PATAGONIA
Dyslexic
ramblings, stories, and misadventures of a virgin trip
November
22 2012 – February 21 2013
I limped
my way to a connecting flight in Newark New Jersey, I could barely walk. An old Achilles injury was inflamed, a
combination of a 14 day crush fest in Indian creek, then 4 solid days driving
back to New Brunswick , had left it swollen and nearly immobile. So with fears,
doubts, and a million unknowns racing through my head I reluctantly boarded my
third flight, and 11 hour jaunt down to Buenos Aries. I flew to El Calafate the
following day, connecting through the beautiful lake-side town of Bariloche. As
I flew south along the range, the towers and spires of Frey danced by each other,
backed by snow caped volcanoes. There I stood on the dusty, windswept streets
of El Chalten, in a place I’d only dreamed of, and I was nervous. Shouldering
my nearly 70 kg of gear I limped my way the few long blocks to the camping near
the center of town. Alone, cold, and
sitting in my wind battered tent I couldn’t help but think; what decisions have
I made in life that have resulted in this moment? What am I doing here? And how
will I look back on these next few months?
Chalten
Massif
November
23 2012 – January 5 2013
Cerro
Standhardt Attempt
An old climbing partner from a
previous Peruvian alpine rock trip had come down to join me for the first
couple weeks. We were motivated, and after a short few days a weather window
appeared, so we packed up, and hiked into Niponino base. Our objective was the
ultra classic Exocet 500m WI5 5+, an intimidating ice and mixed line up Cerro
Standhardt. We quickly learned that mostly everyone in the range was attempting
Exocet the following day. Without rock shoes, or much of a rock rack our
options were severely limited, so we reluctantly decided to wait out the
following day and go for the route the day after, this meant stretching out our
meager supply of food for an extra day.
After an early start, and
nearly 1000 vertical meters of snow and glacier travel, we stood at the Col
Standhardt. Freezing Patagonian gusts blasted us as they raced their way across
the southern ice sheet; we looked up at the first pitch, at the nonexistent ice
smear that should have been there.
“Your Block” Andie said
“fuck” I thought.
Mixed climbing soon turned in
to bare hands, and skidding crampons, I worked my way slowly up. Small crimp to
small crimp, crampon smear to crampon smear, and the 5.10 thin face slowly fell
below me. That pitch was the hardest of its type I had ever led. With frozen
hands and adrenalin rushing I brought Andrie up off a micro cam anchor. We made
good time simul-climbing across easy snow and 5.6 rock to the base of the real
ice business, 4 long pitches of WI 4 -5+. The morning’s bitter cold had given way
to warmth, and that was bad. I worked
my way up the narrow smear of ice tucked deep within the Exocte chimney. Freezing water poured down my sleeves, through
my Gortex coat, and out the zipper of my pants. After a full 60 meters of soft
wi5++ I made an anchor at a couple melted out v-threads and brought Andrie up,
we only had 2 pitches left till the sunny, dry ridge. He congratulated me on
the proud lead, and then quickly stated that he was going down. I was
disappointed, but also shivering so I reluctantly agreed. Fortune was upon us and despite the countless
Patagonian death raps, we were eventually brought back to the soft
glacier...
To celebrate I promptly fell
into a massive crevasse when a snow bridge collapsed, my first full hanger
crevasse fall. Luckily I climbed my way out. Andrie outweighed me by about 100
pounds, so he was on the uphill end of the rope. A bridge collapsed on him shortly after, I
dropped to my stomach in full arrest position, and was dragged 10 feet up hill
before coming to a stop. We eventually made
it safely back to our bivy, and worked on drying gear. I woke up early in the
morning, ate all that remained of my food, a handful of peanuts, and motivated
by hunger, hiked quickly back to the amenities of El Chalten.
