Chapter 1: The Road to Cuzco: 2.5 pounds

May 7, 2011 


Dear Friends,
I’m going to do something very special this year, and you are among a group of people I want to share this with from time to time. If you find this interesting, I hope you will read future dispatches. If you wish to opt out, I won’t be offended.
Robert Smith

As charlie horses go, these could have made the Guinness Book of World Records. It was about 2 a.m. I think I awoke Betty with my moaning as I lay there in the fetal position while the twins screamed at me. The quadricepses are the muscles responsible for lifting the lower leg and allowing you to extend your foot in a karate kick. I had been doing a lot of kicks the prior afternoon, wearing combat boots. We leapt into the air and made the kicks; after we took the heavy footwear off, it was almost as easy to lift our legs as our arms. And our leg movements became remarkably fast. But I paid for it in the dark eight hours later when both sets of quadriceps woke me up to get even.

That was 30 years ago. I considered that lesson this morning when my legs started to talk to me as I was climbing Mount Si wearing 2.5-pound weights on each ankle.

The reason

I was wearing the weights to prepare myself for the 3,000-meter elevation of Cuzco, Peru, where a team of us will be going in August on a public health mission for the descendants of Incas, who are living in tough conditions. Many of these people will speak only Quechua, the Inca language. They live in tiny homes that are filled with smoke from the open wood fires they rely on for heating and cooking. Three months after they obtain an enclosed stove with a chimney, their lung capacity improves by as much as 12 percent. That’s a significant increase, especially at Andes elevations. The stoves require less fuel and allow shorter cooking times. This cuts down the need to search for firewood, and reduces deforestation. The stoves buy time that these people can use to work their way out of poverty. Peru is one of the poorest of the Latin American nations, and we will be helping the poorest Peruvians – the individuals living away from the metropolitan areas. Complementing that effort will be the building and installation of water filtration systems. For these people, these will be life-changing actions that impact them every day.

The road to Cuzco

My road to Cuzco goes through Mount Si, a popular hiking mount that offers a 3,000-foot elevation gain if you climb all the way to the top. The trail is steep, with lots of switchbacks. The highest point is 3,900 feet, or about one third the elevation of Cuzco, so the air isn’t as thin here. I’ll compensate for the friendlier air by wearing weights and doing a lot of hiking. I’ll be doubling the ankle weights to 5 pounds per leg as soon as I can.

Physical Challenges

There are other challenges I won’t be able to train well for – what happens to the body at higher altitudes, especially dehydration. High altitudes mean lower oxygen levels, and the body compensates by manufacturing more oxygen-bearing red corpuscles for the bloodstream. That takes a few weeks. In the short term, the solution is to “cast off water,” which apparently concentrates the blood. One night while camped at the 4,000-foot level on Mount Rainer, I cast off water three times, so I have an inkling of what’s in store. I’ll be drinking a lot of water in Cuzco. And there’s medication we will take that will help with symptoms of altitude sickness.

There was a light drizzle on this first hike up Mount Si. That didn’t bother me, but I was surprised how quickly I became winded. To boost my energy, I snacked on an apple. And then I wondered if I had made a strategic mistake. There was a reason that “an apple a day keeps the doctor away,” and after biting into my Pink Lady I remembered there were no accommodations once I left the trail head. And no-one in his right mind wants to use that privy, anyway. The smoky homes of the Inca may cut lung capacity, but for misery, they can’t possibly match the odiferous nightmare of the trailhead toilet at Mount Si. Some people put matchbooks in their home bathrooms for those moments when a little flame and sulfur might help to mask the unpleasant. Don’t try it at the Mount Si outhouse, unless bright flashes and third degree burns appeal to you. The safest approach is to hyperventilate for several minutes outside, then take a deep breath and do your business as fast as humanly possible. Invariably you find it necessary to draw at least one breath through your clothing before you can exit into fresh air.

End of the trail

And so, as I ate the apple, I began to wonder if the usual effect would occur, but fortunately something else intervened. Confucius say: “A climb of 1,000 meters is ended with a single blister.” I was developing one on my left heel and I had forgotten to bring a bandage. But more than that, my thighs were talking to me. They were telling me the weights had done their work and that I was going to have a charlie horse again if I didn’t call it a day and let my legs acclimatize to this new regimen over time. So at the first picnic stop and with sweat stinging my eyes, I reversed course and began my descent after only an hour on the trail, but promising to be back next week.
On the way down I heard someone singing unabashedly. He was behind me, gaining fast, and lumbered on past, continuing to sing. Before I reached the trailhead, I passed him again, going back up. He was making his second ascent to the top. “It’s good exercise for me,” he explained.

My Peruvian adventure is being coordinated by Seattle’s community colleges under a program called “Global Impact.” I’m involved because, now that I’m retired, I’d like to do the things I wasn’t able to do before. And I’d like to tell the people I know personally about what this program involves. Global Impact is always looking for others who might want to volunteer for service like this. They have programs in Tanzania, Vietnam and India.

You strike me as the kind of folks who might consider this sort of adventure.

More to come.
Robert