny gear pulling our 60 pound bikes up the dirt roads, and going down is actually tough as well as the bikes are hard to stop if they get to much speed! I don't have shocks and I'm much whimpier than Steven on the downhills anyways, he usually cruises and its fun to watch his Bob trailer catch air on the rocks as he flys down. As he is often in front of me I get to see the locals react to him and the trailer, everyone thinks it is much cooler than my panniers!
Though physically really tough it was great to be out in the cloud forest and in the countryside, crossing big rivers on little bridges, passing people working in their fields and occasionally navigating through a heard of cows. (for some reason they always make me nervous) We fall asleep soon after dark and get up with the sun, camp and cook on our stove, and look for bakeries whenever we pass a town.

We eventually made it to Mindo, a town with a tourist infrastructure as it is famous for its birds. Its a great little mountain town! We stayed in an awesome place that had an open air kitchen right on a river and a second story hammock deck. We were there 4 nights and paid 15 bucks total as Steven built the owner a table and we did some cleaning in exchange for the rent. It was sweet. We had time to recover from the biking, study spanish, hike to some waterfalls, and ride horses. Fantastic.
We had planned on biking south from Mindo but found out that the road on our map really isn't a road this time of year, it’s not passable during the rainy season (it rains every afternoon in that area). We had to come back through Quito to get where we wanted to go so used the busses again as we don't want to bike anywhere near this city. Tomorrow we hop on a bus to go 20k or so out of town and then will get back on the bikes and head down what has been dubbed the Avenue of the Volcanoes as we work our way south through the Andes.
We will be doing some hiking and climbing on the way, our first peak is over 16 thousand feet and we will be doing it partly to get ready for Chimbarazo, the highest peak in Ecuador and one that requires glacial travel and guides. Due to its proximity to the equator, it is the closest in the world to the sun. Kinda cool. We are really hoping to be able to climb it, apparently the glacial quality is affected by ash from some of the surrounding active volcanoes and if its too soft we can't go. We will be down there in three weeks or so.
Hope everyone is doing well, send us updates!

Alto Choco Bolsque Reserva

Internet is a touchy thing down here, patience! After spending my lunch money 3 times to try and finish the last post, I gave up. Finally here are some pictures from the spectacular Otavalo market. Streets were flooded with people and tents with vendors were everywhere. You could buy anything imaginable from fine hand crafts, pots and pans, rubber boots, chickens (dead or alive), and any pirated DVD you wanted. The size packages that people would carry to and from the market with all there stuff was simply amazing. These people were like ants carrying packages 3 times the size of their bodies, they are a strong people.


Alto Choco Reserve in the cloud forrest located 2 hours west of Otavalo. We volunteered here for 2 weeks. It was an amazing place to spend a couple weeks with really dense green forrests with some amazing trees and flowers and a loud river that created soothing background noise. We had no electricity so read and hungout at night by candle light. But much to our surprise, there were hot showers with an amazing view.

We did a variety of work; surprisingly enough I think I cut down more green plants with my machete than I planted. A huge part of the job for reforestation is clearing out all the fast growing more weedy plants (like bamboo, it grows at and incredible rate and takes over) so that the canopy trees have a chance to grow. Once those are established the undergrowth will take care of itself. We also worked in the graden doing simple tilling and making a rock path. We even partook in the 7:00 AM cow milking to get the milk for breakfast (well only once).

Oh Siesta!! What a great concept. We would stop work at 12 for a big old lunch and take a 2 hour siesta. It was really nice to have some chill time in the afternoon. Work was very physical and demanding but we were not overworked avaraging about 5 hours a day. So I decided to take up a part time job. Beer delivery. I biked down to the local town about 5 Km away picked up 2 cases of 22oz. bottles and returned to the resereve. I would sell them for 1 dollar and drink away all my profits. Ahh free Beer!

We really enjoyed our stay and volunteering but on to a 4 day bike journey to the town of Mindo! Still have not heard about when you guys and gals are coming to visit and travel with us. Come on, the weather is warm and the scenery amazing.

-Steven