The day after.

By the time we woke the next day the AAI Team had left for the summit, Brian being among them. Ty and I had slept almost 13 hours. We crawled from our tent squinting like nocturnal animals drug out into the light of day. The weather would start out as crystalline and remarkable as the previous two days. It would also turn just as vengefully menacing by late afternoon.

Though our plan was to descend all the way to base camp on the opposite side, Plaza de Mulas, we moved about aimless and slow-witted. Kevin had warned us the night before "you gotta eat something and drink another liter of fluid before jumping in your sack or you'll wake up feeling the way you do now. You'll totally bonk," he cautioned. But it had been all each of us could manage to put down that first liter of hot Gatorade. Against his counsel, we had turned in immediately. Now we were living the consequences. I considered the notion of just resting for a day. But there would be no point in staying another night. To do so would most likely result in still further deterioration of our condition as the thin air levered hard against it.

At some point Chicago Steve emerged from one of the AAI tents. Having decided well ahead of time that he would not attempt the summit, he remained at High Camp. By now his vision was being affected by the altitude. "I'm seeing green," he told us. "That can't be good," I offered, "how long has that been going on?" He said it had started a day ago but didn't seem to be getting worse. Their lead Guide Aiden had determined Steve would be OK while the team summitted, then they would all descend the next day.

Ty and I packed up our tent. We then started experimenting with various means by which we could attach our loaded duffels to the tops of our packs. Unwilling to carry a load down then climb back up for the remaining provisions, we had become resolute with scheme of taking everything down at once. Each of us would shoulder the burden of a double load; the heaviest carry yet, in what was our weakest condition of the trip. I should stress that this was a choice born not of ambition or machismo, but of the complete lack of other acceptable choices.

I noticed two climbers coming down the hill as we gathered up the last of our things. As they neared I could see it was Aiden and Kevin, the two AAI Guides. Their team was not with them. I could tell something was wrong with Kevin as they settled into camp. "Hey, Dudes. What up," I queried. "I bonked," Kevin said in a defeated tone. "I started feeling really tired as we went higher and Aiden asked if we were all doing OK. I said Yes, but another 200 feet up the hill I just bonked. It took me right to the ground," he explained. "I've got the guys hydrating and holding their position right now. I'm going back up in a second and we will continue to the summit," Aiden said. Kevin and Steve would retreat immediately to base camp where their respective conditions could be expected to improve swiftly.

We were not the only climbers leaving High Camp that day. The IMG Team had departed two hours earlier. Also a father-and-son team from Britain was leaving. They were the only other self-guided team I had seen on the trip. Other Climbers had nick named them "The Bulldogs." Loud and boisterous, they often shouted comic retorts to one another in thick British accents. They were fond of wearing sweatshirts with the sleeves torn off, a fashion described as a "wife-beater shirt." And their plans for Aconcagua were just as brash. In short, they planned to paraglide from the summit. Accordingly, each packed a full parachute all the way to High Camp. But for reasons of weather, or reasons of not, they decided to abort their plan and head down the mountain without even attempting the summit. "Hey mate," the older of the two shouted to a climber ascending to High Camp, "step aside a minute." Then he hurled his undeployed parachute off the mountain. His son did the same. The two packs landed hard, cartwheeling down the steep face. One appeared to take instant damage as a streamer of colorful fabric was liberated.

Ty and I considered doing the same, but we valued our contents too greatly so we started down toward Plaza de Mulas beneath monstrous loads. No one trains for carrying heavy loads downhill. You would wipe out your knees before ever getting to the climb. It is just one of those things a Climber has to suffer through as best he can. So we did. I could feel blisters forming early on. Then there was the dampness of what had to be blood coming from the area of my big toenail. Many times our loads would haul us backward against the hillside, only to skid in graceless humiliation. I felt deep sinewy ligaments within my glutious tighten then ache in protest. Tiny camps grew larger, then passed. We made deals with ourselves to descend at least 800 vertical feet before resting again. As our first glimpse of Plaza de Mulas came into view, minuscule and taunting, the weather rolled over into a cold wind-driven pellet snow. We stumbled on for two more hours, finally arriving wet and exhausted some 5,000 feet below High Camp at the tent city of Plaza de Mulas.

We hobbled into the Grajale cook tent, snow-caked and spent. I pulled up a plastic milk crate to sit on while the Camp Boss dealt with a British Climber who needed a helicopter out for one of his team members. It was warm inside the tent and smelled of real food cooking in the pans. I peeled off a wet layer of clothing. The cooks and the camp boss looked me over critically. In this tiny space, their tiny space, myself and my gear were melting in an expansive and untidy manner. But they had seen this kind of thing before. They knew it would be a mistake to have anything to do with me. Somewhere inside me the survival instinct that had been active for the better part of two weeks relaxed. I felt my head bob as slumber tickled me.

Ty had caught up with Kevin and Steve outside. They were kind enough to save a campsite for us to set up in next to them. But by the time he joined me in the cook tent I had already made other arrangements. "...and do you need beds," the Camp Boss had asked lastly as we confirmed the services Ty and I would need. "Beds," I asked, certain he could not mean what he said. "Yes, beds," the Camp Boss confirmed. He led me to a large quonset hut tent with several bunks lining each side. A bare plastic mattress offered forgotten comforts and I immediately agreed to rent two bunks for $20 each ...even though snow was blowing in the tent corners and covering both. We would not have to sleep on the ground or set up our tent in the blowing snow. We would enjoy shelter tall enough to stand in. We might even make some new friends among the ethnically diverse bunk-mates who peered at me from the breathing hole in their mummy sacks.

We joined Kevin and Steve in their dining tent for dinner. I don't recall what was served, but it was hot and their was plenty of it. We ate and ate like lions at the first kill of the migration. Speculation was traded as to how things had gone for the AAI summit team. No one wanted to point out the troublesome weather they were no doubt caught in at the time. So instead we talked about the physical strength of each member, trying to sound confident about a scenario so factually incomplete that we may as well have been discussing alien abduction. It would be several days before we learned they had turned back short of the summit. But they had done so very early in the day, before the weather could punish them, before their energy was burned. The AAI team spent another restless night at 19,000 feet, then left again the following morning for the summit of Aconcagua.

"Dude, you look like hell," Kevin said to me with a smile. I realized I had dropped out of the discussion and taken to a distant stare. There was no cause to doubt him. My forehead had burned and blistered in the intense sun of the last few mornings. My lips were so swollen and cracked they felt like flaps of leather that met without joining. The area around my nostrils was peeling away. I laid a hand to my face and everywhere it touched there seemed to be ragged bits of flesh turned up, autumn leaves on a front lawn. My eyes were bloodshot from the ceaseless wind. Though we were still at 14,500 feet, an altitude equivalent to the summit of Mt Rainier, this was low enough to feel the thicker air, low enough to trigger physiological changes. At this altitude injuries could begin healing, but first they would make themselves known, springing forth from hypoxic dormancy. "You remember that rock you fell back against three days ago," my body would ask. "Well here's the bruise I promised you!"

I thought about my Sons as we settled into our bunks that night. I imagined them warm and comfortable in our home on Lake Samish and wondered what had been going on in their lives these last several weeks. The experiences of the climb had already awakened a vast appreciation for how much I have to lose and I missed them like never before.