The Team is enjoying a well deserved rest today in the beautiful city of Puebla after our success on Iztaccihuatl yesterday. We are staying in the historic center which deservedly is a UNESCO World Heritage site. We are all greatly looking forward to our next objective El Pico De Orizaba tomorrow. It seems one or two of my cybercasts on Izta at the summit yesterday did not successfully go through or cut out, this is probably due to the mountains topography blocking the sat phone’s connection so I will give you a brief recap of our progress so far.
We awoke yesterday at our high camp hut, the Otis Macallister, at the base of the Ayoloco Glacier in the early hours to a beautiful night. Earlier in the evening, we were rewarded with spectacular views of the lights of Amecameca, Tlalmanalco and Mexico City. Myself, Carlos and Gibran our local guides, and 7 of our 9 climbers made the summit in good style just after the sun was rising. Mark and Tim unfortunately did not join us on the summit but they both gave it there all and this time around it just wasn’t to be. Each team member at some point had to dig deep and their success is testament to the tenacity, fitness and perseverance they all exhibited. The going was far from easy due to continuing glacial recession however recent snow on our last trip made conditions underfoot better than the recent past. We were all amply rewarded for our efforts with spectacular views on what was a beautiful, clear sunny day. After that we descended down to the La Joya trail head where we were meet by Arnoldo, our driver and tour guide, who had kindly prepared a lunch for us and had our welcome change of clean clothes. The team spent today on a tour with Arnoldo, sightseeing in the historic old town of Puebla, Cholula and relaxing in our beautiful boutique hotel the El Sueno. They say a picture is worth a thousand words so I have included some here to give you a glimpse of our trip so far. Everyone says “hello” and sends their love and we are all looking forward to future successes on Orizaba in the coming few days.
Thanks for tuning in.
