Mountains, volcanos, and clouds... oh my!

Hey guys!

so today fred schmidt took a day off and took jake, kyle, and myself to climb a volcano just next to quito.

i dont have time to upload my pictures to my blogspot(as it is very time consuming) and already have loaded them to facebook so check out this link. you dont need a facebook account to veiw them

http://creighton.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2033208&l=3f637&id=32504808

it started out ok, but it was a bit cloudy. we took a cable car for the first part of our journey to the shoulder of the mountain. As the day progressed, it got really cloudy and as we were climbing up, we soon found ourselves in peasoup. we, however, managed to make it to the top of the mountain by scaling 700metres of rock, sand, and a bit of ice. after taking a breather and having a few clear minutes between clouds we were able to plot a quicker route down than we had come up. about halfway down it began to sleet on us and as we progressed to the lower altitudes it changed into rain. yay!

the altitude of omaha: a bit under 1,000
the altitude @ quito: a bit under 10,000
the altitude of the begining of the hike :13,000
the altitude of the mountain at the peak: 15,500

that all equals 4 tired people!

ha.

anyways, we were able to descend the mountain safely and make it home in time for dinner

along the way we met some people from georgia and hiked to the summit and back down which was kindo cool

ummm.... i have to be up tomorrow at 0415 to get on the bus that will take me to the highschool camp i am helping out with this next 5-6 days so i am going to cut it a bit short.

hope all is going well.

email me, i will respond.... eventually. i am not taking my computer with me to camp so i wont write for these next few days unless i find one down there.

-david