Aconcagua Info

I realized I never really told many friends about my trip to Argentina, so I figured I might as well post this information email I wrote to someone asking for details about my trip. Who knows, someone out there might find this useful as well...

-----Original Message-----
Yes, I climbed Aconcagua with my bf earlier this year -- overall, the trip was great! We organized everything ourselves and it was just the two of us on the trip, although we did end up meeting plenty of people along the way. We also got some info (e.g., mule costs and hotel info) from a mountain guide/friend, Kurt, who had a trip starting a couple days behind us.

We departed Los Angeles on Dec.. 26th, arrived at Plaza Argentina Base Camp for New Year's and arrived back in the US Jan 17th. We didn't really want to go up the mountain and come back the same way and instead did a loop so we could see more of the mountain. The route we took started from the Polish Glacier's Plaza Argentina route. After summiting, we descended via the Normal Route. Here's a copy of our itinerary (changes to the plan made during the trip and notes are in red):

Dec 26: Depart from LAX
Dec 27: Arrive in Mendoza, grab lunch, purchase permits, buy local food(?)
Dec 28: Buy local food(?) take bus to Los Penitentes, prepare mule loads
Dec 29: Meet Kurt, start trek to base camp (camp at Pampa de Lenas) <-- Kurt stayed in Penitentes an extra day (someone caught a cold)
Dec 30: Hike to Piedra Grande
Dec 31: Hike to Plaza Argentina (base camp), sleep at BC
Jan 01: Rest day at BC
Jan 02: Carry to C1, sleep at BC
Jan 03: Move to C1, sleep at C1
Jan 04: Rest day at C1
Jan 05: Carry loads to C2, sleep at C1 <-- bf carried a load while I stayed at C1
Jan 06: Move to C2, sleep at C2 <-- moved to a "camp 1b" at 17k instead of making the big jump to 19k for smoother acclimatization
Jan 07: Rest day at C2 <-- moved to C2
Jan 08: Summit day, sleep at C2 <-- rest day at C2
Jan 09: Extra day <-- could not summit due to 80mph winds (stayed in tent)
Jan 10: Extra day <-- Summit day: wake up 4am, start at 5am
Jan 11: Extra day <-- ahead of schedule by one day...
Jan 12: Carry load or move to Independencia* <-- camped at a place near White Rocks
Jan 13: Descend to Plaza de Mulas
Jan 14: Descend to Puente del Inca
Jan 15: Arrive in Mendoza
Jan 16: Fly home
(With our extra day, which actually fell on Jan 14, we went white water rafting in a town the bus stopped in)

Permits:
From what I can recall, the permit office closed at 4pm. Obtaining the permit took 3 steps: 1) go to the permit office and fill out a permit request and recieve a price slip, 2) take the price slip and obtain a pay for it at the bank in cash (which happened to be closed for siesta, so we had to go to the Post Office to get a receipt instead), and 3) return to the permit office to finish the process....all-in-all took about 3 hours with a lot running around and waiting in lines.

Hotels:
We stayed one night at: Hostel Campo Base I for $7 each -- you can look them up and make reservations very easily over the internet. Our friends stayed at Hotel Nutibara for $40 per night -- it's a nice hotel that is climber-friendly.

Cost:
It's hard to say exactly how much the trip cost, mainly because we like to "rough it" a little. We only stayed in the hostel for one night on the way in and a small hotel for a night on our way out -- strange thing is that the hotel was actually nicer and cheaper than the hostel despite having a private room and shower! With the exchange rate being 1 USD:3 AR pesos, we didn't spend much on-sight. We even went white water rafting for $15 each and a very nice celebratory dinner in Mendoza (steaks, caprese salad, carpaccio, drinks, desserts, etc.) that ended up costing only $17!

Of course, the most expensive part was paying for the flight. We flew from Los Angeles, to Atlanta, Georgia. From ATL to Santiago, Chile and caught a connection to Mendoza, Argentina. Although we flew Delta, we were fortunate enough to have no hiccups with luggage along the way!

Transportation:
The taxi ride from the airport to Mendoza was $15 with tip, if I recall correctly (we liked our cab driver!). We took the Expresso Uspallata bus line from Mendoza to Los Penitentes for about $12. For the way back to Mendoza, we just caught a ride on another bus company that cost even less. Overall, transportation is very cheap and we had no problems with theft.

If you would like to know the exact cost of our flight and amount of on-sight spending, I can get that to you as well. I'm sorry I took so long to respond, but my bf and I have been planning so many trips lately that I forgot how much time had passed since you emailed. If you have any more questions (e.g. water supply, maps, gear list, pictures, etc.), I would be more than happy to get back to you in a more timely manner! :)