As a part of the 7 summits regimen, and after summiting Kilimanjaro, Elbrus and Kosciuszko, the next on my list was Aconcagua. Aconcagua is the highest mountain in South America located near the border of Argentina and Chile. Nearly 23,000 feet high, Aconcagua is the highest mountain outside of the Himalayas and is known for its insane weather. Aconcagua tours start out of Mendoza, Argentina. We used Inka expeditions as our tour operator and they were pretty impressive. To get to Mendoza, you can take flights into town or a bus from Santiago. We realized that the flights are much cheaper into Santiago, Chile and then the bus from Santiago to Mendoza is an experience worth having. Its an ~8 hour bus ride through the Andean mountains with stunning views along the way. You can buy tickets online here. I recommend sitting close to the front of the top floor of the bus for the best view along the way. In Mendoza, Inka put us up in an awesome 5 start hotel called Hotel Diplomatic. This was a great way to start our gruelling trip. The first evening, Inka guides stopped by our rooms and evaluated all the gear. For the missing items, we went down to an outdoor rental place to pick up extra gear. I highly recommend to NOT rent/ buy from this place as it was overpriced and had crappy brands. There are several outdoor retailers in Mendoza with far better stuff. We went to El Refugio to pick up our extras (instead of Chamonix Sports as recommended by Inka). The next day, we exchanged money, paid Inka and Argentinan government for our trip. This took 2ish hours and then we were ready to get going. We loaded the bags in vans and headed down to Penitentes, an old ski town located just outside the Aconcagua nature preserve. Here, Inka has a storage facility where we were able to drop all our bags and casual clothes that wont be needed on the mountain. We even left our laptops and they were safely stored with the Inka guys. That same night, we packed our bags for the mules to drop our bags at Confluencia camp and Plaza Mulas (base camp). Since we stayed at Plaza Confluenzia for two nights, we didn't receive our Plaza Mulas bags for two more days. I will post a separate link to the full itinerary with elevation and other details. The following morning we packed our day packs and started the not so long walk to Confluenzia. The 12 strangers on this trip were quickly becoming friends along the short and easier hike. Within 4 miles, we were at our first camp site, Camp Confluenzia (3400 meters/ 11200 feet). As soon as we arrived, we were served with cheese, pepperoni, fruits, snacks, etc. I realized quickly that food will not be an issue on this trip. The accomodation at Confluenzia was a large tent with bunk beds. The tent had room for 8 peopel so we needed another one for our team. The tent was full of dudes and they all snored ALL night. It was clear that in order to get any sleep at all, we would need some solid ear plugs. Some other facilities include flushable toilets, running water showers (cold), full kitchen with staff and a common group tent. We also celebrated Christmas at this camp site and had a champagne filled christmas eve. Thanks Inka! Next day, we packed our day packs again and headed out to Plaza Franzia (4200 meters/ 13780 feet) for a day hike. The hike was round trip 9 miles from Confluenzia and is (apparently) required for acclimitization before heading to base camp. Plaza Franzia is located at the base of the South Face of Aconcagua. The view is stunning and completely worth this side hike. The south face of the mountain receives and keeps a signficant amount of snow, giving it a really remarkable look. There are several glaciers on this side as well. During the last 30-40 mins of the hike, we were hiking next to the Horcones Glacier, which has the appearance of being burried under soil. It is SO cool! Following day, the real expedition started. We set out early in the morning ~7 am towards Plaza Mulas (4370 meters/ 14337 feet), which is the main base camp for the mountain. The hike from Confluenzia to Plaza Mulas is easily 11.5 miles and most of it is in a flat valley. The valley also creates sort of a wind tunnel making it horrid to traverse during the windy days. We got unlucky and were doing this hike during one such day. To make matters worse, three miles into the hike, we were faced with a whiteout snow blizzard, that we had to hike through for the remaining 8 miles. This was easily one of the hardest things I have done in my life, completely pushing the edge of my resilience. All of our warm weather gear was in Plaza Mulas and we had to brave this storm in some goretex jackets and hiking pants. I borderline got a frostbite before the real trip started. One of our guides had extra gloves and gave me his mittens. For that, I literally owe him my fingers. Thankfully, our lead guide decided to quicken the pace a bit and we managed to reach the base camp 2 hours before planned. What surpised me was the tiny voice in my head that kept reminding me that we will eventually get there and its all going to be alright. This was one of the key lessons