Tuesday, December 27, 2011

Ecuador High Altitude Expedition #1 – The Hermann Family – Dispatch 3



Hermann Family Expedition 

December 23, 2011 to January 3, 2012

Guides:  Pepe Landazuri and Freddy Tipan

Climbers:  Mark, Wendy, Mackenzie, Chelsea, and Gavin Hermann and Dave Garrabrant

 

Pepe called late Monday night (Dec 26th) with the following report:

"We had an excellent day on Guagua Pichincha.   Everyone was again feeling strong and set a good pace throughout the day, and we easily made it to the summit at 15.670 feet.

Mackenzie was feeling good again today, so I am glad to say she joined us for the acclimatization ascent and did really well!  

[This afternoon (Dec 27) Gavin sent a photo of Mackenzie and himself near the summit.]

After the hike, we drove north towards Cayambe (which is our first big climbing goal) to Hacienda Guachala.  We had an easy evening and a great dinner, and now people are thinking of heading to bed.

[At that point, Mark came on the sat. phone]

Hey there from high in the mountains of Ecuador.  We had a terrific day today – a beautiful hike – and now we are at a gorgeous hacienda.  This place is beautiful.  And we just had an EXCELLENT dinner!  


We are very happy to be here, and I am glad to say, everybody is acclimatizing quite well and feeling very good.  We are looking forward to getting up to the hut on Cayambe tomorrow.  We are having a lot of fun together, and we are quite excited to be going higher.  We'll give you another report tomorrow.  Good night for now."