A mountain climb in Bolivia.

In Novermber-December La Paz ran out of water because the year had been so dry. This year has been very snowy in the Bolivian mountains. In early March I happened to ride bike outside (I almost always ride an indoor trainer) in the highlands and noticed that all the mountains that usually don't have snow were now all white. Since then I have gone up from La Paz almost weekly for different reasons, and the mountains are still covered in snow.

At the end of May I decided to climb a mountain after about 9 months. Even in April and May it rained a lot and snowed in the mountains so it was a bit difficult to find the perfect time to go. Cloudy and rainy weather is not very nice for climbing, and there could be avalanches after it snows heavily. Especially around the last weekend of April it rained very much and it was cold. I usually don't watch the Bolivian news because there are so many bad things happening, but once during that weekend or the next Monday I saw the news and there had been a tragedy on Illimani due to an avalanche.

The last weekend of May was supposed to be partially sunny, so I made the decision to go to the Huayna Potosi area to try and climb Pico Italiano. I woke up early and left home at 3.48 in the night (morning) even though it was raining and foggy. I hoped it would clear up by sunrise. The drive was quite slow and on the small dirt road that rises from Autopista towards the mountains I could only see about 10 meters because of the fog. Higher, close to Chacaltaya I surprised myself by getting surprised by the snow that was on the road. After Milluni checkpoint it started to snow and the road was covered in about 5 cm of snow.

I started the walk towards the "normal" route on the rarely climbed Pico Italiano while it was still all dark, at maybe 5.40 A.M. Once on the glacier, there was a lot of soft snow. I had been on that glacier various times before, but this was the first time that it was covered in snow. The crevasses were covered in snow and it was difficult to see where they were. For some reason I experienced some mild snow blindness a couple of times: everything seemed just white. I proceeded slowly trying not to step in crevasses, but also the soft snow made walking there quite tiring. As it got warmer, my crampons started to ball up with the moist snow that made walking even more difficult. I don't know about the more modern equipment, but I once weighed my boots and they are 2,0 kilos or 4.4 pounds each with the inner boot, the boot itself and a crampon. That is quite heavy at least at the end of a long climb. I got my boots used from an agency in La Paz that rents equipment for guided climbs.

For a moment it was sunny, but soon extremely heavy clouds rolled in.

It took too long to get to the beginning of the narrow and steep couloir that rises 100 meters from 5400 to 5500 m. It also looked loaded with loose snow. It would have been very slow, tiring and also a bit risky to take that route so I decided to abandon the plan and just climbed to a very minor peak that was 5410 meters high.

 On the way down it snowed heavily the whole time. It had been so cold the whole day that I was only barely able to start my car. I got a bronchitis after the trip and spent 8 days resting.

Titicaca Triatlon Olimpico: World's Highest Olympic Distance Triathlon at 3800 meters 12 500 ft

Back in November I heard that a "tennis club" from La Paz was going to organize an olympic distance triathlon (1,5-40-10 km) at Lake Titicaca. Club Tenis La Paz is a very exclusive club located in the best residencial area of La Paz. They have really nice facilities that include at least multiple tennis courts, 25 meter pool indoors and outdoors, a gym and a sauna, some social facilities and I don't know what else. Sometimes they organize swim meets and at least once a year a half marathon. So I thought I wanted to participate in their triathlon. Since fall 2015 I had only done some cycling races.

Originally they planned to have space for 80 or 100 participants (I'm not sure of the exact number). I was quite sure I had plenty of time to sign up later, but one morning about 6 weeks from the registration deadline I saw that this was the last possible day to sign up. The options were to fill out an online form, then go to a bank to pay and finally bring the receipt to the tennis club offices no later than that afternoon, or you could go there and sign up and pay in person. So I went there and signed up. I asked how someone could become a member of the tennis club to have access to the facilities. The answer was that you just have to pay 48 000 USD and get recommendations from 2 people who are already members. There is no monthly amount you could pay. But still, it was a normal late Friday morning and there were about 50 cars in the parking lot.

That was in the beginning of February. In mid-February there was an uphill cycling race from La Paz center to neighboring El Alto, which is 400 meters higher. I had a really good race except that I had to fix a flat tire 8 minutes into the race. Very good legs and watts were higher than last time on same route.

