Feb 01, 2018- A few years back in a bike accident I cracked one of my molars. It was repaired with a root canal but suddenly before leaving for South America it wanted to start acting up. I got into the dentist before leaving and they said the tooth would need work which of course they couldn’t do since I was leaving so soon. In lieu of calling off the trip I was prescribed antibiotics with the hope that they would alleviate the issue long enough to let me climb and get back home. Altitude has a tendency to make toothaches worse so the dentist gave me a second round of even stronger antibiotics as a backup adding that “worst case Argentina has decent enough medical facilities and you could have it pulled.” Not inspiring but options were limited. Obviously I threw the dice.
Now fast forward to Feb 01, 2018 around 4am and suddenly that tooth decides it’s not happy. I’m woken by throbbing pain in my tent and slightly disoriented given its my first night on the trail. I had my medicine bag near me so I grabbed some advil. In my panicked haze I decided that if it’s hurting now I should just up the ante and take the strong antibiotics. I started those and 800mg of ibuprofen. After a bit the pain meds kicked in and I went back to sleep. When I woke up I started thinking if my tooth hurt down here what would it be like as we got higher? I figured I had to find out since I’d come this far. It would have to be one hell of a toothache to get me to turn back.
We had a quick breakfast and then started up on the trail. Today at the tail end of our hike we would get our first glimpse of Aconcagua. It was HOT again but the scenery was amazing! I ended up not being able to get a shot of Aconcagua because of clouds however I was able to get a sense of how massive it is. Hint… it’s huge!
Part of the reason I love hiking, climbing, backpacking, and mountaineering is that solitude and contemplation are built into them. The real world drowns out and you get to leave the bills and responsibilities behind you (temporarily). I always have some of my best and clearest moments out on the trail. Something about the landscape and moving forward up a mountain just makes me introspective. Getting lost in your thoughts can really make the time fly by as well.
After 5-6 hours of hiking we rolled into our second camp called Casa Piedras. Mike I and threw our tent up like pros and we all relaxed for a couple hours. My tooth had held up well during the hike but was starting to throb again. I would become religious about taking my antibiotics at specific intervals taking zero chances with this opportunity. In the back of my mind I was wondering how far I would be willing to push this.
Dinner that evening was cooked by our Argentinian guide Martin whom everyone calls Tincho. The meal was fantastic and spirits were high! Tomorrow we would climb almost 3,000ft up to base camp. The past two days of hiking had been good but the elevation gain was gradual. Finally we would be heading up higher on the mountain and closer to our goal.
Climbing the 7 