Citlaltépetl

Sunday January 31. Finished our packing for a 10am departure on the 2 hour drive up a 4WD road to the Piedra Grande climbers’ hut, our base camp for the highest peak in Mexico. The driver was skillful, sociable and able to provide some local history, identify the trees (they looked like pines, fir and something else) and answer other questions. He has served clients from all over the world; he finds North Americans to be more sociable than Europeans.    My Spanish-mixed-with-Portuguese is serving me well.

Citlaltepetl

   The common name of the mountain and the national park is Pico de Orizaba, but the proper name is Citlaltépetl, from the Nahuatl language meaning star [in] mountain. Our driver Porfirio explained that once a year, one of the planets is perfectly aligned at the top of the mountain. It is a dramatically prominent cinder cone with a remnant glacier on the north side that serves as the climbers’ ramp. The rest of the mountain is loose rock and sand, interspersed with solid outcrops, ridges and boulder fields. Snow had fallen in a storm weeks earlier and was only partly melted. The summit is 5636m (18,491’). The hut is at 4270m (14,010’). The bottom of the glacier is about 5000m (16,404’). It was a holiday weekend in Mexico, and there were lots of people up for an outing in the snow. The hut was quite full, but most of the climbers were coming down that day so it cleared out in the afternoon. The other newly arrived climbers—a group from Mexico City—were very sociable, offering us food, making space for us on the bunks, and inviting us to join them climbing the next morning.

  Mike and I scrambled around above the hut. We definitely felt the oxygen deprivation on our energy level, but much to my pleasant surprise no other signs of altitude sickness. So we decided to head out with our new friends the next morning. I said if I don’t feel well, I will come back to the hut and climb again the day after. Our ride down was not scheduled until Wednesday.

Monday February 1: The long day. We did not sleep well. Mike says he slept not at all. I slept in half hour stretches, waking up with an altitude headache and breathing deeply for a couple minutes until it went away, then falling back asleep. We were late for the 4am wake up. We couldn’t stomach much breakfast: Mike ate half a bowl of oatmeal, while I managed one quarter. We were late getting our gear together, heading up the hill about 5:30am. I felt weak, jittery and nauseous and gave up after half an hour. Mike went on to catch up with our friends.

   It was beautiful weather: sunny, a little below 0C before dawn, a little above 0 in the day, windy in exposed places. I got up again at 7:30, felt better, finished my breakfast, swept the hut, then headed up at my own slow pace, planning to meet the climbers on their way down. An altitude headache was always in the offing, but I found that if I hiked slow enough and used pressure breathing I could ward it off. I got slower and slower as I got higher, requiring two breaths per step. I met lots of climbers on their way down. Our group leader confirmed that Mike was on his way to the summit with the stronger (much younger naturally) members of his party. I made it up to the bottom of the glacier—my goal—about 1:30pm. The last of our friends heading down confirmed that Mike was near the summit and would be coming down soon. I had a clear view of the glacier and saw no one. I holed up in the lee of a big boulder and watched. It seemed like a very long time, but I finally saw a lone figure making its way slowly down the ice. It seemed like a very long time, but he did finally arrive: we were both very glad to see each other!
   Mike’s story: it was one of the hardest things I have ever done. Some of the difficulties in the climb were finding our way through the Labyrinth below the glacier base; my Mexican companions had been there before and did a very good job in the dark. Another for me was the altitude of course and as I approached the summit I was at 3 breaths per step. The wind was blowing about 30 to 40 knots on the glacier and this made it difficult to keep my place. The glacier was also very slick at times and the ice crusts were very sharp and striated making the footing difficult. With that in mind, I took longer coming down the glacier than I normally would have done. Hence Sharman’s long wait time. Strangely enough the wind never abated until we were well below the glacier’s edge. Another thing that was disconcerting at first was being alone on the mountain but I got past it once I was approaching the summit. There is a bit of detritus at the top as you can see in the pics and it was blowing so hard I was leery of getting too close to the caldera’s edge so the pics inside are not too dramatic.   

