Trials and Tribulations on Cerro Tronador

Tronador was different. We started with a unique connection and worked forwards from there.

The "we" in this instance being myself and Adele Priestley. Adele is a badass. We went to school together and she was eccentric then, and has only gotten more outlandish since. She's a professional plow driver, yoga instructor, photographer, and a super strong skier. Mostly she's just stubborn as hell and that resolve has allowed her to excel in more fields than most. She spends her winters sleeping outside in an uninsulated 1968 mini trailer and I've never heard her complain about it once. She's the perfect adventure partner.

After we graduated from school, Adele moved to Chile for six years. Convinced she would never leave, Adele worked hard to form relationships and established herself in communities normally inaccessible to non-Chileans.

Adele and I had long talked about Chile and attempting something unique there. We both wanted to take advantage of her extensive connections and language skills. One such connection was with the Valesquez family. For as long as anyone could remember, the cowboys of the Valesquez family had inhabited and controlled the roadless valley that cradled the Rio Blanco from its outlet in Ralun all the way to its origins on the flanks of the tallest mountain in the region...the mighty Cerro Tronador. This was a route that was untested because the Valesquez family had no interest in opening their valley to travel, but Adele had befriended one of the young cowboys and he was willing to talk to his father, the family patriarch Gerardo Valesquez.

So Adele reached out and Geraldo Valesquez agreed to provide us with the necessary horses and guidance. But he did not promise to be welcoming, he never pretended to be happy about spending time with two gringos.

We knew that Tronador had been summited in the past, but we figured that the combination of not only climbing, but also skiing, as well a Chilean horseback approach could provide us with the unique combination that would render our adventure "a first". So the approach was the anticipated crux from the beginning. In attempting something unique we counted on unforeseen obstacles on the road to Tronador. What I didn't foresee is that the road wouldn't exist at all.

After three days on horseback we got our first look at the mountain. Tronador looked entirely out of place. It rose out of the Patagonian rainforest and wore none of the dense flora that surrounded us. It looked terrifying from afar, all cliffs and glaciers, with no obvious ascent routes. The riding was difficult and tedious. All but one of the families that occupied the valley we traveled had long since abandoned their homes in favor of a modern lifestyle. As a result, the trails they had once maintained had begun to disappear.

The path dwindled with every mile and we spent increasingly more time hacking our way through the new growth with machetes. It was slow going, but our spirits were high with every day we got closer to our objective. But the farther up valley we traveled the more irritable and nervous our guide became. Since his family and relatives had retreated from the upper valley he had not returned, and now he worried about the dangers that lay ahead. Armed with machetes, day after day we worked our way through the undergrowth and along the rocky cliff faces that defended the valley.

And then we came to an impasse we could not solve with machetes. The ancient bridge Geraldo's ancestors had created for crossing the Rio Blanco had partially collapsed, leaving it lopsided and gap-toothed. Geraldo told us this was as far as he could guide us, and that our adventure was over. Adele and I decided we had come too far and worked too hard to quit so close. We told Geraldo we would continue unguided, on foot. Carrying everything on our backs, we were forced to leave our tent and most of our provisions behind.

Within an hour of being told our trip was over Adele and I were repacked and on foot, shuffling our way across the remnants of the ancient bridge. Gerlando unmounted and crossed the bridge with us. It was the most I'd seen him walk in three days. On the other side he held my gaze for the first time as he shook my hand and wished us luck. We told him we planned to return in five days.

Now we were hacking our way through the Patagonian rainforest on foot. Lacking a trail, we used GPS and wild boar trails to make our way towards the ridgeline we hoped would provide access to the upper snowfields of the mountain.

It took us nearly four hours to go a mere 1.5 miles. Rainfall turned into a full-on downpour. Geraldo had told us that there was a shack near the treeline on the southernmost ridgeline of the mountain. We hoped it still stood, since most of the old farmhouses we had seen in the valley had long since collapsed.

We found the shack at dusk. Its door was off the hinges, and it was in complete disrepair, but its roof was mostly intact and the dirt floor was dry. We started a fire inside to dry our clothes and fend off hypothermia.

The following day was spent much like the first, hacking our way through the underbrush and following boar tracks. Apparently no one had traveled this path in several years and the forest had quickly reclaimed what was once uncontested. In places, we could follow the old trail but it was overgrown with branches that constantly ensnared our enormous backpacks and bodies. Rather than carrying our skis on our bags we used them to part the underbrush as we forced our way forward.