Sometimes I managed to swim 2 times a week, but on average just once a week. I have dumbbells at home so they replaced some swims. Running progressed quite nicely while doing 2 workouts each week, all of them at over 3800 meters elevation or 12 500 ft where I live.

Six days before the triathlon there was a 60 km cycling road race outside El Alto. I got away by myself from the gun and time trialed on my road bike all of the distance. One very good 43-year old cyclist also got away from the group and was about 300 meters behind me for the last 40 km but luckily he didn't quite catch me and I won by 15 seconds in the end. It was my first win here after having done 14 of these races.

3 days before the tri I finally put my wetsuit to use for the first time since November 2013 and did 3x500 hard in a 50 meter pool. On Friday I took a bus from La Paz to Copacabana with a friend. The trip took 4 hours and it rained in the city, but in Copacabana it was sunny so I decided to swim in the Titicaca for the first time. The water was super cold and I used my neoprene cap. I only swam maybe 7-10 minutes because I just wanted to know how the water felt like. Then we rode easily the bike course that would be 2 laps and a bit extra.

I had always thought that it would be terrible if it rained during the race. Here in the Bolivian highlands that include La Paz and Titicaca, it can be quite nice when it's sunny, but as soon as it's cloudy it feels chilly. Add rain, and it's cold. Always. Saturday morning came and before I wanted to wake up I heard it was raining outside. The rain stopped but it was totally cloudy. The race start time was 8.30 so there was no way the temperature was going to be even near comfortable at that time with the cloudy sky. There would be an individual triathlon, team triathlon and also a bike+run race, and all participants combined there were over 160 people racing that day.

It was truly cold with a bit of a breeze, I think before the race the temperature was around 7 degrees (45F)  and in the transition area everybody were shaking while getting ready and putting their wetsuits on. When it was time to get in the water, there was a lot of hesitation in the air and once we were on the "start line" in the water, everybody were screaming "VAMOS!" I believe the water temperature was barely over 10 degrees (50F) and no way it was more than 12 (54F).

Without any warm up, the cold water and high elevation made for really difficult first 200 meters, and on top of that the we had to swim straight into the waves. The swim was 2 laps on a triangular course. After the first turn it got a little easier but swimming parallel to the waves made me just a little bit dizzy. I think my neoprene cap was a big advantage and quite quickly I almost forgot about the cold, but sometimes I would try to move my fingers to see if my hands were ok. It never got difficult to move my fingers, so it looked good. The swim went quite good overall but I don't know what my time was because I didn't wear a watch and no one told me my time. No one also told me how far behind the leader I was. Usually at least someone would be there to tell racers what the situation is. A guy who won one of last year's national championships quit in the swim.

It was raining when I got out of the water so I knew I had to put some extra clothes on even though I knew pretty much no one else would do that. I knew I would lose time but I wanted to be comfortable during cycling. I could not imagine getting out of the cold lake, into the cold air and riding at quite high speeds that would make it feel even colder. Being quick in the transition seems to be kind of a priority so almost everyone else just started riding in their triathlon suits or shorts and a top. Only those who were in the team competition doing the cycling seemed to have clothes on. Of all the participants in the triathlon and bike+run, 27 individuals did not finish, and the cold conditions may have a lot to do with that.

 I got my wetsuit off quite quickly but then I put on my hat, long sleeve shirt, a light jacket, a vest, long tights to keep the legs warm, and also gloves! I put on my cycling shoes right there, because after the transition area there was about 300 meters long hill that was not exactly cobbled, but the surface was made up of kind of stones so I thought it would have been difficult to get the shoes on while on the bike, especially in the wet. Again, I think I was pretty much the only one who did this, based on the race pictures I saw afterwards. Most wanted to be quick in the transition, but I chose to be able to pedal properly in that hill. The first kilometer in the town was on stoned / cobbled streets, but after that the surface was ok. Now it was raining only very slightly and at some point it stopped. We rode to the Peruvian border two times (Kasani village) and then did some extra. The bike course was closed to traffic! The profile was nice with a bit of flat riding and some hills. There were some sharp speed bumps.

Cycling felt very strong and by the end I was just 50 meters behind the leader of the individual race. I think that after my slow transition I may have been up to 5 minutes behind. On a short cobbled section just before the end my chain dropped on a slight uphill and I had to stop to put it back on.

