La Malinche (14,534ft)

SummaryNone
OwnerMatthew Gilbertson
Creation Date2012-01-18 18:35:47 UTC-0500
DescriptionLa Malinche (14,534 ft – 23rd Highest Peak in North America)
Matthew and Eric Gilbertson
Jan 4-7, 2012

There aren’t too many places in Mexico where you can eat snow. There are even fewer places where you can camp on it. Pico de Orizaba (18,600ft) is one such place. But after successfully finishing early our climb of this highest point in Mexico (and 3rd highest in N America), Eric and I were hungry for more snow, and set our sights on La Malinche (14,534ft – 23rd highest in N America).

There are several other locations in the greater Mexico City area where snow is accessible: Popocatépetl (17,802ft – 5th highest in N America) and Iztaccihuatl (17,159ft – 8th highest in N America), but Popo is currently closed due to toxic volcanic gases and Izta looked like it would require more logistical planning and uncertainty than we were prepared to deal with for our last three days in Mexico. So, inspired by Pavel’s Mexican Volcanoes trip several years ago, we headed for La Malinche, which from our map looked to be within shouting distance from La Familia Canchola hostel we were staying at in Tlachichuca. After a bus to Puebla, followed by a bus to Huamantla, and then a taxi ride to Centro Vacacional La Malintzi we found ourselves at the base of the mountain in the early afternoon.

With almost three full days to climb only 4500ft over just five miles, we decided that we needed to make things harder on ourselves so we decided that we’d camp on the summit. Hopefully we’d get an awesome view of the sunset and the sunrise, which we had missed on Orizaba by just minutes.

We weren’t quite sure what sort of snow conditions to expect, since during the drive the south faces of the mountain appeared snow-free, but on the other hand we’d heard of people practicing self-arrest on the north face a few days ago. We also weren’t sure about water – even though it’s the dry season, we figured there could still be water trickling out of the snowfields. Eric decided to inquire at La Café Julio Cesar, at the base of the trailhead.

“Ay agua en la montaña?” Eric asked the café dude.
“No, no ay agua. Nosotros tenemos agua,” said the café dude.

So that meant we’d have to buy water at the trailhead. We also wondered where the trail started. “Donde esta el camino para la cima?” Eric asked.

“Aqui,” he answered.
“You guys looking for the trailhead?” we heard someone interrupt in perfect English.

With a sigh of relief we turned around and noticed a college-age-looking student sitting on the steps. Turned out he was studying mechanical engineering at a university in Monterrey, in northern Mexico. He and his buddies were on a little road trip and had attempted to climb La Malinche, but he himself was forced to turn back early due to altitude sickness. His friends meanwhile had reached the summit and were on their way down. As soon as his amigos arrived at the trailhead we tried to extract as much information as possible about the climb.

They said that there were no streams along the trail, and not even a trickle of water coming out of the snowfields. They said our best bet was to buy water at the trailhead. They also said that tennis shoes sans crampons would be fine, but we should wear trash bags over our socks to keep them dry.

Next came the most important question: “We’d like to camp on the summit,” we said. “Not alongside the trail but on the highest rocks – la cima. Are there any flat spots on top?”

“On the summit, no,” they answered firmly, “it’s very rocky. The only place to set up a tent is at the base of the mountain, at the edge of the trees.”

But Eric and I weren’t convinced. No summit is that fortified. We figured that there’s got to be at least a 3ft x 7ft area that we could clear for our tent. Part of mountaineering is gathering information from previous climbers to improve your chances of success. Another part is recognizing which information to disregard. We thanked them for all their help and bid them farewell.

We dragged our gear a quarter mile up the trail until we found a nice wooded area where we could stash our extra stuff, and marked it on the GPS. We didn’t want to have wet tennis shoes for the next few days so we elected to bring along the monster mountaineering boots and gaiters, which combined with the bulletproof Trango tent, crampons, food, and several pounds of water pushed our packs well over 50 lbs.

The trail was so steep and muddy that we were close to putting on the crampons. Mexican trailmakers must not have heard about switchbacks, we figured. But as we climbed higher and the temperature dropped closer to freezing the trail hardened up. It was getting late and most people were headed down at this point, probably curious why two gringos would be headed up the mountain so late with such gigantic packs. But we just said, “hola, buenos tardes,” and everyone smiled and responded with the same phrase.

Around 5pm the ground finally began to flatten out and it became time to scout out a campsite. Unfortunately though this wasn’t your standard campground – we heard some cows mooing in the distance and looked down to discover that it was cowpie minefield! One false step could be fatal. We treaded carefully and set up the Trango on a good spot away from any cow paths.

As we cooked our dinner something seemed amiss. It had all been too easy. We were camping in a nice flat spot, with comfortable logs to sit on, no mosquitoes. With our down jackets on we were toasty warm, and had plenty of sleeping space in the mountaineering tent. The strangest part of all was the realization that we were actually camping legally, and hadn’t had to scout out a stealth site. It was far more much luxurious and comfortable than we were accustomed to.

We were awoken early by some loud urgent-sounding nearby moos. The cows weren’t too happy about the presence of our large bright-orange tent in their pasture. We heeded their warnings and made a quick getaway.

Just a few more minutes up the trail and we were finally at treeline, with a spectacular view of the mountain. The north face turned out to be completely snow-covered, and we were glad to have brought the crampons especially given the steepness and lack of switchbacks. The first glitch in our plans emerged when it came time to put on the sunscreen that wasn’t in either of our packs. Considering all the gear that we packed in such a hurry I figured that forgetting sunscreen wasn’t so bad; we’d just cover up with balaclavas and gloves.