Aguja Guillaumet - Brenner Moschioni – 450m, 6B
A few rest days later a
potential weather window appeared on NOAA, we decided to shoot for the classic
mixed route Whillans Cochrane on Aguja Poincenot. Andri and I hiked through the
rain towards Passo Superior, eventually finding our way around the lake in the
near whiteout, foggy, and wet conditions. I broke a deep trail up the snow
slope, faintly following footprints in the low visibility conditions. Andrie
grew uncomfortable as we crossed slush avalanche debris, he decided to head
down. After we parted ways, I was confident I was on the right track and
continued slowly wading up the snow slope. Not knowing how much further the
high camp was, I laid my bivy bag down at a flattish spot, only a couple feet
from a 300 foot cliff. Snow fell through the night. I woke up at 3am and
checked the weather, still heavy snow. So at 10 am and with over a foot of snow
covering my bivy bag, I admitted defeat, packed up and started down.
Two hours in I met up with an
English climber James Monypenny, with a beautiful Norwegian blond in tow, the
weather forecast had changed, and we had one more day to send. I joined them
and hiked back up what I had just descended.
James and Ragnhild hadn’t seen each other in a while. His light and
mostly see-through alpine tent shook, as 2 elite French climbers giggled like
12 year old girls, and took video footage.
We made quick time on the hard
glacier in the morning. James led up a new variation to get us onto the Brenner
Moschioni, 450m 6b. We climbed beautiful
golden granite reminiscent of the High Sierras, and the sun slowly warmed the
rock. I hadn’t brought rock shoes,
expecting to be mixed climbing, that made the crux 6b crack pitch a real
workout. Our packs were stupid heavy, our strategy poor, but we had bagged our
first Patagonian summit.
Ragnhild wanted to get a naked
summit shot, and of course James and I agreed completely. The picture I took
found its way onto UKClimbing, causing international controversy, and quickly
made photo of the week. A slew of similar shots followed, including one of me
on the west face of Cerro Torre. That first picture of Ragnhild titled ``Fitz
Roy Dreaming`` went viral, and somehow found its way onto German climbing
magazine.
A lazy morning, and an eleven
am start back down turned out to be a poor decision. Snow conditions were soft
and I often sank up to my chest. A 1000 food glissade made short work of the
steeper section. Being Canadian, and confident on frozen lakes, I decided Lago
de los Tres would be safe to cross. One hundred feet out and I was sinking past
my boots in the slush, some sections went past my knees. Over 50 trekkers
watched me plod through the slush. I poured my boots out on shore, changed into
my runners, and wondered why everyone was looking at me weird, as it turned out
the entire crouch was ripped out of my Gortex pants...oh well.
Rain,
Wind, and Patience
Twelve days of continuous storms
battered the range, plastering the entire massive
in rime. The days blended together. I fixed gear, read, spent time being
frustrated by the amazingly slow internet, bouldered, and sometimes got a sport
pitch in between rain showers. We did have one particularly memorable night though.
For no apparent reason James, Ragnhild,
Pete, and I got good and proper Irish drunk. We made our way to a dance club in
pouring rain and 80 kph gusts. James was trying really hard to pick up some
local girls, despite the fact that I had mostly ripped his pants off him
earlier in the evening. He was also
casually reaching behind himself, grabbing an empty beer mug, and discretely
filling it with puke, before resuming conversation with the poor girls. Pete and I tried exceedingly hard to master a
Shakespearian style dance that all the locals inexplicitly knew. It turned out that it was some kind of
Argentinean national dance; I guess that explains why they seemed to take
offence to our dancing. Needless to say, we weren’t allowed back into that club
for awhile.
Aguja
Poincenot - Whillans Cochrane - 550M, 70 degrees, M4, 5+
I somehow found myself with
more climbing partners than I could possibly climb with, but with the massive
amounts of recent snow fall I figured a large group would be needed to break a
trail. NOAA showed us a glimmer of hope in the weather. So as 5 climbers, representing 4
nationalities, and one beautiful German base camp goddess, we once again hiked
the 6 hours up to Passo Superior, myself somehow falling into the role as
leader. The trail breaking up to high camp wasn’t as bad as I expected, and we
quickly set up camp. James not wanting
to get his boots wet did the entire approach in sandals, using garbage bags for
the 2 hours of snow travel. I was slightly better off in my running shoes.