I learned time and again during the expedition. More than ever I realized the truth in the statement "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger" Thankfully, we got to rest all day next day. This was highly needed and enabled us to replenish our energy. The day was mostly gloomy and windy, so it was a nice day to take a break. This also gave us some time to acclimitize and get ready before the hike to camp 1. Following morning, we woke up and had to carry a load to camp 1. Camp 1 is around 16,000 feet (4910 meters) and the first of the higher camps. We Moved around 15-20 kg per person to Camp 1, which made this day quite challenging. It took us ~3.5 hours to arrive at Camp 1, where we ate a picnic style lunch. We piled all our gear and covered it with a pile of rocks for the next time we stayed at Camp 1. During this hike, the team was divided into two groups of faster and slower hikers. The group of slower hikers had to leave our expedition for varying reasons over the following days. The way back to camp 1 was quick and good fun. We enjoyed a nice dinner with the rest of the crew. The days following our load carry turned out to be quite windy and our guides were unable to lock down a summit day. Traditionally, two days after load carry, the team starts moving to higher camps. However, we ended up spending three days extra at base camp to wait out the bad weather on the higher camps. This ended up being good fun as some of us went bouldering around the base camp. If you're a rock climber, bring your climbing shoes! There are some excellent bouldering problems out there. Also during this time, we all visited the doctor to assess our degree of acclimitization. I was quite well acclimitized with low blood pressure and high VO2. However, I had developed a horrid cough (bronchitis) and cold by this time. The doctors gave me some antibiotics and mucus suppressants to help with this. I decided to stay at base camp for another day to recover and was happy to be mostly over my cold and bronchitis symptoms. The extra day we spent at base camp was new years eve and there was quite a party and a celebration to welcome in the new year! Since I skipped one night at camp 1 (due to bronchitis), I had to catch up with the rest of the group directly at camp 2 (5400/ 18000). This meant a solid 5000 feet/ 1500 m elevation gain with heavy packs. We stopped at camp 1 to pick up part of the load that we carried couple days prior. This made the final approach to camp 2 really friggin hard. We did end up making pretty good time and got to camp 2 in 6.5 hours. The views from camp 2 are STUNNING and easily some of the best on the mountain. The sunset from camp 2 will take your breath away. We unpacked our stuff and got comfortable in the tents. Thankfuly, Inka had a cooking tent that we were able to use for breakfasts and dinner the first few days/ nights on camp 2. The weather was fantastic on our hike to camp 2 but quickly disintegrated over the next few days. The winds were SO high that night that some people lost their tents. We decided to make our tent quite taut by adding extra rocks. Even then, the tent was flexing so much at night that it was slapping us in the face. This whole experience was exhausting but hilarious and awesome at the same time. The next few days were really really windy and had horrible weather on the mountain. While it was sunny (thankfully), the winds were strong enough to lift you and knock over when outside. We therefore hung out in our tents and waited for the weather to pass for a chance to summit. The final day of our trip and the absolute last possible day, the weather finally cleared. By this point, we were exhausted of spending 4 solid full days on camp 2 nearly at 18,000 feet. What upset me was that our guides did not take any opportunity over four days to acclimitize us to camp 3, leaving it all for the last day. We also had an opportunity to move our camp to camp 3 and this would have given the entire team a solid chance for a summit. Finally on January 5th, 15 days after our expedition started, we woke at 1:30 AM to attempt summiting Aconcagua. We pakced up, ate some horribly cold and gross porridge and set out on the mountain at 3 am. To our surprise, our guide lost his way initially, causing us to cut across steep ice sheets on the mountain without much visibility. This sucked. I pulled a muscle in my calf was in in immense pain for the rest of the hike. To make matters worse, my backpack was poorly adjusted and gave me a horrible horrible back ache. Our guide also set out at a massive pace up the mountain that completely wore us out by the time we got to over 20,000 feet. This was the moment for decision. While I was tired, I didn't feel TOO bad. Several of the team members could barely sit up. It was a hard day and hard decision causing us to turn around and head back down. While this was disappointing, it was also necessary for the health and well being of most us. I am also very happy to have crossed my high altitude record of Mr. Kilimanjaro and we had gotten higher than every other mountain in South America.