At this point it came in handy that we were already acclimated to 14,000ft from Orizaba. The last stretch to the summit was steep, but didn’t give us any of the headaches or nausea that would be typical of altitude sickness (AMS). We topped out at 9:52am in tennis shoes and were rewarded with a spectacular 360 degree view of the Tlaxcala and Puebla regions of Mexico. A mile below us the high dusty plateau extended to the smoggy horizon. Popo and Izta poked up 40 miles to our west and the silhouette of Orizaba towered 50 miles to our east.

Indeed it would be darn near impossible to camp on the rocky summit, but we spotted a perfect site a short distance below the top. To reach it we had to downclimb some steep rocks for about 20 feet with our heavy packs, but its inaccessibility just meant that we probably wouldn’t be disturbed by any other hikers.

We hiked a little farther along the summit ridge and over another little hill until we found a big broad saddle that would be the perfect campsite, out of view of the summit. We dropped our packs, sat down, and realized that we still had two full days before we had to return to Boston.

“Uhh, what do we do now?” I asked Eric rhetorically. On just about every one of our adventures we’re always racing the clock and daylight to accomplish as many things as possible. There are always more mountains to climb, there’s food to cook, chores to do around camp – we’re never sitting idle. But here, on the summit of La Malinche, with plenty of hours of daylight remaining, there was nothing to do except admire the spectacular view. Never before had we found ourselves on so high a summit with hours to kill, with nothing to do except watch the clouds go by and study the landscape far below.

Soon we got bored of sitting and decided to scramble up some of the other little peaks in the summit neighborhood. We threaded a path over the cliffs, around the snowfields and the boulders and reached the top of Malinche II (as we called it), with a stunning view of the city of Puebla to the southwest.

After a little more tomfoolery we were back at camp setting up the tent. When we had eaten our fill of the scenery we retired to the tent for some fine literature. Our mom had gotten us The Mammoth Book of Climbing Adventures for Christmas, which we had split in half with fellow climbers Mark and Joel on Orizaba. Now Eric and I further subdivided the remaining half between the two of us. We enjoyed stories from Reinhold Messner and Edmund Hillary from the comfort of our sleeping bags.

It was awfully tempting to cook dinner in the nice cozy vestibule but we had heard too many stories of scorched tents and carbon monoxide poisoning, so we ducked below some rocks and cooked outside instead. Unfortunately the clear sunset that we had predicted all afternoon transformed into no more than a hazy transition to darkness. Oh well, we thought, surely it’ll be clear for sunrise.

Battered by strong gusts all night, we awoke thirteen comfortable hours later to near white-out conditions. Almost a half-inch of rime ice had built up overnight on every exposed surface. The tiny little tent guy lines had transformed into thick white icicles, which we pulverized into icy dust with a firm mitten grasp. We had encountered this phenomenon before during our annual Lake of the Clouds above-treeline hockey/snow shelter trips (links: 2006, 2007, 2009).

It was downright nasty outside. Although our campsite was nice and flat we had unwittingly chosen a spot that experienced the full force of the wind raking over the summit. We ate breakfast and packed up as much as possible from the comfort of our sleeping bags but then, with nothing else left to do, it was time to take the plunge. In the tent we suited up as if we were preparing for battle. Warm layers – check. Shell layers – check. Mountaineering boots and gaiters – check. Mittens – check. It was similar to suiting up for Mt Washington in January.

We unzipped the tent doors and stepped out into a wind tunnel. We very carefully and methodically dismantled the tent, making sure that one of us was always holding onto it tightly. If we were unlucky enough to let go the tent would probably end up a thousand feet below us.

We psyched ourselves up for the hundred foot or so climb back up and over the summit to the trail that would bring us down. The summit is so rugged there’s no going around it. From the south side the summit is like a mini Hillary Step – a steep 25 ft rock face that becomes even harder with a thick coating of rime ice, a heavy pack, and mountaineering boots. But to our surprise, the moment we summitted the clouds broke and it was clear all the way to the horizon. Clouds were forming as air was pushed up and over the summit from the southwest and must have been responsible for the overnight rime ice. No matter how many minutes we spent at the top the view never grew old. Finally after another half hour it was time to descend to escape the cold.

With the rest of the day to descend just a few miles we figured we’d spice it up a little and hike one of the other interesting peaks that we had spotted on the way up. We weren’t sure of its name, so we dubbed it Malinchita (little Malinche). As soon as we could we swapped the 2.6lb-apiece mountaineering boots for the 11oz-apiece running shoes, dropped the packs, and proceeded ultralightly towards the top. After some scrambling we reached the summit and were greeted by a small steel cross – a feature we’d come to expect now on Mexican peaks. We hung out for a while and watched other hikers on their way up. When our eyes were saturated once again with the awesomeness of the view we turned around and continued our descent.

We found the extra gear exactly where we had left it – and exactly where the GPS said it should be. There wasn’t much else to do so we lounged around in the sun and finished up our books. That evening we decided to indulge a little and headed down to the Café Julio Cesar for some authentic Mexican quesadillas. For just 80 cents apiece they really hit the spot.

Señor taxi driver dude arrived on schedule at 6:55am at the agreed-upon rendezvous point. We were headed back to Mexico City and then to Los Estados Unidos later that afternoon. As we drove down the mountain we watched a crystal-clear sunrise bask the summit in red alpenglow and sighed with disappointment that this weather hadn’t come a day earlier. But we reminded ourselves that we were leaving Mexico with exactly the prize we had sought – and more. We had successfully climbed Pico de Orizaba and topped it off with another awesome mountain: La Malinche.