Life is good but business is slow. Tourism has hit a new low as the drug traffickers widen the scope of their killing spree, including American consulates and state officials. It’s hard to entice people to come vacation in México when the only news about the country usually involves a mass killing or City of God style shootout. No I promise I haven’t seen any shootouts or massacres. Drug traffickers don’t like climbing mountains so there’s no need to worry. Despite all the bad news we had a group stick to their plan and make their way down south for an adventure.
The group was small, only three clients, but well matched and excited to be México. Since business has been so slow and there were only three clients I was only able to work the first half of the trip which was summiting Iztaccihuatl. Israel, one of the mountain leaders, and I would take the group up Izta and then he would continue on to Pico where he would meet up with HM. I guess since Israel has a wife and new born baby he “needs” the money more than I do (just want to make sure the sarcasm came across).
In addition to being my first trip of the New Year, this would also be the first time I had driven long distances in México City and in the southern states. The only thing more nerve racking than being responsible for people’s lives on top of a volcano is being responsible for their lives while driving in México City. When I went to pick up the car I of course had no way to check the route because my internet was down so I was running on instinct and directions that I was told might not work if certain streets are closed, which is very common. As HM handed me the keys he added, “Oh yeah and the transmission is a little weird, you’ll see.” Mm fantastic, a weird transmission and uncertain directions, this can only end well. I got in the car and HM had forgotten to mention that the gas gauge is broken so I thought I was about to run out of gas the whole time. Luckily it did in fact work out well and I made it home with no problems. When I got back home I was met with a group of people getting ready to go out and celebrate a friend’s birthday. I didn’t have to get up too early and we agreed to not stay out too late so I got ready to go out. I probably would have skipped it had I known I wouldn’t get home until 5:00am.
I woke up at 9:00am to Los Cardinales, a group known for their classic Mexican love songs, blasting in my face. My window is right on the street and as a result anything that happens outside might as well be happening in my bed. I got up and finished packing my bags. After stopping to buy a few last minute supplies I headed to the hotel and met up with Israel and the clients. After a quick breakfast at the hotel we headed out for Amecameca. This was probably the most nerve racking part of the entire expedition. After swerving in and out the crazy drivers, piles of rubble and rock in the road and other various obstacles we made it safely to Amecameca.
After arriving at the hotel everyone unpacked, took a nap or flipped on their tvs. After about twenty minutes one of the clients ran into my room with a mixed look of shock and wonderment in his eyes. “Come here quick” he said. I walked into his room and he had found the free erotic channel on his tv. “This is on normal tv” he asked in amazement. “But its so graphic” he said. “Welcome to México”. After that moment their group would be known as summit team channel 22.
The next morning we made the drive up to the Altzamoni Hut and unpacked our gear to prepare for the acclimatization hike. After a successful hike we made our way down, ate a gourmet meal of instant mashed potatoes, soup and chicken and went to bed. The next morning we woke and everyone was feeling good except for one client. He hadn’t slept a wink that night and when he finally got out of bed his feet and face were swollen which didn’t bode well for his hike up to high camp. We gave him a dose of Diamox and Israel took him on a short hike. He came back from the hike feeling 100% better and ready for the day. We packed up our gear and headed up to the hut for high camp. After grabbing the 20 liters of water we had stashed on our hike the day before we made it to the Grupo de Los Cien hut at 4,700 m. That night we had a peaceful rest with the mountain mice which every once in a while you can feel scurry across your chest.
Unfortunately the next morning at 3:30 am I realized my mug and bowl had toppled over and both were covered in droppings from the little mishka (Russian for mouse). After thoroughly cleaning everything out I hesitantly ate my breakfast praying I didn’t get a highly infectious mouse shit disease. We headed out by 4:30 am and made our way up the knees. At the top of the knees we gave one of the clients a hit of oxygen because his core body temperature had dropped from hiking up with so few layers. The sun didn’t come up until we were dropping down onto the belly or what is left of a rapidly dying glacier. We made it up to the summit within a couple hours and everyone was both excited and exhausted. I crossed the chest with one client to what is technically the true summit but is really only 2 or three meters higher. It is an hour trip for a very slight gain but he was determined. After returning to the group we made our way back to the hut, packed up and headed down to the cars.
Back in Amecameca everyone had their celebratory cerveza and crashed hard into their beds. The next morning I took Israel’s car back to México City and the group headed to Puebla to meet up with HM and get ready for Pico. My trip back to the city was flawless until I made a slight turn on the freeway and ended up about an hour and a half farther south in the city than I wanted to be. It was a long trip back to my house but a lesson well learned. The trip was a success and now I am in the market for more work.
