A Walk in the Park

I mentioned last entry what a wild weekend it was, and without further ado I give you the Sunday half.

Following a huge day at Huamantlada we got back around 7 PM and decided to go out since it was a Saturday and fatigue is weakness leaving the body or something like that.

Before heading back to mi casa for a shower a friend of mine named Tom (another Australian, always been my weakness) mentioned a group was going to hike a mountain the next day and asked if I wanted to go. I said absolutely (figuring we were talking casual afternoon walk up a gentle hill).

Later that night at some ungodly hour Tom mentioned we might want to head back since we needed to be on the bus at 6:30 AM for the mountain. After spitting my apple juice all over the place at this unexpected news I agreed we probably needed to get some sleep and headed home.

After somehow making the bus a few hours later a group of 13 representing Denmark, France, Mexico, Australia, Germany, and the Stars and Bars were cruising towards La Malinche mountain.

Along the way, some time around the point when I was informed La Malinche was the 5^th highest peak in Mexico and we were going to the top, I began to notice I had a bit of a cough and sore throat going, nothing major, but something to remember.

We arrived at the base of the mountain (elevation 3100 m with the top being 4462 m/14640 ft) at about 10:30 AM and started our trek.

The first hour and a half or so wasn’t too bad, a couple steep parts but nothing to write home about. When we got to this landing I looked down and was in high spirits figuring that if I could see this much area below we must be close….false.

Another hour and a half later I was absolutely miserable. My cough had turned into a full blown hack, I was freezing cold, and I could barely drink water my throat hurt so bad. Also I was as physically worn out as I had ever been (including that woeful semester of crew) and still had the steepest part to go.

Looking up at the top I was having some serious doubts when Big Tom grabbed me by the collar pointed to 3 of the French guys (earlier in the day one had mentioned that their national bird was a cockatoo, kind of like a bald eagle but different) who were ahead of us and said I don’t care, they can’t beat us up there. Assuming the fatigue was due to 5 months of relative inactivity I pressed on, sort of.

Having lost the ability to keep myself vertical I began a strange crawling motion that involved all four of my limbs and must have looked just downright pathetic. It didn’t matter, I was finally covering some ground again.

After what seemed like forever of this, I finally made it to the top (3.5 hours of non stop work) with the group which was now down to 8. Despite feeling like I had been slapped in the face by death I was able to look around and appreciate the unbelievable view. It was probably breath taking, but since I had none of that to spare I have no idea.

I took a seat and we hung out up here and had a bit of lunch (yummy gluten free Bumble Bar).

After about 30 minutes and a desperate search for a chair lift, tram, helicopter pad, elevator, or parachute, we decided to head back. Upon standing up it took me exactly 1 step to realize I was in trouble. My knee which had been pain free coming up was not a happy camper for the descent and nor were my lungs, calves, quads, hammies, shoulders, head, or neck for that matter. It was very steep and the ground was mostly rocks going down so it was very slow going.

I will spare you the monologue I was having in my head for the next two hours as I creeped down (for the good of your innocent souls) the mountain.

After a solid 2 hours of sliding, I still hadn’t hit the halfway point but had met up with Morgan, a first class Frenchie. He was struggling mightily as well and we got into a nice rhythm of 5 minutes walking 10 minutes of break. Eventually that got to be too much and with about 2 hours of descent left we were in a bit of a quandary when our saviors arrived.

After passing over a cross road and down a steep slope someone whistled to us. He yelled something in Spanish and not caring what it translated to (in hindsight a questionable decision), we sprinted back up the hill with a new found second wind/pathetic breeze.

Upon arriving at the road two angels riding glowing horse drawn chariots/12 year old boys on mopeds came around the corner and offered us a ride. Having lost the ability to speak hours ago I indicated an affirmative by jumping on the back of the closest one and practically strangling the driver. Apparently this was bad form as the other boy began laughing and I backed off a bit and found a nice handle under my seat.

After a 25 minute drive down where all I could mutter was gracias, muchas gracias over and over again we made it to the bottom. After this picture of me and my heroes and a well earned tip (they didn’t want to take it but I told them this is the going rate for saving my life right now you must) we relaxed at a picnic table until boarding the bus to take us from the mountain to Puebla.

The ride back was crazy with our driver breaking land speed records on the back dirt roads and a lady hopping on with 20 bales of pine straw out of absolutely no where. Upon being dropped off in Puebla I knew I was in bad shape as I was feeling slightly worse than horrible.

I got home and went right to bed with all the wrong symptoms. Monday morning I woke up, coughed up some phlegm (sorry kind of gross I know) and spit it out to find a good percent of it was blood. After assessing my other symptoms and skyping with Mom we diagnosed it as the swine flu so I headed for the clinic.

La doctora told me she didn’t think I had pig flu, but rather a respiratory infection and gave me a broad range of treatments that probably could have knocked out anything. I returned home, let the homestay mom know and then we headed off to the pharmacy.

On the way she hit me with a real slap to the face and pretty much put me on house arrest until I get better. In a joking manner (kind of) I was informed the late night door was locked. As I write this I am still serving out my sentence but about to go have a chat with the madre to see what we can do about tonight. If she says no I have already scoped out my escape route through my window, but based on my mountain climbing skills let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.

Anyways, I think that is plenty of writing for this entry. Again, another great experience I am not dying to repeat (for fear of dying). This weekend should be a lot of fun as a group of about 20 of us are headed to Vera Cruz….