Jeff and I had been dreaming of climbing Cerro Torre for years and years, since nearly the beginning of our climbing career. The mythical looking wind sculpted domes, and the carved blue tunnels through rimed towers had captivated my imagination. I couldn’t wait to climb through them myself!
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The biggest weather window Jeff and I had seen in a year was approaching, and we were perfectly positioned in Patagonia to go climb something big. When we arrived on New Years’ Eve in the town of El Chaltén, the town closest to the Fitz Roy Massif and Cerro Torre range, the weather was good for a spell of a couple of days, but we arrived in the middle of it and couldn’t take advantage of it. Then for a month, the storms rolled over the Argentinian pampas and crashed into the towers of Cerro Torre and Fitz Roy, with no three days of nice weather to climb something big.
I wasn’t surprised by the bad weather, this was our fourth trip to Patagonia, and our 6th consecutive year of watching the weather. In Feb 2016 my husband, Jeff, and I made an attempt on the Ragni route on Cerro Torre, and after a long 17mi approach on the Hielo Continental, we were finally rewarded with a view of our route, Via dei Ragni. But the weather was too hot to make progress up the steep snow slopes and our high point was several hundred feet below the Col de la Esperanza, very close to the Filo Rosso bivouac site.
This peak has haunted my dreams. I wanted to return to climb this incredible peak, but it was not possible with work and weather. Then last February, Jeff and I saw a fantastic weather window, and the stars aligned. We flew down to Patagonia in a 9-day magical whirlwind of constant movement, and summited Fitz Roy via the Franco-Argentina route. While basking in the rays of the sunrise, on the summit of Fitz Roy, I was once again utterly breathtaken by the beauty of Cerro Torre. The summit of Fitz Roy looks down on Cerro Torre, but it looked no less regal or imposing. Immediately the dream was re-kindled inside of me, more fiercely than ever.
We camped at Noruegos with many other parties heading out to enjoy climbing in the good weather too. We knew we would have company on the route, but it became clear that it would be a proper party on the route! This time we approached the peak by approaching from the east, climbing up to Col Stanhardt and rappelling down the other side, with Cerro Torre watching over us the whole way.
The guidebook calls the climbing to the camp at Col de Esperanza ‘the approach’ but it involves steep snow, ice and mixed climbing. However this year the climbing felt so much easier than 4 years ago, much more like an approach. I was thrilled that I had improved so much in the past couple of years. As I hiked past my previous high point, my heart soared. We were actually going to climb this majestic peak! A gleeful smile plastered my face while we set up camp under a full moon.
Climbing through the rime ice towers the next day made me giddy with excitement. We camped beneath the first rime ice pitch that ascends the Elmo. Early in the morning, before sunrise, we started our summit push. Jeff led the steep pitch up the Elmo and the mixed pitches after. I took over for the ice pitches and the dead vertical headwall. Finally we arrived at the base of the first mushroom.
Cerro Torre has three rime ice mushrooms to climb on the Ragni route, and the key is finding the natural ice tunnels that are sculpted by the wind, and provide the easiest and most secure way to climb up and through the billowing, loose rime shrooms. Climbing through the first tunnel, as big as an elevator shaft, lined with vertical blue ice, was the coolest thing I had done in my life. Finishing my lead up through a snowy squeeze, I brought Jeff up and into the sunlight. I couldn’t ask for a more perfect day to summit!
When we reached the final mushroom we saw the vertical rime crux of the route. The previous parties had dug a half pipe in the first half on the unconsolidated rime, and a tunnel for most of the second half. But at the top of the tunnel was a short section the stepped left into loose overhanging rime. This section was the crux of the crux, scary, unprotectable and powerful.
The party in front of us had attempted the pitch but were about to turn around because they lacked the ice tool wings that provided any sense of security in the rime. We had rented a pair of wings, a Petzl protoype, at the local gear shop Viente Oeste. We offered to let them use our tools, to get everyone to the summit. We all held our breath as we watched the Argentinian climber knock huge chunks of rime off as the route disintegrated before our eyes.
Following with icetools without wings seemed like it was going to be tricky. But I remembered a bit of advice from Marcus Pucher, ‘punch your fists into the rime’ and it worked! I climbed up by punching into the rime and stemming, warily eyeing the few opportunities for protection. Climbing through the burrowed tunnel in the mushroom was NOW, by far the coolest experience of my life.
I stood on on the surreal summit of Cerro Torre, having finally climbed the whole peak from base to tip. I was basking the the sunset of the perfect weather window, and only felt immensely humbled and awestruck by the people who came before me, the real heroes who worked hard and long to open the route this season, those who established the route, and the groundbreaking achievements of the climbers I am lucky enough to know. Watching Fabi Buhl paraglide off the summit, I realized dreams never end, they just grow.
Timeline:
- 1 day to Noruegos
- 1 day to Col de Esperanza
- 1 day to below the Elmo
- 1 day to summit and return the the Elmo
- 1 day to get to Paso Viento
- 1 day back to town
Full Trip Report and Additional Pictures
https://cascadeclimbers.com/forum/topic/103320-tr-cerro-torre-via-dei-ragni-02082020/
