A Sierra La Vigilancia pic
Wednesday, August 17th, 2005
Here I am sitting on a rock admiring the view of the surrounding pampas and the sierra across the road.
Archive for the 'Escalada/Climbing' Category
« Home
Sierra La Vigilancia – Day 7
Sunday, August 14th, 2005Aug 7, 2005 – Sun
I love earplugs! Last night, I woke up to pee at some odd hour in the morning. They Realization group was partying hard throughout the night. All I heard was singing, shouting, and screaming. I love earplugs!
Today was another clear day, but it was cold as hell! I don´t know what the overnight low was, but it was 45 degrees when I woke up. We hit the walls earlier today. We went to Centro C to explore the routes that were taken yesterday. It was so damn cold!
Sean lead a route, one we believe to be a 5.10b. I had to belay with gloves on because I couldn´t feel my fingers otherwise. I followed and cleaned the route. It was really hard. I struggled at the bottom part, but eventually made it up. When I started climbing the route, my fingers were so frozen that I couldn´t feel them…I knew I was on the rock, but couldn´t feel the pressure on my fingers.
When I cleaned the top (taking quickdraws off, setting up the rappel), I tied a loose figure 8 knot in the end of the rope (an extra precaution, just in case the rope somehow manages to work it´s way back up, it will catch). I rappelled down. Then Sean began to pull the rope, with the knot still in it. I yelled at him to stop because I saw the figer 8. It was now some 10 feet or so off the ground. Shit. Now what?
I couldn´t help snickering at the whole situation because it was quite funny – the predicament we got ourselves into. We founda huge tree branch with other branches off of it. Long story short, Sean was able to untie the figure 8 with the branch (after many tries). Then we figured we should both stick to the same routine (he does not tie a knot at the end). Yes, a learning experience indeed!
The weather was unpredictable. It started out really sunny, then the clouds rolled in. It looked like it was raining in the distance, but there were bits of blue sky as well. One thing for sure, it was damn cold!!!
There was a large crack that I wanted to climb, so Sean hiked to the top of the sierra to set up a toprope. He had to sling into a tree to set it up, but only had one sling. So he lowered the rope and I tied another sling to it. While he was setting up the toprope, it started hailing. Not thunderstorm hailing, but hailing because it was so cold outside, ice, rather than rain, was falling from the sky in small pellets. I had to move all of our stuff below a sheltered roof nearby and hid there as well.
Sean hiked down all wet. The hail had let up (it was only a few minutes), and I jumped on the crack route. I really wanted to climb the feature. I was able to use leg jams, foot jams, and hand jams in the crack. It was nice to climb because many cracks are trad only — nice to use those techniques every once in a while.
Sean ended up climbing the right face, rather than the crack. After that, we rapped it up because we wanted to get back to the refugio to pack when it was still light out.
It was our last night at La Vigilancia. We paid our bill, but they only charged us 150 pesos for the both of us for 7 days, so we tipped Mauricio and Fernanda 50 pesos. Still dirt cheap! Most of the Realization group had left. Only 4, irresponsible annoying people of the group were left and a couple who seemed to be on their own. Fernanda had left as well, so there was no one working there. Those 4 people, I described l ike that, because: they clogged one of the toilets with toilet paper (when the sign says to throw the TP in the trash can), one of them was smoking inside the refugio (when there are no smoking signs everywhere), and they were really loud. We had visions of the 4 leaving the place in shambles.
Sierra La Vigilancia – Day 6
Sunday, August 14th, 2005
Yesterday, I found my clothes wet from my camelback leaking on it, so I hung a few clothes up and laid the rest out on the dorm bunk, thinking that no one would show up in the middle of the ... [Continue reading this entry]
Sierra La Vigilancia – Day 5
Saturday, August 13th, 2005
Aug 5, 2005 - Fri
It poured down rain throughout the entire night and didn´t stop till Friday evening. This was a day of doing nothing and vegging around. We hung out with Mauricio and his mom and her ... [Continue reading this entry]
Sierra La Vigilancia – Day 4
Saturday, August 13th, 2005
Aug 4, 2005 - Thurs
The clouds and the rain were very impending today. We decided to hike instead of climb, due to the unpredictable weather conditions.
We hiked up to the top of the sierra and around the top, and ... [Continue reading this entry]
Sierra La Vigilancia – Day 2
Saturday, August 13th, 2005
Aug 2, 2005 - Tues
We woke up, ate a little bit for breakfast, then headed for the walls. Mara, a cute little black dog that looks like a fox, accompanied us up to the walls all day long.
We were ... [Continue reading this entry]
Sierra La Vigilancia – Day 1
Saturday, August 13th, 2005
Aug 1, 2005 - Mon
Sean and I had an early morning start. We took the MicroMar bus from BsAs to Mar del Plata at 8am. We were the only passengers on board because Mar del Plata is a ... [Continue reading this entry]
How to stay in Argentina for $5/day or less…
Saturday, August 13th, 2005
Sierra La Vigilancia
The quote on the internet was $10/night for foreigners. The guy working there told us he talked to his brother and didn´t think it was fair that foreigners had to pay a lot more than Argentines ... [Continue reading this entry]
Escalada en roca =)
Saturday, June 25th, 2005
Ayer en la noche, busqué información de escalada en roca para Argentina. Puse un mensaje en www.rockclimbing.com y recibí dos repuestas. Me encontré un sitio de Internet con información de escalada acerca de Mar del Plata, ... [Continue reading this entry]
Marisa