An early morning start despite
the poor conditions, and we worked our way up the glacier. Good snow conditions
soon turned into a waist deep slog-fest, alternating trail breaking, we all did
our part working toward, or what we thought was towards, Aguja Poincenot. After 5
hours of work, on what should normally be a one hour approach, we decided to
wait and see if visibility would improve. We packed 5 men into a 2 man bivy shelter,
sat on our packs, and ate 1kg of Dulce De Leche. An hour later, with no sign of improvement we
bailed back down our twisty hard earned trail to Passo Superior. Patience is a lesion quickly learned in
Patagonia.
Three AM the following
morning we were greeted with the Southern Cross, an upside-down Orion, and a
cloudless windless night. Quick progress up our convoluted trail, a short hour
of final trail breaking, and I was soon running it out up the initial 70 degree
ice of the Whillans Cochran snow ramp.
We had only brought 3 ice screws.
I led through a couple difficult, and quickly melting slabby mixed
pitches, then handed over the leading to James. Climbing as 2 separate teams we
all worked our way up the snowy, icy, and complex terrain; James was making
quick work in the Scottish conditions. Our ropes froze solid, forcing us to hip
belay for the final 300 meters of rock. Belays were questionable at best. “My”
5 man team stood on the very pointy summit, clouds swirled around us, patience had
payed off in the end.
Cerro
Torre Dream – Ragni Route - 600M, 90 degrees, M4
NOAA showed us a dream weather
window, potentially the best of the season.
But as the days approached our 7 day super window slowly shrunk down to
only 3. We were questioning our route choice, if we went for it, it would have
to a sprint with little room for mistakes.
James Moneypenny, Max Fisher, and I decided to push for a dream. Going light; we hoped to cover over 80 km,
and 2700 meters of vertical, to reach one of the world’s most difficult
summits. Cerro Torre was calling, and I
couldn’t resist.
So as the sun rose on another
wet and windy day, we started the approach to the west face via Passo Marconi,
accompanied by the German and Italian as on Poincenot, our blond German base
camp babe, and a token trekker hoping to traverse the ice field. We were super
light; having only 2 sleeping bags, one 2 man tent, and one sleeping pad
between the 3 of us. Twelve hours of hiking on day one and the world’s third
largest non-polar ice cap stretched in front of me, an absolutely breathtaking
sight.
Spirits were high on day 2, and Max’s
pace was restless. Our snowshoes crunched into the icy crust as we worked
towards Cerro Torre. We barley slowed, stashing our snowshoes, plotting their
position, and starting up the approach snow slopes. A couple easy mixed pitches and we reached
our planned bivy.
Spirits were high on day 2, and Max’s
pace was restless. Our snowshoes crunched into the icy crust as we worked
towards Cerro Torre. We barley slowed, stashing our snowshoes, plotting their
position, and starting up the approach snow slopes. A couple easy mixed pitches and we reached
our planned bivy.
We made melted water, and
discussed strategy. The young German big man Chris was wasted. James, Max, and
I were worried about the weather window holding, and decided to push as far up
the route as we could. This left Luca,
Chris’ partner, in a hard spot. So as a
party of 4 we started up the west face of Cerro Torre. In full white-out conditions
I lead up 70 degree mushroom ice, trailing 3 partners. We set up camp on a flat section of rime
mushroom just bellow El Elmo, 16 hours pushing fast had beaten us up. We were excited for the summit push
tomorrow, but the Patagonian gods had different plans for James. He was up all night with an upset stomach,
and difficulty decided not to attempt the face.
