Kästle Pro Team athlete Giulia Monega's reports from the field, from the first 1/2 of her trip:
 
Dispatch #1
On May 17^th, with my expedition partners Dave Rosembarger and Christian Pondella we arrived in La Paz Bolivia. The first stroll in town was chaotic and loud. We got a true look at the Bolivian life and style on the streets. Spending the entire day at 3600m in La Paz was already a good start in acclimatization. The next day, after a good night of sleep, we felt pretty good, and decided to go higher and take a small walk to the summit of a small peak, Chacaltaya the ski resort of La Paz. A glacier once present at 5300m is now sadly melted leaving only traces of snow. Despite the elevation, this peak is really easy to reach; you can drive along the bumpy dirt road up to 5100 meters the highest I’ve ever driven! After only few hundred meters of hiking up and walking around was good enough to test our bodies and to get used to the thinner air. The most interesting point of this destination was the fact that the view from the summit will allow us to have a straight look into one of our objectives, the Huana Potosi east face. This face looked simply beautiful in photos, but firsthand it was just incredible. The whole peak is stunning looking, and the face we were planning to explore looked perfectly white and skiable.
 
The summit view not only gave us a positive expectation for the upcoming summit/ski attempt but also gave us the idea for shorter ski acclimatization for the next day. A shorter slope up on a smaller glacier below one of the ridges going at the top of the peak will give us an idea of how the snow will look like on the higher face. There the next day we start hiking, carrying our boots and skis. It took us around 3 ½ hours to summit the slope we wanted to ski, but it felt quite long to me! I was pretty tired on the last steeper section and I slowed down a lot. The boys were fast and strong, so it motivated me to carry on, despite a dropped ski pole a couple hundreds meters from the summit. (Which I luckily found on the way down stuck over some rocks!)
The snow was a refrozen, firm smooth surface typical of the high mountains in spring season. The sun softened the surface before we skied feeling pretty nice under the edges. The angle of the slope was hard to guess from a distance. We hoped for some steep skiing but not so for our first day, but still enjoyable in firm snow: just perfect.
 
Back down to the edge of the glacier, I was stocked! We just had our first turns in Bolivia the 3rd day after we landed in the country! Now a day to organize the logistics for the next objective and to rest in La Paz and we are set to go camping in a new area: the Condoriri region.
 
Dispatch #2
The next objective was to climb and ski the beautiful South face of Pequeno Alpamayo, a spectacular looking face of 300 meters of perfect 45°/50°snow slope, not high elevation, but esthetically unbeatable.
The plan was to get in on Monday, then we delayed for Tuesday, but unfortunately at midday we all ate a delicious chicken that poisoned us for the all night and next few days! Finally feeling good after a few days of recovering we attempt our goal and set out to the ski the south face. The climb up went well and as we popped out at the top of the glacier with a clear view of our objective. I couldn't believe how beautiful it was and how good the snow conditions looked. When we were at the base of the south face we realized how early we were compare to the sun schedule, so we had to sat down to waste some time in the hopes of seeing the snow soften. We waited and eventually start climbing the face, but the sun’s rays were too weak to melt the hard icy layer of the face, making the prospect of skiing extremely hard and dangerous.
 
We reached to the summit still excited to have climbed our first peak in Bolivia. In the end the decision was made to ski down the west ridge instead. The snow conditions on the ridge were perfect at that time of the day, and we had a great fun ripping turns for Christian's lens. We took our time getting back to camp, enjoying the day and scenery.
 
The next day we started late, this time going for a bigger peak, the Condoriri, the highest in this area. We didn't plan our hike, and on the way up we realized it was taking us longer than expected. At the base of the summit west slope, we were astonished for how the snow was still hard on the South aspects. At that point, cooked by the sun (us, not the snow!!) and late on schedule, we turned around and head back to camp. It was a failure, but a good learning experience about snow reliability and timing.
 
The next morning we packed up the camp and headed down the valley. Our donkeys showed up really late, so I walked down first, alone, making sure that the taxi would have wait for us in Tuni.
With the taxi already in sight, I decided to take a shortcut through the village, instead of staying in the main dirt road. A shortcut that ended with me getting a bite on my ankle by a big dog, that wasn't too happy to see me walking in his yard! The bite was deep and puncturing my skin, but luckily it wasn't painful. So back to La Paz to a doctor where I got medication for my ankle and a anti-rabies vaccine shot. I feel good after the doctor, a little sore on the wound but with high hopes for the next objective: Hayna Potosi!