The Chicas Locas are at Base Camp!

Sorry for the delay in posting, but I didn't hear from the team for a couple of days.

Roxanne, Robyn and David were stuck in the north coastal town of Nabire for a three days waiting for the cloudy weather to clear. They eventually flew in to the small village of Enerotali by fixed wing aircraft and spent one night there, which helped them to gain a bit of acclimatization after so long at sea level.

Yesterday morning they flew in to the Zebra Wall in the big Russian twin rotor helicopter. It was shortly after this that things got a bit crazy!

The team flew in to Zebra Wall at 9:30 a.m. and set up camp. At about noon a security detail comprised of a mix of miltary and local police showed up and informed them that they needed to hike out to Timika ( a city on the south coast and a pretty big hike away!) to clear their passports with the local authorities. The security personnel told them that as Zebra Wall was not governed by the authorities in Nabire, where they had cleared their passports, the group was in violation of local, internal customs.

The group discussed options with the security team and agreed to do as instructed. This agreement seemed to diffuse the situation and the security team decided not to press the issue and allowed them to stay at their camp. At about 2:30 the head of the security detail showed up at camp and insisted that the group leave the territory governed by the Timika authorities. The team had no choice but to pack up camp and hike the two hours to Base Camp, which is within the Nabire territiory that they were aprroved to travel within.

Arriving Base Camp in the dark and under a torrential rain, the sodden group made a hasty dinner and hit their sleeping bags. When David called me in the following morning, it was a gloriously clear day and he was standing under the warm sun looking over at the route.

The plan is to spend one more night at Base Camp in order to ease the altitude adjustment and then go for the summit tomorrow night. Robyn and Roxanne are apparently still full of their normal high energy, and are excited to be in Base Camp. Hopefully we'll get a call from the summit soon!