18,491′ Pico De Orizaba, illuminated at sunset.
Four fit friends channel their moxy for a whirlwind Bozeman/SLC to Mexico and back ski descent of Pico De Orizaba. Yes, two of them made it back for work on time.
This story first appeared on Skimo.co
When I’m looking to travel internationally, I look for three things: powder skiing, long alpine routes, and great food. Surprising to absolutely nobody, Mexico only ticks one of those boxes. Hint: it’s not waist-deep turns. Due to the less-than-ideal latitudinal location of the country, there seems to be a real lack of snow. Puzzling, I know, but for what it’s worth, the tacos make up for it in every sense.
Mexico does have something up its sleeve: Pico de Orizaba. If it were located 500 miles to the north, it would be a world-famous ski destination. Instead, the lofty summit only holds snow and ice for the top 2,500’ out of 18,450’. With its close(ish) proximity to the United States and not-too-high altitude, a quick-hit ski descent had been on our minds for a while.
With a few days to spare between shifts in the grinding laboratory of Skimo Co, myself, co-worker Zak Munro, and some friends from Bozeman decided to catch a flight to Mexico and ski North America’s 3rd tallest peak.
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November 9th: 6 pm MST (All times in MST, so you, dear reader, don’t have to do time zone conversion math)
Zak and I finished work and agreed to meet at 4:30 am the next day to catch our flight to Mexico City. We discussed the final details, and I quickly stopped at the local REI for some power snacks.
November 10th, 6 am MST
Twelve hours later, we were packed in a plane flying to Dallas. Walking around the airport in Texas with ski boots and helmets drew a fair amount of looks. I can’t even count the times we were asked where we were going “hiking.” Zak even fielded a question of where somebody could get some of our Scarpa F1LTs for their vacation to Winter Park, Colorado. They loved the “stylish” look of the boots, and I’d have to agree.
November 10th, 3pm
After landing and going through customs, we began the 10-minute walking approach to our Airbnb in Mexico City. Zak requested I book it close to the airport, so I made sure we found a place where you could both audibly and physically feel the planes taking off and landing. With basically the least amount of Spanish you can know while still having taken a Spanish class, we set off into the local neighborhood and successfully acquired dinner from a street food stand. I just kept saying yes to whatever the waiter asked and ended up with a great meal. This was a consistent theme of the trip: say yes unless you see a pig’s foot with flies on it.
November 11th, 9am
The next morning, we returned to the airport to find our buddies from Bozeman, Montana, Tucker Hoefler and Chris Kussmaul. Tucker is an incredibly strong athlete and consistently put the rest of us in the ground throughout the trip. A few springs ago, he made the third ski descent of Archangel Ridge on Mount Foraker with two other partners. Chris Kussmaul is also incredibly strong and experienced. Zak and I are basically nobodies compared to these two Kardashian-grade superstars.
We just ski in the Wasatch.
With only four days to make this trip happen, everything had to fall perfectly in place. So it was only fitting that a mere 15 minutes after meeting up with Chris and Tucker, we almost got totally hosed on securing our rental car. The rental car manager explained that our pre-purchased insurance was not a thing and that we had two options: either leave a deposit of $22,000 USD and collect the money upon return of the car (no) or buy their insurance for 4x what we paid online (yes). After the hour-long haggle of insurance rates, we hopped in a Kia Ultima and were almost t-boned roughly four times as we sped out of Mexico City.
Our destination? Tlachichuca.
November 11th, 5 pm
We arrived in the small town just around sunset and parked our car at the Citlaltepetl (Summit Orizaba) hostel where we then unloaded our things into a little room. My god, we had been in a car for only four hours, and we were already reeking. Not a good sign.