Three am Christmas day, Max
led us through the 80 degree mushroom ice tunnels to the top of El Elmo. A golden sun rose to the east, setting fire
to clouds obscuring all but the tallest portions of the range. Luca started up
the mixed middle pitches of the west face, as I shivered and stomped my feet in
a useless attempt to stay warm. We were making good progress. I took over the
lead. With Jon Walsh, and 7 others
around in different parties, we climbed up the WI 5 headwall, ice flew. A
couple spectacular mushroom pitches latter Max, Luca, and I stood at the base
of Cerro Torre’s infamous final mushroom pitch.
Conditions were amazing, some of the best in history, with reasonable
solid ice and a natural tunnel through the rime.
I lead the final pitch, as Sean
Villanueva played “I wish you a merry Christmas” on a steel flute. Strong
updrafts blasted razor sharp ice crystals into my face every kick, to my left
Cerro Torres south face dropped impossibly far to the glacier below. I was
confident, felt truly in my element, stemming, and hooking up the strange
mushroom half pipe. We were lucky; the ice was solid enough to hold screws,
although no one was confident enough to test if they would hold a fall. We
stood on the summit, jagged granite peaks and towers floated on a sea of
swirling clouds, a dream had been reached. Max and I were the second, and
third, Canadians to have stood on Cerro Torres summit without the use of Cesare Maestri's bolts, Jon Walsh was the first
20 minutes earlier.
22 hours after that 3am wakeup
we stumbled along in snowshoes on the ice sheet, somehow still moving forward. Mercifully
we stopped and set up the tent. I gave
James my sleeping bag. Wrapped in 4 down coats, with a backpack sleeping pad,
and mountaineering boot pillow I passed out for 6 hours of uninterrupted sleep.
With frozen feet in soaked boots, and a handful of nuts for breakfast we
started the 30 km grind back to town. I walked for over half an hour with my
eyes completely closed, listening to the crunch of James and Max’s snowshoes on
the hard glacier crust. 16 hours slowly passed, we were all wasted, but moving
well, and eventually stood in town with a beer in on hand, and food in the
other. Our trekker friend returned a day
latter with tales of crevasses, river crossings, and difficult route finding.
Rescue
and Friendship on Fitz Roy
Only a short three days after
our return from Cerro Torre and another window showed up on NOAA. After a quick discussion with Patagonia’s
leading expert Rolo Garibotti; Max, James, and I decided to go for the ultra
classic 1600m Supercanaleta up Fitz Roy’s far side. My left Achilles tendon had
been creaking quite loudly since our return form Cerro Torre, but was feeling a
lot better. The swelling was down and the creaking had nearly stopped by the
time we once again started hiking into Piedra del Fraile. But after 1000m of
vertical gain it became apparent that Fitz Roy wasn’t in my immediate
future. James and Max were looking
strong. It was my turn to make the right
call, so I handed them the gear and food I was carrying, wished them luck, and
limped back down hill. A nice family of 8 in a 5 passenger car gave me a ride
back to town.
As my friends worked their way
up Fitz Roy, I partied new years away in El Chalten with good friends and
pretty trekker girls. I slept in the sun
New Year’s Day, the blond German goddess Leo passed out on my lap. I wasn’t
climbing but life was still pretty good. Nine o’clock PM, we got word in town that
all was not well in the back of Fitz Roy, Max had somehow broken his leg. We didn’t know how, or how bad, all we knew
was that we had to get him out - fast.
In classic Patagonian fashion the weather window was rapidly slamming
shut. We quickly formulated a plan, and
built up teams with the selfless members of Chalten’s volunteer rescue team,
and strangers willing to do anything to help.
It was amazing to see how the community came together to get one of
their own out.
