Ms. Lightbody: Iztaccihuatl Volcano

Last Sunday, we went with our friends Corine and Stéphane to climb up to the snow line of the volcano Iztaccihuatl. It's the 3rd highest peak at 5220 m. The plan was to hike up to the snow line at about 4000 metres. Iztaccihuatl means = White woman in Nahuatl. She is pictured as a sleeping woman on her back, therefore you can see the silhouette of her body including her hair, head, chest, knees and feet. Some find it difficult to see this! But with an open mind and imagination it's possible to see her. We left Mexico at 7:15 am and arrived in the village before the hike at Amecameca. In the local market, we had a breakfast consisting of sopes, quesadillas with cafe de olla and atole de guayaba. Before we reached the mountain, we bought our park permits at El Paso de Cortez, which is where Cortez first laid eyes on Mexico City. Corine and Stéphane had no problem climbing up...however the situation was different with me. After hiking up for about 30 mins I started to feel dizzy and the yellows and greens in the flowers and grass became more of a fluorescent colour. I could barely go further than 25 steps in one go without taking a rest and regaining my vision. This was a symptom of high altitude sickness. When Manu and I finally made it to the first "portilla" (the first of for posts up to the snowline), a Mexican woman/nurse gave me a lemon to suck on. She told me this would help increase my alkaline level. We had nuts, muffins and water packed in our bags...but this wasn't enough. If you go hiking up high, bring citrus fruit to help alleviate the altitude sickness. Manu didn't feel the dizziness, however he did feel short of breath, which is logical seeing as though there is less oxygen at this elevation and later on he suffered from a mild headache. We were disappointed that we couldn't reach the top that day, but consoled ourselves with a nice long nap with a front row view of the second highest peak in Mexico: Popocatepetl volcanoe. It's right next to Iztaccihuatl at 5426 m. I researched the reasons why some suffer from altitude sickness and other don't, and there is no apparent reason. Sex, age, physical condition have nothing to do with your insusceptibility to altitude sickness. I think that I could have made it to the snow line, but it would have taken me a good 5 hours in total from the parking lot to the snow line. With some effort, Corine and Stéphane made it in a little over 2 hours!