That night the hunger really began to set in. Having to carry everything forced some serious cuts in our food stores. We had rationed a little less than 1000 calories per day. Adele and I woke the next day in wet sleeping bags to a foot of new snow. We had no choice but to get moving.

As soon as we gained the ridge that would take us to high camp, the storm returned with a vengeance. Enveloping clouds deprived us of our bearings. The strongest winds I have ever encountered threatened to blow us all the way back to the Rio Blanco. My left eardrum sustained an injury in that storm that was still ringing two weeks later.

Eventually, we made it to the stone hut that would be our home for the next two nights. It was more like a frozen mausoleum than a shelter. Gaps in the rocks that created the walls of the hut had allowed snow to blow into the little structure. When we arrived, the door wouldn't open. Looking through the cracks we could see that the entire structure was filled with snow. With the storm still hammering us I felt a real pang of panic. We leaned against the door and tried to extract the snow with the adze of our ice axes. It was completely futile. In a fit of rage and frustration I kicked the door and the top of it swung open. It was a dutch door and I had sheared the bolt joining the top half to the bottom. A most welcome surprise.

We nicknamed it the Ice Box. Exhausted, we shoveled and cleared the little shelter until sunset, then crawled into our sleeping bags to endure one of the coldest nights of our lives.

The next morning, I woke up to Adele vomiting outside the Ice Box. It was the result of a full night of shivering and acute dehydration. Melting enough snow for water was difficult because our propane canisters kept freezing. We took turns holding the little canisters in our bare hands to keep the flame alight.

We spent the morning recovering from the bitter cold night, melting water and taking stock of food and fatigue. That afternoon, the storm subsided abruptly. Encouraged by the first sunshine in days we decided to go on an exploratory tour through the glaciated terrain above the Ice Box. 

Roped together, we set off in the direction of the peaks. We skinned in between gaping crevasses until we reached the basin below the west face of the Pico Argentina, one of Tronador's three peaks. Too close to the top to turn around, we transitioned to crampons and climbed to the highest skiable point. A short vertical band of rock above us marked the summit.

We celebrated by arcing GS turns down the west face as we watched the sun set over Chile.

Knowing the weather would hold, we decided to attempt a second summit the following day. I set an alarm for 4am and prepared for bed. Adele climbed into her sleeping bag fully dressed, beacon still on.

We began touring in the pre-dawn dark. Following our ascent route from the day before, we were able to navigate the glacier with relative ease. Eventually our progress slowed. After a quick and rocky down-climb onto the west face, we were confronted with a long and crumbling ice traverse.

After several hours spent hanging on the points of our ice axes and crampons, we encountered a wind slab that encompassed the entire north face, and our only possible ascent route. A quick hand-pit test demonstrated an instability in the snowpack that, given several thousand feet of exposure below us, neither of us could justify crossing. The choice to turn around was obvious, but frustrating nonetheless. It was time to start the long trek home.

Hours later and thousands of feet lower, we looked back at the place where we had turned around. Even from our new position, miles away, we could see that a naturally triggered avalanche had crossed just beyond our decision point.

It's so rare that you get that sort of validation from a "safe" decision in the mountains. Unheard of really. But that day the mountain winked at us and let us know we had made the right call. A celebration was in order. This time with two cereal bars each.

After bushwhacking downhill for two days, Adele and I staggered into the field where we left our horses and Geraldo. It had been exactly five days since we had seen him (or anyone). We collected the food we had been forced to leave behind and proceeded to eat for several hours.

In addition to being very relieved to see us, Geraldo was also extremely curious about Tronador. He had spent his entire life in its shadow but had never ventured much past the little shack Adele and I had used for shelter on our way to the glacier.

When we showed him the pictures of us skiing from the peaks, his entire attitude changed.

Prior to our ascent, Geraldo would make sure we knew how difficult it was to secure our skis to the horses. A burden we apologized for daily. He didn't like gringos, and he let that feeling be known. The day after our return, Geraldo stopped us half way through our usual apology. He said, "everything is ok, we are headed home and I have been a part of something that has never been done before." He even smiled at us. He called us friends and shared his food.

Two more days on horseback and we would be back in Ensenada. It had been ten days since we had left the comforts of town. We were each ten pounds lighter and were fighting the acute effects of exhaustion. But we had accomplished our goal. We had reached Tronador from Chile and skied from one of its highest points.

There is so much to be gained in simply trying hard things.