Pico de Orizaba Climb

Dec. 1 - 6, 1998

Tuesday, Dec. 1

I arrived in Mexico City at 1:30PM, caught an airport taxi to Hotel Aristos in the Zona Rosa District, checked in and got settled in the room. My roommate had arrived but was out sightseeing at the time. The hotel was very nice with a nice restaurant with reasonable prices. Our room was on the 12th floor and had a nice view looking down the Paseo de la Reforma with its park-like strips along both sides of the street and large statues every 2-3 blocks. I took a walk around the Zone Rosa area. There were many "swanky" shops and restaurants with statues on many of the street corners. When I got back to my room, I met my roommate, John Potter, a judge from Louisville, KY. He has climbed Mt. Rainier and Mt. Kilaminjaro. The climbing team met in the hotel lobby at 8:00PM. Chris Keen, the lead guide, and Ben Marshall, the assistant guide, covered the itinerary and logistics of the trip. Other members of the team included Lee Nelson, Keith Goodwin, Gary Iverson and Bernie Friel, all from the Minneapolis-St. Paul area, Dave Jansen from Boulder, CO, and John. After the meeting most of us went to a great restaurant just around the corner from the hotel. The food was very good, and the entertainment included Mexican music, singing and dancing.

Wednesday, Dec. 2

We met at 7:00AM and had breakfast at the hotel. The bus, affectionately referred to as the traveling base camp, picked us up at 8:30AM. We left Mexico City and traveled to the town of Huamantla. It is a quaint little town with no other "white" people and no one that we found that could speak English. Our team really stuck out. We did some shopping in the town market place. The market was spread around 2 square blocks. There was every kind of food you could think of, including chickens with their heads still on. As an example of the prices, you could buy 1 kilo (2.2 lbs.) of carrots for 15 pesos (approximately 1.5 cents). We bought bottled water for ourselves, and Chris and Ben bought food for dinner. We met at a restaurant called Los Balcones to have lunch. It was a very nice place with many wall murals and balconies. The waitresses did not speak English, so we struggled with ordering using our limited Spanish. The food was very good and reasonably priced.

We then traveled to the high altitude training site of the Mexican Olympic Team at 10,000' on La Malinche (14,636'). We stayed in cozy cabanas with fireplaces and full kitchens. After we settled in, we took an acclimatization hike to about 11,800.' When we got back to the cabanas, Ben and Chris started dinner. Ben made the best salsa sauce I have ever had, and Chris cooked chorizo sausages in the fireplace. The salsa and chorizo sausages were added to a tortilla with tomatoes, peppers, etc. for a terrific taco. We also had fruit and hot drinks.

Thursday, Dec. 3

We got up at 6:30AM, had oatmeal and chorizo sausage for breakfast and took another hike to around 11,200 ft. When we got back to the cabana, we showered (this was our last chance until Saturday), packed up, and boarded the bus. We drove to the town of Tlachichuca (8700 ft.) near the base of Pico de Orizaba. We dropped off our stuff at Senor Reyes' compound and relaxed a little. Ben and Chris went shopping for today's lunch and lunch and dinner for the next two nights on the mountain. The town was getting ready for a celebration and was setting up a carnival in the town square. The church at the head of the square was white with dark blue trim. It was beautiful and large, taking up one whole block. After having a buffet lunch, we loaded up our mountaineering gear on a Dodge truck and got into an old Dodge Power Wagon (vintage 1950's or 60's) for the ride to Piedra Grande base camp at 13,800 ft. It was a 14 mile (5,300 ft. of elevation gain), 2 hour ride that was both bone-jarring and very scenic. It's been described as "class 6 with a two-wheel-drive vehicle." We passed through corn and potato fields with the mountain in full view. Then we drove through pine forests. We passed the village of Hidaldo, which is considered the highest village in North America (11,155 ft.). This is where our camp guard Carlos was from. He guarded our camp when we were on the mountain. We saw many burros and burro-drawn carts. When we got to Piedra Grande, we set up our camp (4 3-man tents) and kitchen area. We had a macaroni and cheese/chili combination dinner, started a bonfire, watched a spectacular moon rise, talked about the next day itinerary and equipment, and hit the tents early (7:00PM).

Friday, Dec. 4

We awoke at 7:00AM, had breakfast and went for an acclimatization hike up to around 16,000 feet to review and practice mountaineering skills including ice axe arrest, cramponing and rope travel. The hike to 15,500feet was through dirt and rock, which wasn't pleasant with mountaineering boots on. After practicing, we cached our crampons and ice axes and headed back down to camp. We had a pasta dinner and hot drinks, discussed the summit day attire and equipment and went to bed early (5:00PM).

Saturday, Dec. 5 (Summit Day)

We awoke at midnight (most were moving before then), dressed, packed our backpacks, had breakfast and started climbing at 1:15AM. As it had been for the first four days of the trip, the weather was spectacular. The sky was clear and the moon was so bright we did not need headlamps to climb. We got to our cache near the bottom of the Jamapa Glacier at about 3:15AM. We roped up into two four man teams. The lead team was Chris, Lee, Dave, and me. The second team was Ben, John, Keith, and Gary. We headed up the glacier for the long trip to the summit. The snow was good to OK and steep to pretty steep. We took 15 minute rest stops every hour. We reached the summit at 9:50AM, rested, and took pictures until the second rope team got to the summit 45 minutes later.

The view from the summit was spectacular. To the west we could see Iztaccihuatl, Popocatepetl and La Malinche. Popo was "smoking." To the east were mountain ranges with haze and light clouds. We could not see Mexico City to the east or the Gulf of Mexico to the west because of the haze and/or clouds. We headed down the mountain at about 11:00AM. We got back to the cache site around 1:00PM, picked up our trekking poles and water bottles, rested and headed back down to base camp. We got to camp around 2:30PM, packed up our gear, got it loaded on the truck and got on our Dodge Power wagon for the trip back to Senor Reyes' place in Tlachichuca.

We all took hot showers and had a wonderful dinner served by the Reyes family while we talked about the climb and possible next climbs. Then we all retired for the evening in the Reyes' bunk room.

Sunday, Dec. 6

We got up early (6:30AM) and had breakfast at the Reyes at 7:30AM. The breakfast was delicious. The main course was called Chequiles (sp?) and consisted of chicken and tortilla chips in a mild salsa sauce with shredded cheese on top. Also served were terrific pastries, orange juice, and coffee. We then loaded our gear on the bus and headed back to Mexico City, via Puebla, to catch our planes.

General comments on the trip:

	The guides kept reminding us to drink, eat and breathe. They also reminded us to breathe a lot on the way down. I only got a headache on the day before summit day when we were on our way down. But once I did some heavy breathing and had a good drink, I felt better
	We ate only "real" food. There was absolutely no freeze-dried food on the trip. We actually packed sandwiches on both our practice day and summit day on the mountain. The guides also tried to go a "local" as possible, meaning we ate as much of the local food as possible. After about 17,500 feet, I did not feel like drinking or eating, but forced myself to do both. I actually ate half of a salami sandwich on the summit of Orizaba.
	The acclimatization schedule seemed to work well, although I thought we could have done more hiking on the second and third days.
	The bakery in Mexico was excellent! And the food, in general, was very good.

Stephen Davis

December 1998