Illimani Increible by John Prud'homme

After a “breakfast” of a few cookies and coffee, we roped up and left Nido de Condores (high camp) at approx. 2:30 AM. The ridge from camp started narrow, on firm nieve (at approx. 45 degrees), then turned briefly to a short rock scramble which led us to the broad glaciated prow which constitutes the bulk of the route. At about 5800 or 5900 m, after roughly three hours of climbing on nice firm nieve, we encountered the bergschrund, which was only passable via a 3 m vertical ice wall. As we had heard from descending groups, this was a deal-breaker for most, and it almost was for us, had it not been for some creative and persistent axe/pro work from our guide. After a half hour or so of some serious effort and a couple of falls (we caught him) he managed to place two pieces of pro, one good and one terrible, and was safely up the wall. I followed and promptly fell twice, trying to clear the slightly overhanging lip. The third time was the charm though, I too was up and safely anchored, ready to help (or haul, as it turned out) our other rope member up the pitch. And finally, with a few more falls and a lot of rope pulling, we were all up “del Diablo” as we dubbed it and a lot better off towards our goal. Above the bergschrund and feeling good now, we continued on with about a hundred meters of nice climbing on fairly steep (approx 50 degrees), hard ice to nieve which brought us, finally, to the summit block and ridge. It was at this point, just on to the summit mass, where the wind became intense. It felt like we had dipped into the jet stream and were headed the wrong way. As such, the last couple of hundred meters to the summit were like that slow, drunken stagger home from the bar, but a hell of a lot colder. Finally, after roughly 7 hours or climbing, we were on the summit and hugging each other like disaster survivors. True elation. And all in all, one incredibly fun climb.