Mountain Wo(men)
A female’s journey on the tallest mountain in the Americas
By Rachel Guevara
I entered my hotel room at the Park Hyatt Mendoza with caution, not wanting to scare the stranger that I would be tenting with for the next month. The room was empty, a large navy blue duffle sat in the far corner of the room. The possessions scattered around it didn’t appear to belong to a female. I wondered, was it going to be another trip without a female companion?
I heard a knock at the door. A man walked in and introduced himself. He was incredibly kind, and we both quickly acknowledged that it was a bit weird to pair up a 19-year-old girl and a 38-year-old stranger in a hotel room. At the team meeting later that evening, the reasoning behind the pairing became clear. He was the youngest member of the expedition, minus one of our local guides, and the entire team was composed of solo male travelers.
It was far from ideal, but this has been my reality for the past five years. At the age of 14, I began to dream of climbing the tallest peaks in the world. After reading countless mountaineering memoirs and climbing a handful of peaks with different groups, the disproportionate ratio of men to women in mountaineering (and anything extreme in the outdoors!) became apparent. On the Pacific Crest Trail, I held a trail-family of 9 men after not seeing a single uncoupled female for hundreds of miles. I then entered the competitive climbing scene at the University of Washington which is dominated by men. There is the biological card—women are not built physically in the same manner as men, but that does not limit our strength to always be “less than”. On the Pacific Crest Trail, studies have shown that while the entire thru-hiker demographic is primarily male, by the end of the trail, the thru-hikers that remain are primarily female.
After a 3-day and 40-mile approach, we reached Plaza de Mulas, a base camp tent metropolis, on the south face of Mount Aconcagua—the tallest mountain in the Western Hemisphere. As we debriefed in our mess tent, a waitress walked in. It was the first female I had seen in five days. I slowly started to put it all together. The women worked the logistics. They cooked for the teams, cleaned for the teams, and waited on the teams. The guys climbed, guided, and drank.
We spent days acclimatizing at 13,800 feet before executing our load-carrys up the mountain. The carry to Camp 1 was the worst. With the loads on our back coming in at just under 60 pounds, the team whimpered at the thought of climbing from 13,800 feet to 16,900 feet. Getting the load onto my back was a bitch in the first place. I used my strategy from the PCT, the seated roll-over press-up. The load was not shy. Every time I kicked a step, I had almost half of my total body weight pulling me down the mountain. My guide asked if the weight was a lot for me, being so small compared to the rest of the guys. While the men behind me stopped every few steps to hunch over and heave, I looked at him and said,
“I’ve done it before, I can do it again.” My size should not be a restriction to my abilities. It’s the grit in the end that allows an individual to excel under extreme conditions. It's being comfortable with being uncomfortable that keeps somebody out there alive.
As we moved up the mountain, as much as I grew to love my guides and teammates, I longed to have somebody to relate to. I was thrilled every time I got a glimpse of a female porter carrying 70-pound loads up the mountain, smoking her male counterparts. But other than that, I did not see another female for two weeks.
I have cherished all the men that I have had the pleasure of meeting on expeditions. I would not trade climbing with them for anything. Mountaineers are badass, regardless of their gender identity. But there’s always an off-putting energy to the incredibly specific demographic that comprises extreme sports in the outdoors. It can be intimidating to go out and do something with a group where nobody looks like you. Where nobody else has to go outside in -40F temperatures to pee because they can use a pee bottle while sharing a tent with a stranger. Or where nobody else has to laugh awkwardly and lower their head when a weird comment about a wife, girlfriend, or stranger is made.
More women deserve to experience the highs and lows of mountaineering.
My beloved team on my Mount Aconcagua expedition.