I obviously took the bed with a creepy doll stitched into the comforter. We then proceeded to gather in a circle and take some pills together. Diamox, the pills were just Diamox, nothing else. We had no shame taking altitude drugs as we’d be cutting it close on acclimatization time. In the following hours, I learned how much of a diuretic Diamox is. We were on a synced-up every-forty-five-minute peeing cycle. This became an issue when Zak had to continuously get off a rather tall, rickety, and noisy bunk bed throughout the night. I vaguely remember Chris mentioning to Zak that he’d stab him in the back if he kept moving. Ah, the camaraderie.
Tucker Hoefler, Zak Munro, and Chris Kussmaul organizing the kits before an AM departure.
Tucker Hoefler contemplates how much faster he’s going to walk than the rest of the crew. Turns out, way faster.
November 12th, 7 am
The next morning, we loaded into the truck and began our journey to the Piedra Grande hut, which sits at roughly 14,000’. During the two-hour car ride up a proper 4×4 road, we discussed our plan of getting to the hut, prepping for the following morning, and possibly shuttling a load up higher on the mountain. That would reduce the weight of what we would have to carry early in the morning during summit day. This seemed like the best idea to diminish the chances of any altitude sickness. Hopping out of the car at 10:15 am, we immediately tossed out that plan and suited up fifteen minutes later to try for the summit that afternoon. We knew how it could go wrong if we pushed too hard, so we kept a mellow pace. And took more drugs, of course.
Zak Munro and Tucker Hoefler help the shuttle driver pull out the gear at the 14k hut, only minutes before starting the climb.
Chris Kussmaul makes sure his kit remains in one piece while he watches the unloading.
November 12th, 9:30 am
Wearing trail runners, we started the 4,500’ climb through an inertia-sapping scree, dust, and boulders combo. Until about 16,000’, we averaged about an hour per 1000’ of climbing. On the way up, we passed about four parties, all giving us nasty looks and comments about how there was little chance we could ski the peak. We became familiar with the Spanish words “firme” and “estupido.”
To be fair, we were doing the opposite of the other climbers. We were unguided, carrying small packs, leaving in the daylight, and hauling skis up, so it’s unsurprising that they were taking some playful jabs at us.
We cruised up to the snowline—around 16,500’— and transitioned to boots n ‘pons. This was also the first time I started to feel the altitude a bit. Chris had a tiny headache earlier, but that disappeared once we slowed our roll a bit. Suddenly, the summit became covered in the clouds that had previously been obediently sitting in the valley. Until this point, the weather had been the definition of “splittah.” Clear, no wind, and beautiful views all around. And now it started to look like we might have to summit and ski with no visibility. We debated whether to head back to the hut and try again in the morning or to push on to the summit.
Ultimately, we decided to continue our ascent until it didn’t make sense. And honestly? We didn’t want to reverse that confusing approach in darkness. I mean, I like challenges and all, but I’ll happily avoid them whenever I can.
Approaching through the moraine of dust roughly around 15,500′.
Clouds looming while ascending the bootpack to the summit.
Zak Munro on the summit crater/ridge of Pico De Orizaba.
With pointy bits on the feet, we began the slog to the summit. Pico De Orizaba is by no means a technical peak other than having to wear crampons and carry an axe. However, I put the axe away within ten minutes of hiking and stuck with two ski poles. Plenty of guided parties will rope up, but none of us saw a single crack in the glacier. Years ago, there were more crevasses, but with the warming climate, it seems these have mostly disappeared.
As the climb continued, the clouds began to vanish and were gifted incredible views of the surrounding valleys and mountains. This was convenient timing as at least three of us (seemingly not Tucker) began to slow down significantly as we gained altitude. Chris and I were on the “thirty steps and hit a wall” program, while Zak was on the “thirty steps and occasionally dry heave” program. The last 450’ were god awful as we ascended this seemingly endless curving track to the summit.
November 12, 3 pm
18,450′, what a trip. Chris had been above 20,000′ a few times and Tucker had been up to 19,000′ before, but for Zak and me, this was our first time above 14,500.
