I decided to go to Mexico back in February 2012,and from that time I started to look for information,best season,gear,routes,mountains,but my biggest problem at that time was finding a climbing partner since I was back in New Brunswick and not too many people were interested in going to Mexico for 2 weeks.
So after I did a research and got some helpful information from my friends from BC that already did those peaks Adrien and Dean, I wasn't too worried in that case if I wouldn't find a partner since they told those peaks can be done solo too.
After long days looking for climbers all over the place,finally I found a climbing partner,a friend of Adrien from BC,Mohammad, we did a hike a while ago when I was living in BC.
So we started to get ready,make our plans,gear list and everything.
The trip was planned first for end of December to middle of January,but we had to change our dates to December 14-December 28.
Few weeks before our expedition starts,one of Mohammad's friends,Shane,joined us,so our group got bigger, but Shane will join us 2 days later than us.
We booked our car from Hertz,for 2 weeks,booked our stay at Mr.Reyes family,for our last climb,we were ready to go.
Day 1
After a noisy flight to Toronto I found Mohammad and in 30 minutes we were in our airplane to Mexico.
Took us a while to get our baggage,and to get out from airport.By 2 PM we had our car,our GPS was working well in Mexico,so we started our way to Toluca.
Took us 2 hours to get out from Mexico city,the traffic was pretty bad,when we arrived in Toluca we found our hotel pretty easy,Hotel Rex,a cheap place to stay,but they don't have any parking,so we had to park our car at another hotel,but while I was talking to the front desk person about our room and place to park Mohammad got a parking ticket that we had to pay right away or the officer would had taken our license plates.
After buying some groceries for our first climb and trying some mexican food,quesadilla,we went to bed with our mind and backpacks ready for morning,for our first climb.
Day 2
We got out from our hotel by 6.40 AM,and took the highway to Nevado de Toluca,with some incredible views of our destination.
The entrance fee for the park is 20 pesos.Arrived at trail at 4100m around 8 AM,got everything ready and started our hike.
After few minutes we saw our destination and we started to go down to first lake Laguna de Luna.
And we keep going down to second lake,Lagula del Sol,a beautiful lake,and started our steep ascent to the ridge going to the summit,with amazing view of Popo(Popocatepetl) and Izta(Iztaccihuatl),our next destination.
After few minutes we arrived at the summit ridge,where we went right instead of going left at the second subsummit,and then we tough we are getting close to the summit,so we decided to scramble up which was a bad idea, after few minutes we end up in some exposed and crazy scramble so we had to turn back,but we saw some climbers going on the right way so we just went back and started to follow them.
The scramble part to the summit is very easy,maybe is class 1-2,nothing to difficult.
We arrived at the summit of Nevado de Toluca(4680m) around 1 PM.
On the summit we took a huge break.
Around 2 PM we started to go down on a soft trail going down to the lake Lagula del Sol ,and then followed by a nice walk near the lake,and the last uphill just killed us.We came at the car around 5 PM and less than in 2 hours we were back in our hotel room.We went outside and tried some tacos which of course were really good after what we went back to our rooms and went to bed.
Day 3
After our acclimatization hike on Nevado de Toluca,we start to drive from Toluca to Amecameca,our next stop for Izta(Iztaccihuatl).
The highway gets busier before getting in Amecameca.
After few hours we arrived in Amecameca,found our hotel,hotel San Carlos,famous hotel for climbers and started to look for fuel and stove in the city,was a hard job,at the end we just bought a regular fuel that we found.
After few hours our friend Shane from Vancouver,arrived at the hotel,with his rain cover,was very funny to see him in that dry place with his yellow rain cover.
Soon we went out to find some good food,and decided just to add some gasoline in Shane's fuel bottle and then sort out the gear for our next climb.
Day 4
First thing in the morning,a guy from Toronto knocks at our door,he was climbing solo,and was also planning to go for Izta the same day,and he saw our names in the hotel entry and decided to see if we can team up,so we decided to give him a ride to La Joya.
After few hours we took our permits for Izta,the information centre is very close to hotel San Carlos and start our drive to Paso de Cortes.
At Paso de Cortes we saw some incredible views of all those big peaks,and there we paid our park entrance,for 3 days was 81 pesos per person.
After we got everything we started to drive on the off-road to La Joya,it took us around 20 minutes.
At La Joya there were few cars,and a big group of climbers that just started their climb.
Later we went for a small hike up,and made some food before making our camp spots near our car.
Day 5
After a long 12 hours sleeping night,we woke up,made some food,packed our heavy backpacks with lots of water for 2 days and for cooking,and started our climb to Grupo de Los Cien Hut.
Took us 4 and a half hours to get there,in the hut was only another team of 2 climbers,which was perfect for us,and they said that it's ok to leave your gear in the hut.
We sorted our gear for the climb,made some food and went to bed.
Day 6
3:15 the alarm clock is on,so in 30 minutes we started our climb to Izta.
Cold,windy,steep and loose terrain from the hut,was horrible.
But then we had some great views of some lava coming out of Popo,and a great sunrise with views of Orizaba,La Malinche and Popo.