Before starting the run I took my jacket, vest, hat and gloves off. The run was 2 out and back loops on Copacabana beach. Now it was raining again. After maybe 4 km I caught the leader and we ran side by side for a while. This is a guy from La Paz that I know well and who has represented Bolivia in the 2015 Pan American games in Canada. Another Bolivia's top triathletes participated only in the team competition and did the run segment. At one point there was a police officer on a motorbike who said that this is where the turnaround is. There was also a table with water mugs and a girl there, but she didn't say anything, so we assumed the policeman was wrong and decided to run all the way to the finish area where we believed the turn around point was. We got there, but there it did feel like we were not supposed to be there and we stopped for a while to ask where the turn around is and then just headed back for the second loop. Soon I got away from the other guy and eventually managed to finish over 1 minute ahead of him. I'm glad that the 3rd place guy was not very close to me and 2nd place because it turned out that we really did at least 1 kilometer of extra. My finish time was 2.21 but it would have been maybe 4-5 minutes faster without the "extra mile" but anyway it was expected that at this elevation especially the run would be quite slow.

To my surprise was given a nice Huawei cell phone and 1000 bolivianos ( over 140 USD ) for my win!

Sports

From the beginning of August I slowly took up sports again. In December 2015 and January 2016 I barely trained at all. Somehow I was in very good cycling form in the beginning of April and did two road races. Then again from mid-April until August I didn't really do anything.

In the beginning I did mostly just cycling but not much at all. Then started jogging and increasing hours on the bike. Still the training was very modest but I participated in cycling races. I think in October I started doing occasional hard running workouts, and sometimes I was able to log in  quite decent training weeks. Sometime in November I started swimming 2 or 1 times a week . In December cycling fitness started to be really good and running was ok. In total I did 8 cycling races between August and December 11th. Swimming is still slow. So for the whole year I totaled 10 cycling races, but no running races or triathlons. Finding time for training is not easy when you work 45 hours a week and need 3 hours to do a 1 hour swim workout and five hours if you go and do a good track workout after the swim. It's not very sustainable especially if something comes up and you have to do something extra like taking care of some paperwork or go to the dentist or doctor.

Another trip to Pico Italiano in July 2016

A few days after Illimani on July 23 I headed for Pico Italiano for the fourth time. This time my only goal was to look for my ice axes that I had lost there at about 5320 meters after a fall in April. I felt quite relaxed because I knew it was not going to take all day. Just wake up well before sunrise ( can't remember at what time), drive slowly to Huayna's base camp, walk the path a little bit and head to the big glacier without snow. Like I've written before, the mountains in Bolivia practically don't have any snow. They are in sad condition.

An icy slope lead me to where the ice axes should be. I went through a large area very carefully, and all that time I was afraid of rock falls. They are very common around there, I have seen it. Luckily just some small ice particles fell down, and small stones. I thought the ice axes could be found easily, but it took some time to find one. The other one was nowhere to be found but I was ok with just one.

Illimani July 2016

In mid-July I wanted to climb Sajama with a Russian person but we were advised against it by two people who knew the current conditions quite well. So we went to Illimani instead, with a guide. I had climbed Illimani in 2015 alone but I was happy to go there again because it is a pretty and very high mountain and the symbol of La Paz. I also believed that it could be in an ok shape because the route is on the side of the mountain that is more in the shadow. So I thought it might not be all ice.

The climb was not successful but still the trip was pretty nice. 4 days. It was fun to see the place again and to pass all the features along the route that I had seen the year before. Somehow the rocky ridge to high camp felt more difficult than last time. It would be a nightmare with a little bit of wet snow there.

On the third day we woke up a 1 a.m. I had actually slept better than I expected and the tent was quite warm, I didn't need to sleep with my big jacket on. Last time I went without a tent. That does sound a little rough now. The camp was at 5490 m. The beginning of the climb was a steep ridge that was rock and sand. Normally it would be snow but this year (2016) there is no snow on the mountains. I didn't like that ridge either. Just like the ridge below the high camp, one mistake could have extremely serious consequences. You could fall and not be able to stop or not be stopped by rocks and go all the way down for an eternity. With snow it is a lot easier. This year it has not rained or snowed much and since about October there has not been enough water for the city. Many have been weeks mostly without water.

