Quebrada Ishinca

Last Sunday we began our approach to acclimation peaks up Quebrada Ishinca. Our trip began with the young bus driver lashing our four 50 lb bags to the roof of the little collectivo (small toyota mini-bus used by locals for public transportation) with a single strand of thin cotton string. Brad Mastros and I shrugged our shoulders trusting the driver and crammed into a little bus with 12 other locals only for the bus to return to the depot due to road closures from a marathon race. So we dragged our bags to street corner and hailed down a much more expensive taxi to get us through the traffic jam and to the hills, but was also delayed by the race. During the taxi ride up the dirt road we had to pay and heavily negotiate (with our non-existent spanish) to get through road construction, an impromtu toll erected by compensinos (local poor farmers), a burro driver and two burros, and additional taxi ride up to the trailhead proper. I spent 10 minutes negotiating with a drunken compensino for his felt hat which was too small for me and had a large white and green stain on the front brim. I talked him down from 3 dollars to 1 dollar, then he backed out.
Four hours later the burros dropped out bags at base camp at 14,450 ft. in Quebrada Ishinca. After an acclimation hike day, we climbed an acclimatization peak, Urus, to 17,500 ft. It was easy so we planned to climb another acclimatization peak the next day. However, I spent the entire night wearing my down jacket and shivering in my zero degree bag with outside temperatures around 39 degrees. Each hour suddenly hot and droused in sweat, I would frantically try to open the tricky zipper of the sleeping bag, find my flip flops, grab a roll, and burst out the tent to the spot 20 feet from camp were my body would purge everything possible from every oriface. I spent the next 30 hours in the tent, slowing drinking warm Cyotmax drinks and eating easily digestible ramen noodles. Oh, praise to lovely ramen noodle gods for their magic! After the evening of purge and rehydration the following day, I was ready to go and attempt Toclaraju´s West Face Direct, a moderate ice climb at nearly 20,000. But clouds obscured the peaks so we decided to bail and arrange burros. Before we could arrange burros, the friendly Croatian expedition gave us three days of food including heavily smoked and salted Croatian pork that was over a month old! They insisted it was ok to eat, it tasted great and we´re not dead yet!
Heavy negotiations again were necessary to make the simplest contract with the burro driver, but we finally reached the trailhead Friday afternoon just in time to conjole our way onto another teams privately chartered collectivo for the ride back to Huaraz. By 4;00 that afternoon, we drank Cuzqueno negro, Peru´s local black ale vaguely reminescent of Berkeley´s Death and Taxes, as we sat on the plaza sharing gastrotestinal distress and other stories with fello climbers.

Pictures of Quebrada Ishinca and climbing Urus are here:

Quebrada Ishinca

Salud!, Chris