Trip Reports

Aconcagua - 4 to 26 January 2025

Team on summit day
Trip Report

Written by Leader Andrew Stuart Chapman (Andy), January 2025

On Sunday 5th January we all met up in Mendoza pretty exhausted after a long flight from Europe. The next morning we had the chance to meet our superb guide Diego and sort out plans for the mountain.

Leaving early on Tuesday we drove to Los Penitentes and onto Aconcagua Provincial Park where a three-hour walk took us to Confluencia camp, where we would spend three nights acclimatising. The facilities at Confluencia were excellent and the staff extremely friendly with good food in plenty of supply; it was a good start to the trip.

We acclimatised by walking towards the south face of Aconcagua, reaching a high point of 4000m. This certainly helped us in the long walk to base camp at Plasa de Mulas, which we managed in less than seven hours.

Saturday was spent an acclimatising and preparing loads for the mountain. We carried group food of around 6Kg each to Camp 1 (Canada Camp), which was then carried higher by porters. After this first carry on the mountain the following day we went to Bonete Peak (5000m), which was an excellent day out with light snow showers on the descent.

On the third day of acclimatisation we walked towards Camp 2 (Nido de Condores) at 5200m. In the past we had carried loads all the way to camp, but on this trip we decided to only go as high as 5200m before descending back to base camp. We were now suitably prepared for the mountain and spent a rest day for last minute relaxation before our attempt at the summit.

Climbing to Camp 1 for a third time took a little bit less than three hours. We had some snow in the evening and some difficult conditions, however we managed to climb to Camp 2 the next day. Diego and myself made the decision that we would stay for another night at Camp 2 and have three nights there as the weather forecast wasn't looking great for Monday. That would have been our earliest summit attempt and as the conditions were quite harsh it made sense to hold back. In fact, it was fairly cold and grim at Camp 2. Thankfully on Monday 20th January the weather looked to improve and it took us just two hours and 20 minutes to climb to high camp - 'Colera Camp'.

After very little sleep we set off at 5am for the climb to the summit. The team were now feeling well acclimatised and we were able to make quick progress to the Independencia Hut in a little under three hours. From there we had a two hour walk to 'The Cave' at the base of the 'Canaleta'. The traverse was brutally windy and it was incredibly important to wrap up to stave off the bitter cold. From The Cave it took us 2 hours 45 minutes to get to the summit of Aconcagua. In -16 Celsius and 5 mile an hour winds the entire team were able to enjoy the experience for a good 45 minutes. We started our descent and took a little under two and a half hours to get back to high camp, totally exhausted. We spent another night there before descending to base camp the next day at a little under three hours. We returned to the roadhead on Thursday where we had a spare day in Mendoza and a chance to enjoy wine tasting and steak eating, two popular Argentinian activities.

Andrew Chapman « | Next report »

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