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The Ascent
Part 4 (back to Part 3)

The Ascent to Base Camp
Eleven burros arrive to be loaded with our food, archaeological equipment, film equipment, and personal gear. Once loaded, we form a train of human-burro beasts of burden as we begin our ascent along the paths above Quilcata. The approach to Sara Sara takes us through terraced fields of wheat and pastures of grazing sheep and cows. Jim Underwood of The Mountain Institute, and a friend and colleague of Johan Reinhard, draws a map in his field notes as we ascend. The route follows a clear mountain stream up the lower slopes of Sara Sara. basecamp

The terrain is semi-arid, with blooming cacti and flowering trees offering color to the otherwise brown and occasionally green slopes. We approach Sara Sara from the north side, which gets sun all day. (Some of us have a tough time getting used to the fact that south of the equator the sun lies to the north of us.) The snow has melted off Sara Sara's north side, revealing rock spires, or gendarmes, that stretch up like grand organ pipes toward the sky.

slaughter

It takes us two days to reach base camp at 15,000 feet. Even Francisco, a sheep that was bought in Quilcata, made it up—tethered to Genero, one of the cooks. The ground offers us a flat plateau strewn with huge boulders and green high alpine moss. I try not to cringe as Francisco's throat is cut and he is prepared for dinner tonight. Johan, Jose Antonio and their archaeological team will start carrying loads up to the summit tomorrow to supply our final camp at 18,000 feet. "I'm convinced there's a sacrificial mummy up there," says Johan, "because when I was up there in 1981 I found a female Inca shawl pin on the surface.....Inca women didn't just go up there for no reason. There may even be more than one body on the summit given the significance of this mountain to the Inca."

Come back in the next few days to read about the team's arrival at the summit and their first archaeological find!

The Ascent | Digging in Thin Air | The Mummy's Journey | Preserving the Past

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