{"id":11122,"date":"2017-04-28T01:41:45","date_gmt":"2017-04-28T05:41:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.escapeartist.com\/?p=11122"},"modified":"2020-06-01T11:21:24","modified_gmt":"2020-06-01T15:21:24","slug":"day-2-warm-day-turns-cold-snowy-wet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.escapeartist.com\/blog\/day-2-warm-day-turns-cold-snowy-wet\/","title":{"rendered":"Day 2: A Warm Day Turns Cold, Snowy, and Wet"},"content":{"rendered":"
Thank goodness our trail mate, Eric, had not told us of the previous year\u2019s trip. In fact, Steve had only sent us pictures of the trip 2 years prior, to be sure to lure us into this. I\u2019m pretty sure that my invitation to Carol would have been met with much less enthusiasm if she\u2019d known the truth about the trip the previous year.<\/span><\/p>\n In a nutshell, the previous year\u2019s group was snowed in right after starting and spent the first 2 days in a tiny <\/span>refugio<\/span><\/i> (a stone hut with a fireplace) while the storm dumped 5 feet of snow on the mountains. They made it, but were forced to push through the rest of the journey in 2 days, in what took us 4 to cross. Eric and Steve related the stories after we got started…and after it was too late to turn back.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Weather in the mountains is unpredictable, even in the summer. We were about to find this out firsthand. After getting up at first light, which is just before 7:00 A.M. in Argentina, I rolled out of bed, visited my favorite boulder, and then found Edgardo and Cristian enjoying a <\/span>mate<\/span><\/i> by the campfire.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Mate<\/span><\/i> is as much a social experience as it is a caffeine jolt. A gourd is filled with a ground up relative of the holly tree, hot water is poured over it and then it is drunk through a filtered straw made of metal. They refilled the gourd and passed it over to me.<\/span><\/p>\n The protocol is that when you are drinking the <\/span>mate<\/span><\/i>, you don\u2019t stir or move the straw, don\u2019t speak, and drink until you get that slurping sound when you reach the bottom. Then you hand it back to the person filling the gourd and wait your turn to drink again.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n The straw is shared by all and is not wiped or cleaned between uses. I was told repeatedly by Steve and Cora that the silver metal kills the germs and bacteria of previous users. I seriously doubt that and wondered if they were trying to convince themselves. I wasn\u2019t convinced, but truly didn\u2019t care. The <\/span>mate<\/span><\/i> was great, the company was fantastic, and the germs were welcome to give me more disease-fighting ability in the future. Remember, if it doesn\u2019t kill you, it makes you stronger.<\/span><\/p>\n After other folks were up and about, breakfast was served. The tents and gear were then packed and we hit the trail. Departure was planned for around 9:30 or 10:00 A.M. to give the sun a chance to rise above the valley walls and warm the chill that lingers on the valley floor overnight. But we had a schedule to keep to make it over the pass and down into the valley and the <\/span>refugio<\/span><\/i> by dark. The Notch by noon. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n The ride to the pass was steep and lasted about 3 hours, clearing over 3,000 vertical feet in under 3 miles. The solitude and vast emptiness is staggering, as we saw in our long steady climb up to the high pass.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n