I decided promptly that I will return to this mountain and will attempt to summit in the near future. However, I will certainly go back with a private expedition, rather than a team of 12strangers. If we were slightly more in control of our expedition, we would have moved to camp 3 and attempted from there. We also could have attempted for the summit earlier in the trip rather than waiting for the very last day possible. Overall, this trip was an excellent experience and the people we met along the way were terrific. Inka expeditions is a great expedition operator and we thoroughly enjoyed the food and the support from them. We will certainly go with Inka again in the future. Thanks for reading! contact me if you have any questions about this trip :)
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Since we moved to NorCal, we have been trying to do a bunch of outdoor activities. The great thing about the Bay Area is its crazy awesome geography that offers beach and mountain activities within 100 miles. So 4th July weekend, we set out with our mountain bikes to the Mt. Tamalpais region. The trail we decided to do can be found here on MTB Project. A bit out of shape and strapped for time, we decided to bike only a section of that trail. Here are the basic directions: 1. Start at Muir Beach 2. Bike Towards Muir Woods on Muir road 3. Turn left on Deer Creek Fire Road (several hikers will also be hiking around here) 4. Return to parking spot by coming down Coastal View Trail (awesome single track downhill) The Deer Creek Fire Road section of the bike ride is pretty much entirely uphill. Not too bad for someone in shape. Which we were not. It kicked our ass and turned out to be quite painful. Combine that with temperatures at least in the 90s with sun beating town. Needless to say, we were tanned and totally exhausted at the top. As soon as we go to the Coastal View Trail, all the exhaustion disappeared because the ride down was super fun! This single track trail has views of the bay almost the entire way and is very beginner friendly. This part by itself made the painful bike ride up totally worth it! After our bike ride, we loaded our bikes back in the car and drove down to Muir Beach for some fun in the sun. As it turns out, the sun was nearly gone, leaving us in an overcast windy beach. Not to worry, we were determined to go swimming with the dog! The water was FREEZING and invigorating. I will do it again! After swimming around, I quickly put on some clothes and headed out to the car to change, keeping my lady parts hidden from the swarm of July 4th visitors! I think (I hope) I succeeded =D It was a great day of biking, hiking and swimming. Next up, we had lunch at a lovely vegan/ organic lunch spot called Cafe Del Soul on the way out. I had hummus edamame wrap, that was delicious! I highly recommend this place! Clockwise from top left: 1. Justin on his awesome bike on the trail uphill, 2. Me, biking down from the highest elevation of the ride (with relief), 3. Gorgeous scenery from the top of the ride with Coastal View trail in the distance, 4. Swimming in freezing waters on Muir Beach!
The next morning, we woke at 6:15 (VERY unlike us) and made it to the "Many Glacier Entrance" of the park. We literally had to race and beat 3 cars in line ahead of us so we could get to the campground and set up camp. It was a good plan and we got a great campsite to set up camp for the next 2 nights. In the process of racing though, when the cars behind us finally got to the campgrounds, they didn't hesitate to show us the finger! oops!. Well, I suppose when you want something, you've got to fight for it. Many Glacier part of the park is considered to be the heart of the park. In my opinion, the views are some of the best. There are several most popular hikes that start out in the Many Glacier region with access to glaciers, wildlife and lakes. If you're not up for hiking, the views are spectacular just from the Many Glacier hotel and you'll see amazing vistas just walking around Swiftcurrent Lake. Many Glacier Hotel at the Swiftcurrent Lake. This is a must see at sunset! We had planned to do a longer hike but we got too comfy in the tent and slept for 3 hours. Seriously, air mattress is the way to go! We went for a shorter hike since we still wanted to hiking somewhere and the clouds were looming above us. The perfect hike we chose was to Apikuni Falls and back. The hike itself was short with a distance of 2 miles round trip and elevation gain of 700 ft. The views were amazing and at the end, the falls were just awesome. The hike winds through the tropical alpine that GNP has abundance of and ends with stark views of the Glacier hills. Here's where the falls are located: Details of the hike: Hike: Apikuni Falls Hike Area: Many Glacier (at Glacier National Park Many Glacier Entrance) Distance: 2 miles round trip Elevation gain: 700 ft Difficulty: Easy - Moderate (kid friendly) Here are some of my favorite pictures from the hike! Top two are from the start of the hike. There were great views everywhere we looked! The waterfall was larger than life and totally epic. There is a stone below the falls and we walked almost right under the falls. Watch your step though! The hike was gorgeous and fast and there were lots of kids doing it. We were a happy couple! Gorgeous view opposite the waterfall! I am so glad we had an easy day and just enjoyed chilling around the Many Glacier region taking lots of pictures! It was a great way to warm up our legs and do a short hike in the park!
