Huayna Potosi, 6088m
A lake full of minerals near Huayna Potosi, reminded me of my tour of South West Bolivia.
Looking up at Huayna Potosi. The right one of the two peaks in the middle is the top of the mountain and our goal.
All geared up for my first ice climbing lesson
This is the gletsher on which we were gonna practice
Half way into our lesson Luis suddenly started climbing up this ice wall without an explanation. A bit later he asked us to follow him up...
Jason going up the ice wall. Luis was providing counterweight above, without that we'd never have made it I think, as it was we all did.
Here we practiced absailing. I've just come down, the others are still up there.
Making some nice pictures of the gletsher while the rest are coming down.
Day 2: start of the actual climb
The metal cabin at 5200m in which we spent the night. Much more comfortable than a tent!
When we woke up at 1am I took this picture of the task ahead. The right one of the two peaks in the middle is the summit of Huayna Potosi. It looked very far...
2am, me and Lorenzo all geared up and ready to go
The only picture I made during the ascent, at the expense of freezing fingers: one of the two smaller ice walls we had to climb in the dark. Usually slopes look less steep on photo than they are in real but this one actually looks worse than it was.
6:30am - An exhausted but very happy smurf at 6088m. Behind me is the actual top of Huayna Potosi.
The sun was just rising as I got to the top, and the mountain was casting this incredibly big shadow on the landscape behind it.
More climbers pulling themselves up the ice wall to the top as the sun cast its first light on the slope.
Bruno and Matthieu starting the descent from the top
More climbers coming down the mountain.
Some fancy snow-and-ice structure along the way.
Another view of fellow climbers descending.
Climbers going up one of the short steep parts as we were going down.
One of the ice walls I rapelled down from. The crevice made it rather difficult.
A look back on a hill of snow along the way down.
Another look back on the snowy mountain, on the left you can make out the path followed by the climbers.
Pretty much the same as the picture before, I had to make this selection quickly :)
I didn't know where exactly to leave the snow to get back to our metal cabin, so I sat down in the snow to wait for Matthieu and Bruno, but they just sat down behind me and we had Luis make this picture.
A final look back at Huayna Potosi from the refuge where it all began two days earlier. The right one of the two peaks in the middle is the top of the mountain where I was just five hours before making this pic.
