CERRO ACONCAGUA (22,843') -
ARGENTINAFebruary 4 - 27, 1993 - Steve Smith
Several climbing friends and I decided to attempt a climb of Cerro Aconcagua during February. We had a total of eight participants - six who would go for the summit and two wives who would wait at basecamp or Mendoza. Our six climbers were four Desert Survivors (Doug Ran, Morgan Irby, Nobby Riedy, Don Falk), a BLM Friends of the Inyo WSA volunteer (Wendell Moyer), and myself. Dale Van Dalsem and R.J. Secor provided me with excellent information which we used in making the climb.
Morgan Irby went down to Santiago two weeks early to travel down to Tierra del Fuego but before starting his odyssey to southern Chile, he traveled to Mendoza and obtained all six climbing permits for our summit group. The permits cost $80/person and we had to provide a recent ERG and doctor's letter that said we were physically fit to do the climb. While there, Morgan also made an initial quick solo recon of the route and carried a load of group supplies up to Plaza Canada (16,300').
During the recon, Morgan discovered that the Hotel Refugio at Plaza de Mulas had just opened - its billed as the highest hotel in the world. He also made arrangement for our group to stay in nice lodging at the Penitentes ski resort three miles below the usual staging area at Puente del Inca. It is the base of operations for "Aconcagua Express" mule service operated by Ricardo Jatib, C.C. 15-5545 Uspallata, Mendoza, phone 061-247062, which provided us with outstanding support