Stick around for details of the next two days!! :-) I finally got to visit Glacier National Park a few weekends back! Its been my dream for several years and now living in Idaho Falls put me only 7 hours from it so I had to do it. It was everything I had hoped for and more. Plenty of wildlife, gorgeous trees and waterfalls, and the most stunning views ever. I will write about my trip in 3 parts because there is just so much info to cover. In fact, we got so taken by the views just around the drivable parts that we ended up having to cancel one of our planned hikes! GNP is about 7.5 hours drive from Idaho Falls, located at the very north of Montana going into Canada. a little fun fact, you could do a ranger led tour where they take you into the Canadian side of the park. If you're planning to do this, make sure you bring your passports! The drive from Idaho Falls is certainly long and we ended up breaking the trip and spending the night in Missoula, MT. If you are trying to fly in to see the national park, you could fly to Missoula and rent a car to drive around. You could also fly into Kalispell which is a city right outside Glacier to the west. I assume flights to Missoula would be cheaper but flying into Kalispell would cut down the 2.5 hour drive. After arriving at the West entrance of the park, we soon realized that ALL the campsites were closed. We must have arrived around noon which is too late apparently. Most campsites were taken by 7:30 AM so plan ahead for that! In any case, we managed to stick to our plan for the most part. After arriving at the West entrance, we drove down the "Going to Sun Road" and ended up staying at the KOA outside the St Mary East entrance. If you end up in our situation, the Going to Sun Road is worth driving down and the KOA takes reservations so call and book a spot right away. Also, there are several campsites outside the East entrance so you'll safely find a place to stay somewhere. Going to the Sun road is everything you'll read on the internet and more. Its ABSOLUTELY STUNNING. The views will take your breath away. The road itself starts next to Lake McDonald, winding next the the beautiful McDonald falls and then follows the McDonald creek till it literally starts heading up the mountains. I couldn't believe my eyes by the road has been carved into the Glacier mountains which gives it the appearance of "Going to the Sun". You can see several glaciers, streams, waterfalls and valleys while driving this road. We took our time and stopped everywhere we wanted to and took lots and lots of pictures. I would recommend the same to you. The road has been well planned and there are several areas to pull over your car and get lose in nature. Several short and long hiking trails also start right off the the Going to the Sun road so with a little bit of planning you cold pack a lot into the day. The park map has most of the trails with their distance on it so if you haven't planned, you'll probably still find something amazing to do. Gorgeous McDonald Falls (top and bottom) Even though the day was cloudy, the views were amazing (bottom). The mountain peaks were merging into the clouds and at high altitudes, the clouds were on the roads! After getting through the Going to the Sun road and setting up camp at the KOA, we made a delicious dinner of baked potatoes on the campfire. We planned ahead for almost everything except dairy products. Silly, I know. Buy your dairy as late as possible. Our sour cream and cheese lasted a day but we were able to use it for dinner that night thanks to our cooler. Another thing that we really enjoyed was having an air mattress. If you're car camping and have the extra room, get an air mattress. Its easy to inflate and set up and very comfortable if you're spending 3-4 days camping. The day was well spent and we were really really exciting to hike in the Glacier National Park over the next couple of days. Justin chopping wood like a bad ass that we found near the campsite for our campfire (top left). Our super comfy bed in our tent using an air mattress and down comforter (top right). Our fresh dinner of baked potatoes with tomato and veggies sauce (bottom). Our first day was a success. Stick around for more stories from the rest of our time at GNP. We were so glad we did this trip!