The we put on boots and crampons. From there the ridge continued but it was not very hard. However it was all ice. Luckily the ice was in forms of medium sized penitentes so it was not so hard to stay upright. We were very slow, going roped up. The Russian complained for at least an hour because her rented boots were too big, feet were hurting, walking with the ice axe was hard and whatever.   Finally there was a section with snow. Good snow. One of us almost didn't see a crevasse and that caused a moment of mild exclamation marks. It was still dark when we had to cross a narrow ice bridge. The Russian was ahead of me but stopped right after crossing the bridge and I had to stop in the middle of it. I don't think she even realized where we were. The guide yelled at her and we kept going.

Then the ice got more slick and the slope got steeper. I had to be really careful. Falling was definitely a quite big possibility. Pretty quickly I started to have doubts. I was afraid of falling myself and also afraid of the Russian falling. Since we were connected by a rope, one of us three falling would have taken everybody down and the guide was a bit nervous too. It would have also been very difficult to stop oneself from sliding: a self arrest on almost slick ice must surely be almost impossible even when the slope is not very steep. I didn't think it was going to get any less icy higher up and I knew there were a few 40-50 degree sections ahead. So I decided to unclip myself and go down. We were at 5920 m of altitude. It was an easy decision even though I was not tired physically because we had been climbing so slow.

I started going down and in a few minutes met the only other 2 people on the mountains, 2 nice Colombians. After a little chat they decided to go down as well, but I think their decision was based on both of them being quite fatigued at that point.

On the way down I noticed that the guide and Russian had stopped on what looked a steep slope. Time went by and I got to the high camp but they didn't move. I'm sure they were still for an hour and a half and I was a little bit worried, but at the same time I was very relieved that I was not there. I never got a full explanation of what happened but they didn't get any higher than that. I think they were stuck at about 6000 meters before finally coming down.

It's interesting to think about what had I done if it was just me? Had I turned around? I think when you are alone, you are more focused on keeping going and "doing it" and getting to the top. It makes sense that in a group you feel safer, but at least in my case I think it's easier to give up and get comfortable when I am with others and things get difficult. When I am alone, I'm usually a little more demanding.

Climbing on Pico Italiano.

In the later half of April I did two trips to Pico Italiano. The first attempt was not successful because we decided to continue on the glacier for too long. There is a point where you choose to go left towards a couple small snowfields and a couloir, or keep moving up on the glacier and try to get to the 5700m high summit from the opposite direction. We decided to take the glacier approach even though it was obviously full of crevasses. First it was better to follow a terrible, steep, narrow scree slope between a rock face and the glacier. After a gaining elevation slowly there, we arrived at a spot where the glacier looked nice. It was the upper part of the glacier almost where it turns into snowfields.

It was nice and steep at first. Then the angle eased up and we really had to work to find a way across and over the numerous crevasses. Most of them were really deep, maybe 10 meters or more, and some were about 5 meters deep but really wide and had snow on the bottom. Being in that labyrinth of crevasses was actually quite fun for a moment, but eventually there was a very long crack in the glacier that simply made it impossible to cross it. It wasn't even very wide but just enough to be too much, the bridges that covered it were just really really thin and it was too dangerous to try them, walking along the edge of the crevasse was equally dangerous because there was a spot where another crevasse was too close and made the bridge too thin and anyway further away it seemed really bad. Going down a little bit and following the edge of the glacier was not possible because right there was a vertical 10 meters high slick rock wall and right next to it was a vertical ice wall that was as high as the rock wall. A lot of time was spent trying to figure how to get across the crevasse but no solution was found. The elevation there was 5430 meters and the best climbing was really close but we didn't get there.

Just 5 days later I went and tried another route on Pico Italiano by myself. So, this time instead of following the glacier like last time, I took left. I had started the walk from the road early and got to the beginning of Pico Italiano's lower southern snowfields really fast. There was a bad rock fall about 400m to my right. About 10 boulders the size of a closet broke loose and flew and rolled down at incredible speeds. I checked out if there was an easier way up, but ended up taking a quite steep and narrow couloir. It is about 50-55 degrees and steeper than it looks like in the picture.

