Uploaded March 2023 | Updated September 2026, 1 week ago
Extreme Adventurer, Wingsuit BASE Jumper Tim Howell takes us on a 12 day expedition to Aconcagua! Filed at Christmas, this was certainly a festive adventure worth remembering..
Trip Report:
DAY 1: The town of Penitentes is a sleepy ski town, it almost looks abandoned in the summer if it wasn’t for the mountaineers starting their ascent from the town. We talk about the routes, various other mountain ambitions, before we finally weigh our packs and load up the mules.
DAY 2: Wake up early 2nd camp, get local food, finally seeing the first view of Aconcagua, and llamas. The backs of my knees are burnt and Ewa had sunburn on the tops of her hands from where she has been using the walking poles.
DAY 3: We slept under the stars again and were abruptly woken by the noises of mules getting packed. Our mule rider had a long day ahead of him, he will ride to basecamp and then all the way back to the park entrance in one day. So he’s keen to get going. We would now start to gain altitude, up though a tight gorge and to basecamp. The scenery changed from wide bottomed valleys to narrow gorge and snow capped peaks all around us, much more of an alpine feel, then the flat river bed a thousand meters below. A sign lets us know we are at basecamp, “Plaza de Argentina 4200m
DAY 4: We followed the path through the maze of tracks leading through the dry glacier. Then we reached the mountain of scree that lead to the plateau on top, where we relaxed a little before heading back down.
DAY 5: Rest day at basecamp. It gives us an opportunity to sort out all our kit and prepare it for our upcoming summit push.
DAY 6:We wake up to a white Christmas, a small amount of snow has fallen. Cooka offers us satellite WIFI to message our family and wish them a Merry Christmas. We already know the ascent to camp 1 but that doesn’t make it any easier, especially now we have heavy packs on and the weather is coming in.
DAY 7: It took us an hour this morning to find running water, the camp is very basic and doesn’t have water storage or and running water pipes. A small stream sits next to the camp but of course is frozen in the morning. It took us a while to dig under all the ice and find a stream flowing enough to fill all of our water bottles.
DAY 8: It was an uncomfortable night. Broken sleep due to the wind, cramped confines and heavy breathing. There were three of us in a 2 man tent, we had chosen the smaller tent to save space and weight.
DAY 9: The weather would give us a window of opportunity today. So we packed our gear up early and started the traverse over to the normal route. Although we had planned on climbing the Polish glacier, it was heavily crevassed and there had been a lot of snow recently so we opted for the easier route. Exhausted, tired and feeling defeated, we took some time to look at our options. There was no one else on the mountain today, we had been breaking trail through the snow all day which was taking a lot of time and effort. We continued to the next col but the strong wind turned us back, we had been secluded on the southern face, but moving to the western slopes meant we were getting battered by the wind with a windchill of -30.
We contemplated our failure, we wouldn’t have enough food or time for another summit attempt now and would have to start our descent tomorrow morning. We knew we had given it a lot of effort, and there is always more you can do. There is the remains of an old climber who succumbed to the mountain 100m away from our camp. It was a reminder that you always need to have some energy in reserve to be able to get off the mountain. Giving it your all might mean you don’t get to go home. At the end of the day walking off the mountain without any injuries or worse makes it a successful trip.
DAY 10: We packed up and made our way back down to basecamp. Our weary legs sliding down the steep gravel hills and finally past the snow level onto more solid and dry tracks. We met up with Dayna and Swifty at camp 1 who had a similarly hard time on the mountain during their route.
DAY 11: We planned to descend in two days, reaching the first camp today and then bypassing the next one all the way to the park entrance the day after.
DAY 12: The day was spent taking our waterproof jackets on and off between rain showers and sun. After a brief stop for lunch at the camp, the clouds continued to shower us for the rest of the hike back to the park entrance.
Although we thoroughly expected to summit, we were not overly disappointed. The mountain will always be there for another day and another attempt. What makes it worth it is the time spent on the mountain, experiencing new situations, views and sharing it all with good friends.
