South America

Saturday, January 20

Jungletrip around Tena

In the jungle

One night sleeping in the cabañas at Miss Piggy's place!

Rafting home on Rio Napo

Monday, January 15

Ecuador

After the beach followed a massive busride across the northern part of Peru straight into Loja, Ecuador. From Loja we continued in a 3.5hs helltrip (we think the driver was a formerFormula 1 driver, we called him Hoellen-Toni!!!!), instead of scheduled 5 hs, to Cuenca, where we stayed a night.

The next morning, theearly bird called and we took the first bus to Alausi. Alausi to Riobamba is the last stretch of the train between Guayaquil and Quito, that is operating.

We bought tickets and jumpedonthe ROOF (!!!!!!), the only spot where you can sitsince the coaches are all cargo cars. So we were sitting with our rucksacks on the top of a bouncing and shaking train and headed 3.5hs norths.

The train follows a valley with amazing views and arrived during sunset with a spectacular view onto the snowcapped vulcano Chimborazo (6310m).

Friday, January 12

New Guy on The Team!!!!....Papa Brosch!!!

Sven in the team!

On January 2nd, Papa Brosch a.k.a. Sven flew into Lima, Peru and will join us for three weeks. ........first stop Huaraz, trekking capital of Peru. We stayed at two different lodges run by 2 english brother Alex and Charlie Good. Unfortunately Papa brosch got pretty sick from high altitude, so Chris and Fu had to go mountain biking twice......and feed Papa Brosch with Cocatea all day long. (He tests positive for Cocain now for at least 4 weeks!!!!)

Mountainbiking from Alex' Lodge in Huaraz

Hiking and biking from Charlie's lodge in Yungay (Llanganuco)

Southpeak (in the clouds) of Peru's highest mountain (Huarazcan)

Bus ride from Yungay to Chimobote (die drei vollen Nasen!)

From Huaraz we took the bus through the Canon del Pato, a stunning canyon that is formed where the two major mountain ranges of the Andes in Peru, Cordillera Blanca and Cordillera Negra, merge together. The road goes along a river betweenthe ranges, on therightside of the street is a 500m vertical drop and on the left side the mountains rise, also vertically, for maybe 2000-3000 meters. Its pretty amazing.

... via Cañon del Pato

After this 6hs busride we arrivedin Chimbote at the coast, where we caught the next bus to Huanchaco for surfing nice pacific waves - three days at the beach, Papa Brosch burnedhis legs.....!!! So did Chris!

(Pics will come)

Lake Titicaca

We shared the time at Lake Titicaca with a couple from Germany (Nati and David), whom we met on the bus from La Paz to Copacabana, Bolivia. we spent there about 4 days, doing some small hikes and visiting two days Isla del Sol, in the bolivian part of the lake. Here some pictures.

(Soon)

Tuesday, December 12

It is all about the very next step!!!

Huyana Potosí

It was a clear and sunny morning in when Juan, our guide, picked us up at 7.30am from our hotel. We were packed for three days and more or less sufficiently equipped.

La Paz

To complete our gear we first went to Juan's house on the hill overlooking the city of La Paz. After we had picked up ice picks, sleeping bags, thermal rests, gloves, harness etc we kept on going north towards the base camp which we is about 14km north of the city. On the road we passed two check points where we registered as climbers out on the mountain for the next three days. We drove down a lovely valley with a nice first impression of the mountain we were going to tackle: Huyana Potosí, with a altitude of 6088m above sea level.

Huyana Potosí (6088m)

It took as about 1.5hours to reach the base camp at an altitude of 4700m above sea level. once we got there we had the our first meal basically consisting of carbohydrates and proteins to get enough energy for our first ice climb training in our life. At about 11am we left the camp and headed for the 'Old Glacier'. We crossed a little dam and followed a stream continuously climbing until a we reached the little lake below the glacier. We put on crampons and harness at at the beginning of the glacier (4900m) to climb into it. Juan showed us a couple techniques how to get up and down steep walls.

Chris climbing the wall

Climbing even these relatively small walls was really exhausting and we realized the thin air immediately. Still, with sufficient breaks we managed all the exercises quite well and hiked down after approx. two hours in the ice.

Fu climbing the wall

At the base camp we realized how tired we were; Chris became quite sick, Fu did a better job on the altitude. We relaxed and tried to recover in the afternoon sun, with Cocatea and sugary water with a taste of coffee. We head dinner at 4pm and went to sleep at 5.30pm, completely shattered. Still, breathing was a task that required some concentration and despite falling asleep we suffered from altitude sickness the whole night: headache and slight stomach problems screwed our night.
The following morning we got up, still groggy. After forcing food into our system we left for the Campo Alto (Altitude Camp, 5200m). It was a steep climb and took us about 3hours: while Fu was alomst passing out guide Juan, Chris still fought with the sickness and took his own pace to get to the camp, which you can spot on the rocky top in the foreground (middle of picture).

Campo Alto and the last 800m to the summit

We head some sandwiches there before we went to sleep at about 3pm. After three ours sleep we were woken up by Juan to be fed again with pasta and soup. At this point we were fully acclimatized and did not have any symptoms of altitude sickness anymore. Still, also up here and despite our good condition, breathing was the key not to feel bad again due to the lack of oxygen. After dinner, we went to bed again to rest some more. It became slowly colder and colder up there and at 11pm we got up to get ready for the summit.....

It was hard to get up. Every move, even just dressing and putting on shoes was exhausting and made us panting. We forced two cups of Cocatea in our stomachs and left the cabin for the glacier. A short hike down the rocks and we put on our crampons and secured us on the rope.
Juan was leading us for about 20min steep up the ice before we had the first rest. From there we climbed continuously along the glacier up to the 'Campo Argentino' at 5500m. There we had the second rest, trying to catch breath. It was a hard piece of concentration.....inhale, step, exhale, inhale, step, exhale.....on and on. After the 'Campo Argentino' we headed straight up to the ice walls at 5660m. Since we were moving very slowly, the cold added to the tiredness. Right underneath the ice wall at 5660m, we secured ourselves with the ice picks while Juan climbed the 40m wall to put the rope in place. Slowly, we followed him a almost vertical wall up to 5700m. We reached the ridge at the top of the wall completely exhausted. Breathing was so hard that we just rested propped on our ice picks in the snow.

Turning around at 5700m

Even after 10mins our pulse and breathing did not slow down and we decided: safety first! We gave up on the summit and turned around. The wall down was a challenge and 1.5hs later we reached the bottom of the glacier: we have never been so exhausted.

Chris hiking out

We fell onto our mattresses and had a couple of hours of sleep before we left the Campo Alto to hike down to the Base Camp. Juan's father Miguel was waiting there to pick us up and drove us back to La Paz.

Fu hiking down the end moraine of the 'Old Glacier'

It was a experience we will never forget. Afterwards we realized, that the decision to turn around was right since we might have made it a bit further up, but the way down would have become even harder. We reached our limits, that's for sure. Next time we will do it and beat the mountain!!!!
There are a couple of summits over 6000m in Peru waiting for us........

Salar de Uyuni

The tour through the Salar de Uyuni and the desert (South-West Bolivia, up to 5000m)

Here just a few impressions of the incredible and bizarre landscape of the desert and the salt plains in Bolivia. We did a three day tour in a jeep with one American and three Brits joining our group. Enjoy!