In La Paz, at the hostel I was staying in, I met 3 New-Zealanders who had tried to climb a 6,000m mountain. Only one made it. A bit later, I met a Belgian girl who made it at her second attempt. All told me it was hard, but unforgettable. Huayna Potosi is a 6,088m high mountain, maybe the most accessible six-thousander summit in the World. Experience in mountaineering is not required, and it costs only 150usd for 3 days including permit, transport, food, equipment renting. Bolivian style!
The mountain is located about 30km from La Paz, it takes a couples of hours to get there.
The ‘base camp’, at 4,800m high. It was already a record for me.
Conditions are basic. No shower, no hot water.
It is possible to climb Huayna Potosi in 2 days. If you have experience, and if know you don’t need much time for acclimatising to the altitude. I have been told the success rate in 2 days is only 40%, and 60% in 3 days. If the rates are so low, it is probably because it is open to anyone. As long as you pay…
There is no more than 2 persons per guide. I teamed up with Michael, American who lives in Taiwan, and Evan, our Bolivian guide who climbed this mountain more than 300 times. In the afternoon of the first day, we did some training exercises: walk on the glacier with crampons, climb up and down a wall of ice with ropes and ice axes.
The main advantage of the 3 days option is for the acclimatation. So the 2 first days are quite slow and you need a good book.
This is the face of someone who does not doubt much:
Morning of the 2nd day, the weather was great.
But the weather in the mountains changes quickly. On the way up to the ‘high camp’, 3 hours walk, rain and snow:
Here is the high camp, 5200m:
Conditions are Spartiates, nights are cold. Again, no hot water, no shower, and we slept all dressed.
The 2nd day, we went to bed very early, at 6pm. The altitude has more or less effect on people, and it is impossible to know how you are going to react until you get there. It is one of the reasons why I am here: I want to know if I can handle it. The first effect is common: headache. Second effect is nausea and vomiting. Third effect is diarrhea. Then loss of consciousness. I felt a bit of headache and take some Sorojchi, a medicine against the altitude effects.
We woke up at midnight. Cold, full moon, and full of energy! The headache was gone. From 1 in the morning, we started climbing on the glacier, crampons on feet, with ropes, torches and ice axes. Because it is at night, I do not have pictures of the ascension.
It is definitely one of the hardest things I have done in my life. We saw 4 or 5 other groups going up. It is cold (between -12 and -15C), but I didn’t feel it at all. I knew it because the water in my bottle was frozen. Because of the lack of oxygen, the steps are short and slow. Everything is slow motion. Nobody talks, only at the breaks, every hour or so. The guide pushed us, he was worried we were going to be late. When the sun is up, the snow heats up and avalanches and rocks falling make the descent dangerous.
Around 5.30am, when the sun showed up, we attacked the last wall, a mix of ice and rocks. Exhausting, for the arms too.
1 hour later, we walked on the ‘arrete’ to reach the summit, 6,088m!
The summit is very small and it was hard to take good pictures of us:
The weather was perfect, the view is absolutely fantastic. Far from the city noise and pollution. It was an absolute success.
But quickly, it was time to go down. It took 5.5 hours to go up and 2.5 hours to go down.
Under the summit, protected from the falling rocks, we had food and tea. I was wearing my favourite shirt:
We took the same way down. But it looked different under day light. This 50m wall was just above a crevasse:
Going down is wayyyy easier:
In the afternoon, we were back in La Paz. I slept for hours, exhausted. It is so hard that for a few days, you only think about flat beaches. But with time, the mountain calls again. And this adventure gave me ideas: there are many other mountains waiting to be climbed all around the World 😉
takemethere 