Patagonia: An inspired Moment

Thanks to Seba at Aylen Aike for making our stay so pleasant. Thomas posing for the wall of fame.

After a wet departing party for some gringos and long night and a long night that ended up at the lokal Tango place in El Chalten, Thomas Meling and I got inspired to make use of the last little window of good weather. We started our hike up to Paso Guillamet after an early dinner and made it up to the bivi well past midnight. After a few houres sleep in the pass followed by a shot of coffee and some Clif bars we started scrambing up the Brenner route in head lights and summited at 8.30 am. We rapped the Amy couloir and were back by 10 just as the wind picked up, just as the forcast had predicted. A mellow lunch at the pass before we raced down the talus and made it back to the Rio Electrico bridge in 2.40 h. 17.40 CTC. Way better than submitting to being hung over and watching movies at the hostel.

Scrambling in magic morning light. Fhoto: Thomas Meling

Patagonia, a late update.

A lot of stuff has been going on over last couple of weeks but too slow inetrnet connection. David and I have mostly unsucessfully attempted various things. A lot of cool stuff has been done by other climbers. Such as Magnus Eriksson's and Thomas Meling's integral ascent of the Mate y Porro" on the north pillar of Fitzroy just houres after the first complete ascent. Here are a few pics from David's and my attempt of the Pendulorama-Kearney/Night on the north pillar of Fitz. Unfortunately David got sick and started puking on the first bivi. A pity since conditions were perfect.  The pendulorama variation was not as bad as people have been saying and is in my opinion an excellent option if the gully from the other side isn't in. A brilliant line in it's whole that's worth coming back for. Definately! We descended via the regular approach gully (bowling alley). Not recomended in warm weather! To quote Jules in Pulp Fiction: "That was divine intervention".

[caption id="attachment_576" align="aligncenter" width="553" caption="Stemming up a not to bad corner on the Pendulorama. Photo: David Fält"][/caption]

 

 

Patagonia: First round

Back down in El Chalten again since a couple of days after two nights at the Piedra Negra bivvi and a quick hit in the mountains. Magnus, Thomas and I climbed the Fonrouge route on Aguja Guillamet in pretty snowy and cold conditions up to the ridge and rapped down the Guillotte couloir on my third day here. Good fun!
Now we're hanging out with the outher gringos, bouldering, sportsclimbing and eating chocolate and beef.



[caption id="attachment_564" align="aligncenter" width="461" caption="Thomas Meling climbing the 6b+ corner on the Fonrouge route Aguja Guillamet. Magnus Eriksson belaying."][/caption]

[caption id="attachment_565" align="aligncenter" width="336" caption="Thomas Meling on A. Guillamet"][/caption]

[caption id="attachment_562" align="aligncenter" width="336" caption="Mange getting into

Geting here was quite an epic and it seemed to get totally out of hand but things ended up running pretty smoothly after all. Plane tickets to El Calafate emerged from out of the blue, we survived a day on one USD which bought us a piece of bread to share between two and to top it my lost bag arrived a day ago.

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