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Ocshapalca:

Hugo struggled to establish himself on the opposite side of the bergshroud. The snow was 70degrees and hip deep powder. With the concentration, the 17,000ft altitude didn't matter. As Hugo struggled to establish himself on the face he swung his axe, and then there was the WHOMPF. The whompf that is heard in nightmares. In what seemed like forever but was actually an instant, Hugo and 50 tons of snow were gone, into the bergshround. There was no tension on the rope. Did he hit a bridge or did the snow snap the rope? I pulled and and then there was tension. To remove him it was easy since I just had to slide down the slope. Well, until he hit the lip of the crevasse. In the minutes that followed, I saw a glove flop over the lip and then an axe, then the glove and the axe, and minutes later Hugo was out, heaving and wanting to puke. It was time to go down, with no access to the face and my partner in no desire to go any further.

Cayesh

After a fitfull night of sleep we resumed establishing moraine camp. We found the right way to reach the upper moraine and after 1200ft of sort of scary scrambling we reached to top of the ridge, made camp in bivi-sacs and sat down to a wonderful meal of dehydrated food, SO yummy.Settling down to sleep the winds and clouds blew in. The altimeter fluctauted wildly and we knew it wasn't going to be a great night. By about 4am, it started to snow and by sunrise there was a couple inches of snow on the bivi sacs when we would let it stay. The snow continued until 11am. By 11, the sun came out , and we decided to setup the tarp. By 1pm, Hugo started to cough up phlemn, well his infection was back. Over the next many days the weather became worse and so did Hugos infection. After several days of the snow, the food running low and Hugo becoming weak, there was only one thing to do and it was to go down. For me it was back to Hueraz, Lima and then the US. Were we successful, yes: we came back friends. Get to the top: no, not this time but there will be other trips.