I came out to Santiago in Chile to take part in “Beyond the Peaks, Celebrating 20 Years from the first Chilean ascent of Everest”, all organised by Vertical – see
www.everest20años.cl/english
Aldo Boitano, CEO of Vertical very kindly took me for a little trip up to the Atacama Desert.
| Was I glad to see Aldo and his wife Claudia when I arrived in Santiago Airport on 8 March. | 
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| We immediately transferred to an internal flight up to Calimar on the edge of the Atacama Desert. | 
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| Where a people carrier was awaiting us and took us the 90 minute drive to San Pedro de Atamaca. It’s one of the driest places on Earth and two of our Berghaus Athletes Anna and Philip Gatta were taking part in a gruelling 200km race in this very area. | 
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| Definitely not for the faint hearted but it has a savage beauty. | 
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| We were ‘camping’ in a wonderful eco-friendly hotel, Explora Hotel de Larache from which the next morning we ventured forth for some fun climbing. | 
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| The view at dawn of Volcan Licancabur from my bedroom window was stunning. | 
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| It was an hour’s drive away in a canyon called Naciemento near the village of Socaire. The routes are all single pitch on superb Quartzite rock. They have left the cracks for the trad climbers and have put up numerous sport climbs, all of which looked really hard. There was a bit of a breeze and it was perfect t-shirt weather. | 
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| Marco on the right is directer of guides for the Hotel and very kindly pointed out the climbs and joined us climbing. One of the routes was up the crack line behind us and was around 5.7. | 
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| Aldo in fine form. | 
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| I had a go… | 
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| …and then in the best Victorian tradition, our driver had a laid out a superb packed lunch. | 
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| Not of course forgetting some vintage Chilean red wine! | 
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| And we did manage a 5.8 after lunch, first led by Aldo!! | 
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| That night, back at the hotel, I gave a lecture to the guides and some hotel guests of my first ascent of the Central Tower of Paine in South Patagonia, 49 years ago!!! The guides were a brilliant crowd, friendly, knowledgeable and very enthusiastic.
And that was the first day – wait for the next!!!! |
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