I had seen this couloir pretty well in December from across the valley. Then it was still covered in snow and all white but now it was very icy. There was a section of approximately 15 vertical meters/45ft that was pure hard and slick ice, not crunchy ice, but higher up it looked like there was crunchy ice. So I got to the last meters of the icy section, grabbed a rock with my hands with ice axes hanging from the leashes and thought I was in a good position, but then my foot slipped. In a couple of seconds I was 50 meters down. I'm lucky I didn't hit the rocks but my knee got twisted and it took 5 hours to get to the car. 

Climbing Arkhata

Arkhata is a 5647 meters or 18,525ft high mountain about south-west of Mururata. They are very close to each other, and there is a ridge that connects the Mururata main glacier and Arkhata. I didn't use the ridge and haven't really seen it well, but it should be easy.

It was Wednesday April 13th when me and another Finnish La Paz resident left after 10am from the city. Compared to last year, the road was a lot better because it was paved a lot further, and it was widened and ready for pavement all the way to Ventilla (I think that's the name of the very small village) where you have a choice of taking a very steep right down towards Palca and Illimani, or go straight towards Los Yungas (the road goes between Illimani and Mururata), or take a very slight left and drive toward Mururata. When you take the left, the next small town is Choquecota.

 The drive is bumby, and eventually you take a right to cross the river. We drove to about 4230 meters/13,880ft and parked. Soon after that spot the little road goes left and up in another valley. Suddenly a man appeared and asked if we were going to Mururata and when we were going to come back and some other questions. Then he left almost running. I never want to talk to these people because you never know what they are up to. Of course they are usually harmless country people but I never really feel safe unless I am at 5000m or higher. So, for me camping there was out of the question and we took out heavy backpacks and headed up. I had been there before and climbed Mururata, so I knew what to expect. This time it looked like a better idea to stay on the right side of the valley. There are actually slight paths there and one of them goes really high, maybe up to 5100m. There are some steeper sections, but all in all it's all quite nice going compared to many other mountain approaches. At about 5050m there was a green area that could have been good for camping, but we had time to go higher so we kept going. The glacier starts at about 5015 meters and we were to the right of it. I think it was at 5130m where we saw another small flat area with some ok camping spots that were fairly wind protected. We left our stuff there and went higher but there were no campsites there, so we went down and got ready for camping.

The sunset was nice, but when it got dark and colder it was time to get in the tents at about 7pm or a bit before that. I think I slept from about 12 to 3. It was a very nice, windless starry night that never got very dark. At 4.25am we started getting ready. Even after a badly slept night that didn't help your recovery, it's a nice feeling to get up on the mountain and get ready for some climbing. All the water and wet areas just outside the tents were frozen, but in the night I wasn't even close to being cold, thanks to my -20C /-4F sleeping bag. I didn't  even have to fully zip it or have gloves or inner boots on at 5130m or 16,830ft.

We started walking at 4.55am in the darkness and crispy cold. It would have made no sense to go down to the glacier, so the best thing to do was to keep going up along the right side of the valley on rocky terrain, and eventually we would have reached the Mururata main glacier. Then it looked easier to go right and up a steep sand slope, than to continue to the glacier. So we went slowly up for maybe 150-200 vertical meters until the terrain got flatter. And as the terrain I was reaching the flatter terrain, I could see the Arkhata summit, and it's western glacier. They both looked a lot bigger and nicer than I had anticipated, so I was excited. There was a little pond. My partner was behind me and he had taken a different route, so I got to the glacier by myself, put on my climbing boots and crampons, and headed up.

It was still early, about 8am, and I was on the shadowy side of the mountain so it was cold and the snow was perfectly hard. It was totally calm and the sky was clear. I went up or a while and the saw Jari putting on his boots on the edge of the glacier. From there it was fairly steep but not exactly steep.

It didn't take very long to get to the top. I would have liked the climb to continue longer. It was pretty easy. The top of the mountain has plenty of room and it's almost flat while the opposite side of the mountain is very steep. The views of Mururata and Illimani are great. Starting from the beginning of the western Arkhata glacier now looks like a good idea. It should be an awesome climb, but the beginning of the glacier may be steep (and icy) according to Google Earth.