Two a.m. and we were already
hiking in to Piedra del Fraile, worries of my Achilles were put far out of my
head. Patagonian snake winds blasted the
peaks around us, the gusts sounded like jumbo jets taking off. We stopped at Piedra del Fraile to get some
more information from James, he was utterly wasted. The winds would often flatter us to the ground
as we hiked up over 1000m to the pass. We scrambled over the pass, and got
blasted by over 100kph winds. The team descended 600m, and walked across the
glacier towards the base of the Supercanaleta, often jumping crevasses; this
wasn’t going to be a North American style rescue. We found Max’s tattered tent,
there were 4 people crammed into the light 2 man tent. Two climbers had come over the previous day
when James passed them on his way out. There was also a wasted and
inexperienced Japanese climber with them who had joined Max and James on the
climb. The decision to let him join them was probably not the best call and
slowed them down dramatically; they had been 26 hours on the peak.
Max had broken his Tibia
sliding down the final 50 feet of snow, his crampon point got caught. After 26
hours of difficult pitches and dangerous rappels it was the final 10 minutes
that got him.
We hauled Max across the
glacier then up the 300m snow slope.
With several climbing ropes tied together we would walk or sometimes
crawl downhill, pulling him. It was an
exhausting process and all the help was greatly appreciated. The team reached
the col, and anchoring Max off a boulder we carefully lowered him down 80
degree choss. Rocks tumbled. A quick lower down snow and we reached the
second team with a solid stretcher. 2 men carried as the stretcher was lowered
pitch, after pitch, down 1000m of steep tallus, moss, and mud. 20 hours after we started Max was safe in El
Chalten, it had been the most remote successful Patagonian rescue to date. We
partied hard that night, celebrating our success; I went over 50 hours without
sleep.
Escape
from El Chalten
The weather was looking bad
for at least 2 weeks, and we were getting ready for a change. Chalten was starting to wear me down; I just
wanted to be warm and dry for a change.
James and Pete felt the same. At 4 am in lashing rain we packed up
our tents and gear. By 6 am we were cruising north on a 26 hour bus ride to
Bariloche.
Bariloche
January
6 2013 – January 21 2013
Twenty six hours ebbed and flowed by, as the
beautiful scenery passed us by. I was
surprised when we arrived in Bariloche, over a day in a South American bus had
actually been an enjoyable experience. Cab drivers refused to pick us up, and
for good reason; between the 4 of us we had over 200kg of gear. Eventually a
local in a truck gave us a ride into town.
A night in an overpriced hosted worked out well, we convinced a couple
of blond Coloradan girls to come join us in Frey. The following evening James, Pete, and I
hiked 10 km up to Frey with insanely heavy packs, 3 weeks of food, and a
paraglider.
The weeks in Frey were a
welcome vacation from Chalten. Hard
climbing was put on the back burner. We guided beautiful girls up easy
multi-pitch rock routes, lending them our gear, and often leading without
harnesses or shoes. At night we wrapped
up in sleeping bags, and searched the sky for shooting stars. Mornings normally involved a swim in the
perfect alpine lake, then a couple hours passed out in the hot sun. We returned to town once to party Pete home,
re-supply food, and pick up a few more blond base camp babes. James and I did manage
one true day of climbing, linking up several hard routes on the golden, and
pocketed north face of The Slovenian Tower. The climbs were some of best
cragging style lines I had ever done.
In true Patagonian fashion we
once again packed up in rain and blasting winds, and hiked into town. Frey had
been very good to us, but the 3000 foot walls of Cochamo were calling. I left
two thousand dollars of mountaineering gear at Alex’s house. Without checking
the weather forecast for the infamously rainy Cochamo Valley, James and I
boarded a bus to Puerto Montt, Chile.
Cochamo
January
22 2013 – February 11 2013
James and I had already spent
a couple days more than we had intended in the rundown, and generally
depressing, seaside town of Puerto Montt.
Our delay was partly due to girls, and partly due to a needed visit to
the hospital... I’ll leave it at that.
