Peru 2024 Pt 2: Growing Up

This builds off of Peru 2024 Pt 1, so please go back and read that first… or don’t. What’s life without a little whimsy?

Our group of alpinists has a diverse range of skills and experience. Matt and Alan work IT for two completely different industries (public sector and technology), but both have cool climbing experience. Nate is a Wildlife Veterinarian for the State of Nevada, but also does a lot of backcountry skiing. Miles is an Engineer, is a quick runner and backcountry skier, and through-hiked the PCT last year. I am a Respiratory Therapist for both a local hospital and the Air National Guard, and have experience as a Search and Rescue medic (with a lot of rope rescue training). We collectively have a lot of applicable experience, but would all like to be more well-rounded before we take on larger objectives. 

In 2023, we climbed the Hotlum Left Ice Gully on Shasta which included a 1000 foot snow climb, and the Disappointment Cleaver on Rainier on which we had to work out a re-route around a massive open crevasse (that is still there this season). After Rainier, we started talking about what we wanted to climb in 2024. Peru came up as a possibility because it is relatively inexpensive to travel to and climb in, has extremely accessible high mountains, and we would be able to see how we do at altitudes over 20,000 feet. After a couple months of tossing around other options, Peru came out on top and we started to plan around this trip. 

Mountain routes have grades of technicality so climbers can decide if their ability and skill matches those required for that route. Our objectives require technical skills including glacier travel and crevasse crossing, snow and ice climbing, alpine rock scrambling and mild climbing, and altitude acclimatization and risk mitigation. We have many of these skills, but were all able to do some ice climbing in Lee Vining and June Lake in January. These days were fun, great practice, and also gave us great perspective on gear selection for our Peru trip. It also gave us another trip that we got to spend time together, which is important. We are now actual friends who climb together, but also do other things together. 

Nate has been backcountry skiing a ton as part of his training, with Miles going on some of the trips with him. We’ve all been rock climbing off-and-on through the Spring and Summer both inside and outdoors. Matt and I also climbed a new route (as far as we know) in the Sierra’s that involved some snow climbing, route planning, and a mildly spicy mixed (snow and rock) section. All of these help us make better decisions on the gear to bring on our trip. Getting the best gear of any type doesn’t often make-of-break the success of an objective, but having the right gear does. Gear decisions are best made by trial and error. 

Beyond technical skills, we’ve all been training physically for the past 6 months. While we aren’t all on the same exact training plan or the same week of each plan, we are all doing some sort of training plan to build endurance, get stronger, and be the most physically prepared that we can be. This required hours of time each week at the loss of sleep and time with our families. Below are some examples of some of the workouts we did.

Besides snow skills and physical training, there are also a ton of smaller skills required for this trip. Though these mountains are climbed almost every year, the actual paths on each route are not marked and boot paths from earlier climbing parties can be unreliable. The ability to navigate and read terrain is a necessity for our team. Another skill needed for each member is basic first aid and how to handle medical emergencies with what we will be carrying. We’ll be doing some discussion and training while acclimatizing in Huaraz, Peru to get familiar with our group first aid kit. 

We’ve been planning and training for the past 8 months and are ready to go have some high adventure in one of the most spectacular parts of our planet! We’ll be posting photos, videos, and blog posts as often as we have internet, so stay tuned for more posts!

Pt 3 is about gear and equipment for the trip!