View from the top

The cauldera

   We rested and ate a little--Mike had not eaten a single bite of his sandwich the entire climb and was exhausted--before picking our way down through the rock and snow, over ridges and across small valleys. Coming down the last slope we could see three trucks heading down the mountain: we knew that our friends had departed on schedule and we would not see them again, exchange emails, or say goodbye and thank you. Half an hour above the hut we ran into a group of young Mexicans laughing, throwing snow and taking pictures. They wanted their pictures taken with us. Twenty minutes above the hut we ran into a young climber named Angel who was staying the week at the hut. Our friends were worried about us and had asked him to go up to look for us.

   Except for Angel, the hut was deserted. We fired up a cup of Miso and began to think about what to do next. Mike said he might like to sleep for 24 hours. We wondered how, with no means of communication, we could get back to town early. The snow play group came in. It turned out they were from Tlachichuca and were heading back down soon. Their driver confirmed that he could make room for us and our gear. With great delight we threw our gear together and rode down in their jeep, stuffed with our gear in the third, rear facing seat for the long dusty drive. One of them spoke pretty good English and we carried on a lively conversation. They invited us to dinner at their house. I said no, I am tired, but Mike said yes, with pleasure. So we joined them in the patio of their rented house for a barbeque of chorizo and beef steak in tortillas with chipotle salsa, served with Coca cola. When Mike confessed he is a vegetarian, they could not find a single thing in the house to offer him. So he ate his PB&J sandwich left from the climb. Our hosts were all elementary school teachers in nearby schools, and rent a house together. The one who spoke good English served as translator. We mostly discussed education.

   When we said goodbye, thank you, took more group pictures, and drove to our compound looking for something more to eat and a blissful sleep in our van, no one answered the buzzer, and no one answered the phone. We eventually gave up and the driver, Carlos Espinosa of Servi Espinosa mountain guides, took us to his place to sleep. I thought it was the other guiding company that houses climbers, but it turned out to be a private home and he had given us his bed. His whole family are mountain guides, and his brother had seen us the day before at the hut. They were very gracious. Brother Lupe must have been clued in by Carlos, because he showed up at the door with a plate of fresh salad for Mike and two bananas. J And hot herbal tea and towels for the shower. The family doesn’t speak much English. In fact, Carlos didn’t speak much at all the whole time. But it turns out he is a first year law student at the University, and in his room we found a certificate by the president of the university for distinguished performance in legal argumentation.

Tuesday February 2. Today is our recovery day. In the morning Carlos’ father Felipe gave us a ride over to our compound at Servimont. We paid him the modest sum requested for the rides and lodging plus a huge tip for Carlos’ law books. Mr. Reyes greeted us and provided us a sumptuous breakfast of torta español and fresh croissants with home-made mango marmalade. The rest of the day was pretty low key: we didn’t feel up to doing much. We sorted our gear and repacked the van and washed dishes, caught up on email and blogging, and made travel plans for tomorrow. I learned that our friend Olivia is not at home in Veracruz, she is working for a few weeks in a small puebla on the Pacific coast in Oaxaca. We decided to flip our itinerary: go to visit Olivia in Oaxaca first, then drive down the west coast of Central America, picking up Belize on the return. Oh the joys of an open itinerary!

Talking with our primary host Mr. Reyes—he has never give us is first name—and with his driver Porfirio and meeting the Espinosa family has given us some insight into the class politics of small town Mexico. The Reyes family has been the major business owner in town for generations. They ran a soap factory for the better part of a century, and when that closed down they used the building for a bakery and store, then refit it as a museum and guiding business, with lodging and outfitting for international climbers—a business they started in the 1940’s. They are all well-educated and speak excellent English. As noted above, his uncle is a renown sailor. Mr. Reyes’ social status is evident in all his social interactions. The Espinosa family and Porfirio’s family are much more humble, and this also is evident in their bearing. For example, Felipe declined our invitation to come into the compound to see our van; he preferred to wait outside the gate. Porfirio ventured when asked that the Reyes family probably votes for the PRI, while his family usually supports PDA, the democratic action party.

Mr. Reyes recommended a restaurant for our dinner. Early to bed for the long drive tomorrow.