Once on top, we hung around and took photos, did the whole high-five thing, and watched Zak dry heave some more. The next bit is where the question mark lay. We all figured we’d be able to get to the summit with some ease, but we had only heard horror stories of terrible ski conditions and accidents. A few years back, I had some close friends attempt to ski Orizaba and witnessed another skier die as they slid on blue ice and went over a cliff. With that nagging in the back of my mind and having seen some ice near the summit, I decided to hike down to 18,300′ to click into my skis while the others made some spicy-ish turns from the top.
In hindsight, I wish I had skied just from the top, but it is what it is. Still a ski from above 18k.
By summiting in the afternoon, we had the weather on our side. The west-northwest face we descended had warmed up as much as possible and provided an interesting mix of ice, corn, and small runnels of soft snow. Having only skied a handful of times that season before the trip, my legs felt somewhat like jelly after more than six jump turns. Another cycle began for all of us (again, excluding Tucker), where we’d link five to seven turns, then gasp for air as we watched the crazy landscape drop below us. It wasn’t great skiing, but wasn’t the worst I’ve experienced. In fact, I have had much worse—possibly knee-breaking—snow conditions while skiing the Emmas after they refroze from some midday clouds & wind. I guess not every day features Utah’s “greatest snow on earth.”
What we came for, beyond the view…the turns.
November 12th, 3:30 pm
Back at the toe of the glacier, we popped our skis off, put on trail runners, and pointed our tired bodies toward the hut. Looking back at the summit, it didn’t look like a big deal. But then I took two steps uphill to grab my backpack, stopping and leaning on my poles to breathe.
Right, altitude is a different beast.
November 12th, 5 pm
After quite literally almost blowing out my knee three times from the loose, scree descent, the sun had finally set. We were treated to a stunning sunset above a valley of clouds. We switched to headlamps, well, the other three did. Mine was conveniently discharged at some point during the climb. So I followed closely behind Zak as we poked our way back to the hut, where we ended up hoarking down some freeze-dried meals. We then proceeded to have one of the worst nights of sleep of the entire trip as every other climber chose to wake up and get ready to climb at midnight. Note to self: bring a tent next time.
The morning after. Having driven up & summited in the same afternoon, a restful night’s sleep was definitely not had amid the seemingly 100 potential sumitters waking up at 11pm to begin climbing.
November 13th, 10 am
The beefy Suburban picked us up, and we made our way back to the hostel. Tired and smelling awful, we collected our things, repacked the bags, and hit the road to Mexico City, a mere forty-five minutes after returning to the hostel. With heads down and hunger increasing, we quested into the city and narrowly avoided a few collisions. In an explosive manner, we landed in our rental apartment and then focused on putting as much food as possible in our bodies. Great success.
November 14th, 3 pm
Rocking negative covid tests, Zak and I loaded onto the airplane headed back stateside. When we landed in Dallas, we pointed our compasses north and walked straight into a TGI Fridays. Tell me that is not the most American thing to do… granted, it was the only thing open. Surrounded by screens blasting NFL highlights and stereos playing mid-2000’s Sean Kingston, we felt like we were the furthest thing away from the quaint, quiet Mexican town we had just been staying in.
November 15th, 12:30 am
Finally, back at the Salt Lake City airport, we made our best attempts at the local FKT time from the infamous terminal B to the passenger pick up traverse. We had an unfair advantage as we came from 18,000′ a mere 48 hours ago. Though we didn’t beat the FKT, with appropriate planning and a summit of an 8000m peak, one could easily uproot the current champ.
November 15th, 10 am
A mere nine hours later, Zak and I met up once again back at Skimo Co for the weekly shop meeting. Tired, haggard, and full of a haze that could only come from a sleep-deprived international mission, we joined the meeting and told this exact tale to our co-workers.
A kiss of sunlight on Pico De Orizaba’s summit.
Total Skimo Co to Skimo Co time: 112 hours (FKT)
Skimo Co to the summit of Pico De Orizaba: 74 hours (FKT)