Follow us on Instagram: instagram.com/gooutdoors
Follow Tim on Instagram: /instagram.com/tim_howell_adventure
Tim's website: timhowelladventure.com
instagram.com/ewakalisiewicz
Extreme Adventurer, Wingsuit BASE Jumper Tim Howell takes us on a 12 day expedition to Aconcagua! Filed at Christmas, this was certainly a festive adventure worth remembering..
Trip Report:
DAY 1: The town of Penitentes is a sleepy ski town, it almost looks abandoned in the summer if it wasn’t for the mountaineers starting their ascent from the town. We talk about the routes, various other mountain ambitions, before we finally weigh our packs and load up the mules.
DAY 2: Wake up early 2nd camp, get local food, finally seeing the first view of Aconcagua, and llamas. The backs of my knees are burnt and Ewa had sunburn on the tops of her hands from where she has been using the walking poles.
DAY 3: We slept under the stars again and were abruptly woken by the noises of mules getting packed. Our mule rider had a long day ahead of him, he will ride to basecamp and then all the way back to the park entrance in one day. So he’s keen to get going. We would now start to gain altitude, up though a tight gorge and to basecamp. The scenery changed from wide bottomed valleys to narrow gorge and snow capped peaks all around us, much more of an alpine feel, then the flat river bed a thousand meters below. A sign lets us know we are at basecamp, “Plaza de Argentina 4200m
DAY 4: We followed the path through the maze of tracks leading through the dry glacier. Then we reached the mountain of scree that lead to the plateau on top, where we relaxed a little before heading back down.
DAY 5: Rest day at basecamp. It gives us an opportunity to sort out all our kit and prepare it for our upcoming summit push.
DAY 6:We wake up to a white Christmas, a small amount of snow has fallen. Cooka offers us satellite WIFI to message our family and wish them a Merry Christmas. We already know the ascent to camp 1 but that doesn’t make it any easier, especially now we have heavy packs on and the weather is coming in.
DAY 7: It took us an hour this morning to find running water, the camp is very basic and doesn’t have water storage or and running water pipes. A small stream sits next to the camp but of course is frozen in the morning. It took us a while to dig under all the ice and find a stream flowing enough to fill all of our water bottles.
DAY 8: It was an uncomfortable night. Broken sleep due to the wind, cramped confines and heavy breathing. There were three of us in a 2 man tent, we had chosen the smaller tent to save space and weight.
DAY 9: The weather would give us a window of opportunity today. So we packed our gear up early and started the traverse over to the normal route. Although we had planned on climbing the Polish glacier, it was heavily crevassed and there had been a lot of snow recently so we opted for the easier route. Exhausted, tired and feeling defeated, we took some time to look at our options. There was no one else on the mountain today, we had been breaking trail through the snow all day which was taking a lot of time and effort. We continued to the next col but the strong wind turned us back, we had been secluded on the southern face, but moving to the western slopes meant we were getting battered by the wind with a windchill of -30.
We contemplated our failure, we wouldn’t have enough food or time for another summit attempt now and would have to start our descent tomorrow morning. We knew we had given it a lot of effort, and there is always more you can do. There is the remains of an old climber who succumbed to the mountain 100m away from our camp. It was a reminder that you always need to have some energy in reserve to be able to get off the mountain. Giving it your all might mean you don’t get to go home. At the end of the day walking off the mountain without any injuries or worse makes it a successful trip.
DAY 10: We packed up and made our way back down to basecamp. Our weary legs sliding down the steep gravel hills and finally past the snow level onto more solid and dry tracks. We met up with Dayna and Swifty at camp 1 who had a similarly hard time on the mountain during their route.
DAY 11: We planned to descend in two days, reaching the first camp today and then bypassing the next one all the way to the park entrance the day after.
DAY 12: The day was spent taking our waterproof jackets on and off between rain showers and sun. After a brief stop for lunch at the camp, the clouds continued to shower us for the rest of the hike back to the park entrance.
Although we thoroughly expected to summit, we were not overly disappointed. The mountain will always be there for another day and another attempt. What makes it worth it is the time spent on the mountain, experiencing new situations, views and sharing it all with good friends.
Follow us on Instagram: instagram.com/gooutdoors
Follow Tim on Instagram: /instagram.com/tim_howell_adventure
Tim's website: timhowelladventure.com
instagram.com/ewakalisiewicz
