patagonia

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.

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.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=torE11ndR0E&noredirect=1

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.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXUTAzEEtNI&list=UUiesV_bFm23J45u34gAqFFg

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.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iT3CIhftp4k&feature=c4-overview&list=UUiesV_bFm23J45u34gAqFFg

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.

 

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.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CLX56yyXYIg&list=UUiesV_bFm23J45u34gAqFFg

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.

 (photos are a selection of mine, Max Fisher's, and James Monypenny's)