After one hour we reached our first glacier,and started to feel the smell of Popo,then we took the wrong route,and ended up on some steep terrain.
By the time we reached the Ayoloco Glacier everybody was exhausted,sick,after we reached the ridge going to the summit,at that point I started to feel a small headache,but was gone after few minutes.After hours of going up and down at 5000m we finally reached the summit of Izta 5230m.
On the summit it was still windy,everybody was exhausted,we made fast a summit photo and started to go down.
After few hours of climbing down,and ending in some steep terrain we finally arrived at the hut and went to bed for 1 hour,then we started to pack our gear,garbage,and get down to the car,because the gate is closing after 9 PM.
In few hours we all,one by one,reached the car exhausted but happy.
By the time we got back to Amecameca,we just dropped our backpacks and went back to find some food,and decided to eat some tacos at one street food place,was delicious,better then our pasta soup the last 2 days.
Day 7
In the morning we just dropped everything in the car,we where too tired to arrange the gear, and found a nice restaurant with good food and soon we started to drive to Tlachichuca for our next climb. The road was long and expensive with all those tolls.
After 5 hours of driving we arrived in Tlachichuca and found our booked place,Reyes Familly ,what a great place and amazing people.
By the time we arrived,It was cloudy,windy,and we couldn't see our destination,so we weren't sure about next day.
Soon we decided to take a walk in Tlachichuca and eat some food,wasn't the best idea,the food was delicious,but by the time we came back to Reyes Family there was food waiting for us in 1 hour,it was a hard job to eat that delicious food,took us a while.
Day 8
We woke up with an amazing view of our destination,so we knew that we are going for the summit.
At 11 AM we took our 4x4 ride to Piedra Grande Hut,and after one and half hour we arrived at Piedra Grande Hut.
We got lucky and found some spots for us in the hut,was crowded,and after that we went up for a short hike up 500m from the hut to see closer the labyrinth, and we met the same group of 2 climber from Grupo de Los Cien Hut, and they shared with us some information about conditions of the climb.
After taking few photos,so we could take a closer look at the route we went down to the hut were we made again our pasta soup.
Soon we started to get our backpacks ready for the summit.
After 6 PM we went to bed,and were trying to get as much sleep as we could.
Day 9
12-00 Alarm clock is on,pack up,eat one pack of cookies for 3,put all our hard shell gear on and start the climbing up.
We went outside to see how cold it is, wasn't too bad so we decided to leave our down jackets.
We were the first climbing team,arrived at the Labyrinth,was icy,with some steep sections,but was ok.
By the time we got to the Jamapa Glacier we could see our long way up to the summit,so we took a break and I ate 2 of my 3 chocolates, leaving one for the summit, lots of food, then we started our ascent on the glacier.
Took us so much to go up on that steep icy glacier but we had some crazy views of sunrise,with views of all those big peaks,was just fantastic.
50m bellow the summit I stopped,I was so cold,my hands were freezing,so I just stopped,and changed my gloves,changed my liner gloves with another pair,and now was harder to put the second pair on my hands,but I was warm.
By 9:30 AM we reached the summit,summit of Pico de Oriziba 5636m.
Amazing mountain,great climbing team Shane ,Mohammad,we did it,Pico de Orizaba top of Mexico.
I was feeling fantastic,we waited for Mohammad,who arrived after few minutes,took few photos,just enjoying the views for a while,and we chatted more with our friend from Toronto who was on the summit solo too.
Soon we started to go down.By the time me and Shane arrived at the base of Jamapa Glacier,Mohammad was still at the half way,and was going very very slow,we were watching him for a while,and was just too hot,all that reflection from the glacier,so we decided to go down,so we could get down to the hut in time and find our driver to let him know to wait for us.
At the Labyrinth we took a wrong route,when we saw that it's too steep we went back,and went down on normal route.
By 2 PM we got back to the Piedra Grande Hut,happy and we found our driver and we told him that we have to wait for Mohammad,and soon we started to pack all our gear.
Was getting late,our leaving time was 4 PM,we started to get worried for Mohammad,asking from other climbers if they saw him,finally last group that came down said that they saw him going down slowly and we were happy knowing he is coming down.
Mohammad arrived at the hut by 5 PM,all 3 of us jumped in the car,and after one and a half hour we arrived at Mr.Reyes.
We met Mr.Reyes,took a shower and had again some delicious food.
Day 10
We woke up and we started to pack up our gear,Shane couldn't find his poles,so we had to wait so the driver that went at 11 AM with another group could bring them back since he left his poles at the hut.
As soon as Shane got his poles,we started to drive to Veracruz,long drive,hard to find a hotel,and we had the most delicious tacos,and our first beer.
The rest of the days,we just enjoyed our time in Mexico,before we headed back home,after having a great time with Mohammad and Shane,great team,and having a successful expedition with great view,lots of good memories.
Here are some videos:
Nevado de Toluca: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mAcmz...7fNftQ&index=3
Izta: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5fa00...7fNftQ&index=2
Pico de Orizaba: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3JL3j...7fNftQ&index=1
No comments:
Post a Comment