I am getting way behind on writing about some of my favorite escapades! Someone asked me a few days ago what my favorite place in the world was and without a doubt in my mind I blurted "Jackson Hole!". This got me thinking why I loved being in Jackson so so much. It could be because its unique in character and due to its bold Western lifestyle, or because all seasons offer amazing outdoor activities. But when I thought about it a lot I realized that its the people in Jackson driving to protect its beauty that makes it so gorgeous. Jackson Hole boasts the best ski resort in North America : Jackson Hole mountain resort (duh!) and is home to the Teton National Park and the Teton mountain range. The mountains give the city a resort-y feel and it is surely reflected in real estate prices (try finding something under a mil - good luck to you). I will try to write a lot about JH especially when I'll be spending my second ski season there but for now I try get down there every few weekends to enjoy the best view, weather and people. A few days back we decided to go camping in the Teton national park and white water rafting in the Snake River. Unfortunately for me, I got horribly sick but managed to have a great time (its hard not to...). We started the weekend by driving later in the evening to Teton national park to find a campsite. We just purchased a new tent and a new Thermarest sleeping pad for Justin and wanted to try it car camping before taking it backcountry. Since we hadn't camped in the park before, we were totally unaware of how quickly the campsites were taken. Lucky for us, we managed to get the last site available in the entire park at the Signal Mountain campground. This ended up being an RV site and cost us ~$40 instead of the usual $20 (dammit!) but at least we had a place to rest our heads for the night. Our original plan was to camp at Jenny Lake Campground but we soon learned that over the weekends, the campground is FULL by 7:30 AM!!! Anyway, that evening we had a nice dinner at Peaks, a restaurant in the signal mountain campground area. The restaurant is awesome with great food and just stunning views. You can see Mt. Moran clearly and its right on Jackson lake which made for a beautiful sunset that evening (see pic below). I had the garlic soup and beet salad and Justin had the trout - both were great and very filling. What I loved about the restaurant most (aside from great food, views and service...ha!) was that they were handing out pamphlets about eating seafood sustainably! If you have heard of seafoodwatch.org, you'll know what I am talking about. After retiring to our campsite, I slept quite well. It was our first time camping with our dog, Snow and she was thoroughly confused. It was hilarious. Anyway, the campsite was snugly situated between trees with gorgeous view of the mountains and the lake nearby. For breakfast we had bagels and juice that we purchased the night before at the grocery store in town of Jackson. We enjoyed our camping experience so much that we wanted to stay a second night. So thinking we were awake and ready early, we drove to Jenny Lake campground at 9 am expecting to find another campsite. We soon found out we were wrong and the site was full way before we got there. Next time, we will have to get here way earlier than that! Because I was getting sick, we decided to go rafting and return home that night instead of camping again. We were smart and purchased a Groupon for rafting with Mad River Boat Trips so we got to go rafting for half price! It was totally awesome experience. This was my first time rafting in the US. I have been white water kayaking a few times in Wisconsin and rafting in the Ganges in India but who knew the Snake River had a few thrills up its sleeve! I highly recommend checking out rafting if you're spending your summer in JH. Another advice - take a guided trip if you're not totally sure what you're doing. It will be worth it. After a fun time rafting we had lunch at one of my fav restaurants in town - The Bird. The place is totally weird and totally awesome at the same time. Being vegetarian, I got the veggie burger which is cleverly named- For the Patchouli Lover: The Bushy beaver. Ha!!! I had to look up "Patchouli" on urbandictionary and I was not disappointed lol. Here are some pics from our trip! We went to Glacier National Park couple weekends back so I will make a list of the "must haves for camping in that post". I can't recommend Jackson Hole enough - its truly an awesome place!! Panorama of our view from Peaks restaurant Justin and Snow hanging out near our campsite View next to our campsite at signal mountain campground Ready going rafting on the Snake River! We had an awesome time with great friends!! Thanks Mad river boat trips!
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