We had two days at Banos and lower altitude before attempting our third peak in six days – Chimborazo, the tallest mountain in Ecuador. We made our way through the Chimborazo National Park to an upper parking area. Once unloaded we headed up two hours and 2,000′ to high camp. Yes – high camp is aptly named as it sits at 17,338′. This was the most primitive of camps – everything including a commercial size stove, wood for the outhouses, giant sleeping tents, fuel, etc., had to be carried up by porters.

We dumped all our gear and headed into the kitchen tent for dinner. Then back to the sleeping tent where we were stacked up like cordwood!

After no sleep and listening to the winds howl for hours, we were woken up at midnight for our summit attempt. I was feeling extremely tired, slightly upset stomach (several days of runny, local yogurt to blame?) but ate breakfast and decided to make as much of an effort as I could. Unfortunately, after an hour of basically vertical ascent 1,000′ through rock and rubble fields (on crampons – which is not fun,) I decided that it was just not my day and turned around.

It was to be another 5 hours climbing to the summit once the team finally reached the glacier, but everyone made it! Yay Team! They showed me photos of the ice and rime on their faces and said it was windy and cold almost the entire time. I was so happy for everyone – they obviously should be proud of their summits and hard work!

There are really two summits to Chimborazo: Ventimilla and the Whymper summit. Most people only climb the Ventimilla because although the two summits are only a few hundred feet apart, altitude sickness and/or bad snows conditions between the two summits can make that additional very short trip take several extra hours. Brandi chose to stop at the first summit while the other three headed to the true summit.

As I was heading down the mountain, I looked up and saw two teams descending. I waited at the parking area with Jacob (we switched guides when I turned back) for our bus to arrive. Once everyone was down safely we headed to our hotel and a well deserved nap!

The trip had started on my birthday but everyone arrived in the evening on the 25th and we didn’t actually meet until the next morning so I never mentioned anything. After the Chimborazo climb I mentioned that I had my birthday on the trip and it was agreed that I could have a glass of champagne at the hotel. HAHA Unfortunately it was the weekend of their presidential election. In Ecuador it is mandatory to vote and there was no alcohol service on Saturday or Sunday, even for tourists. I made do with a giant chocolate covered chocolate mousse bomb, though so all was not lost!

The next day, we parted ways – some had early morning flights while Alex and I had the same late evening flight out of Quito to Atlanta. We just lounged around for the day – I managed a short horseback ride and she had a test to take for her MBA. We met for lunch, dinner and then rode to the airport together – once we got to Atlanta, she headed to Seattle and I made it back to Salt Lake City.

And then home it was after a grand adventure!