We pilled food into a shopping cart until the general mass looked to be
20 days worth of food, we were actually fairly accurate, and jumped onto a 2
dollar, 5 hour, bus ride to Cochamo.
Neither of us really knew
where were going. I started asking the locals in the only two words I knew,
“Cochamo...Escalada?”
We did manage to get off at
the right spot. James and I pilled our
gear and food, including 30 lbs of produce, on the side of the road. Conveniently a young attractive girl showed
up shortly, and after inadequately conversing with her for several minutes, we
loaded 200 pounds of gear into her small two door car. Having absolutely zero
room for passengers, we stood watching the damaged, and incredibly over loaded
car, speed up the washed out dirt track, hoping that hadn’t just loaded all or
our positions into a thief’s car. James
and I started walking into the valley, following the tiny car, and after what
turned out to be eight kilometers we arrived at the trail head, and the car. We arranged a horse for 9 am the following
day. Two pm the following day our horse
showed up, and we hiked the deeply rutted 10km track into the Cochamo Valley.
The ruts would often reach over 8 feet deep, and were filled with thick jungle
mud.
Trinidad
Valley
Within three hours of arriving
at La Junta, we had set up camp, eaten and were running up to the Trinidad bivy
boulder. The weather was splitter, there
was no way we were missing this weather window.
I had taken pictures of some of the classic and intriguing hand drawn
topos in the refugio. We were psyched racing the coming night through the dense
jungle, jumping from log, to stump, to tree like a 90’s Mario Brothers character. The night won. At the proper alpine time of 11am, and with
the skepticism of cochamo veterans we took off for our first route, the 11
pitch E Z Does It. After some scrambling, a lot of simul-climbing, and your
standard 1000m choss gully descent we returned to the bivy with hours to spare.
The next day we climbed No Hay Hoyes, a beautiful 6 pitch 5.11 on Gorila. We swapped leads up beautiful corners and
steep cracks. We failed to find the
start of our intended climb the followind day, and decided on a rest day,
hiking 8 hours down to La Junta and back on a food re-supply mission.
I looked over to James, “one
rope?”
“Sure” he said.
I love committing to climbs.
I lead the first block of pitches up the ultra
classic, 3000 foot, Bienvenidos a mi Insomnio, a 5.11a free route up Trinidad.
I broke through the clouds after an enduro 5.11 butt-crack-flare pitch. A
floating sea of white filled all the valleys below us. The sun blazed in a blue
bird sky above. James led the crux slab traverse, a full pitch of delicate
slab, and thin face moves. I followed, nearly falling, and shredded a few
fingertips in the process. We raced up
the final thousand feet of 5.10 terrain, blood dripping, and feet screaming in
protest. James and I had sent Cochamo’s longest free route in under 8 hours.
(photos are a selection of mine, Max Fisher's, and James Monypenny's)
Our finger tips forced us into
a rest day. We spent the day being slowly driven insane by the swarming horse
flies, but eventually mastered the art of caching them, and feeding them to the
many multi-colored lizards. If you sat very still the lizards would sit on your
shoulders, forming a reptilian force field, eating flies as the swarmed your
face.
Las Manos Del Dia, - 5.11+,
1800 feet, is a climb for a true master of 5.11 terrain. It consists of 7 pitches of 5.11, including
thin face, slab, friction corners, laybacking, and splitter cracks form fingers
to endurance offwidths. The easy pitches
are still 5.10. It is a classic described as being better, and more difficult
than Astroman. I was keen, and James was game.
James lost rock paper scissors
so he started up the thin face of the first pitch, 5.11 of course. I followed and we started swapping leads
upwards. The climbing was hard and always
right at my limit. 5.11 pitches flowed
by as skin shredded off my body. Cursing into the wind I nearly lost it on the
final pitch, blood soaked the thin holds, and I was 10 feet from the top. With
a grunt and desperate stab I made it to the top. Eighteen hundred feet of climbing had worked
me to the bone. It was the most demanding free climb I had ever done.
La
Anfiteatro
We spent a rest day back at La
Junta, flirting with beautiful South American girls, and sliding down the sick
100 foot natural granite waterslides. But the weather was still holding, so we
packed up 5 days of food and hiked. Most of the climbers in Cohamo were in La
Anfiteatro, we enjoyed the company. We
blasted up a 14 pitch, 5.11a route called Excelent the next day. It was average
at best, but we were warmed up for our main goal; Al Centro Y Adentro, 5.11c,
1500 feet, and sustained.
It was 30 degrees Celsius,
James and I stumbled up the steep boulders towards the base of Al Centro, and
we were paying for our late start with every blazing step. James found a
glorious cool cave with a waterfall near the base. We chugged as much water as
we could, I was seeing stars, and was probably approaching heat stroke. At high noon James started up, linking the
first two pitches. I double arm-bared up a 5.11, Bombay chimney on pitch 3. We
swapped upwards, climbing stunning flakes, coners, face, and cracks. I even
managed to free the arête laybacking on the crux pitch. Twelve foot long, Andean Condors swopped mere
inches from us as we neared the top of the climb. I topped out with a dyno, another world class
route beneath us. We rappelled, and made it back to the bivy just as the sun
set. A skin growing rest day followed.
I was keen on a climb called;
Flakes of Wrath 5.11+. It is a rarely
climbed route high above the valley, and includes endurance laybacking, and
run-out slab climbing on beautiful clean white granite.
We simul-climbed up a twelve
pitch “approach” climb of poor quality, one 5.10+ pitch providing the only real
interest. It was five pm by the time we stood at the base of Flakes. In
hindsight our 10 am wakeup probably should have been a bit earlier. I started
up the second pitch, a manly, scary looking pitch of curving granite. The corner widened from fists to
unprotectable offwidth, resulting in a climb or fly scenario on 5.11+ terrain.
I was out of chalk, the sun was low, and I didn’t have a number six cam, but
started up the pitch, bumping cams with me up the fist crack. I pulled my foot
out of the crack, it felt strange, looking down I realized that my shoe was
done. There was a 4 inch tear in the side rand on my old, triple re-soled shoe,
and the entire sole was ripping off.
That was the final straw, we bailed, a climb to go back for next trip.
Twenty days was nearly done,
our food had dwindled down to scraps, and the rains came. We hadn’t seen a drop
of rain in nearly 3 weeks, an unheard of event. James and I had climbed the
hardest, longest free climbs of our lives. We spent a day sitting under a tarp
in the pouring rain, exchanging stories misadventure with new friends, and deep
frying all the food we had left; onion-rings, snickers bars, cookies, donuts,
garlic, and whatever else was laying around.
Cochamo is an amazing place, filled with amazing people, and some of the
world’s best granite. A future trip is in the works.
Time
to go home
I said good bye to James, and
wandered the dirty streets of Puerto Montt with all my gear, looking for a
hostel for the night. A couple Spanish phone calls went down, I was given an
address and a name, and went to find what I thought was a hostel. I found
myself knocking on a door to a house, an old shirtless man answered the door, I
said the name of the women I was given.
Eventually a lady came out, and she walked me 12 blocks uphill to the
most rundown hostel I’d ever seen.
Everything worked out, and I jumped the early morning bus back to
Argentina.
I knocked on the door to
Alex’s house, and was greeted by good friends.
The summer in the south was coming to an end, and rains settled in for
most of my final week. A couple friends
from Cochamo ended up crashing at Alex’s, along with a fun Swedish guy. We partied hard till the sun rose, got a few
pitches of steep limestone sport climbing in between hangovers, then partied
some more. All the while the rains came
down hard. The week flew by in a blur of
night clubs, skinny dipping, and blurry mornings, and I was once again boarding
a bus to start the 60 hour trip home.
Patagonia had been good to me.
