The Plan
On Friday the Sierra Nevada looked stunning. Javier and Jim set out from the Ventura trailhead above Lanjarón to ascend to the Refugio de Caballo.
From there they would make for the Refugio Elorrieta for the second night, before dropping down the Rio Lanjarón valley and a return on the Sunday evening.
The weather forecast for the Saturday was mixed with some precipitation and cloud. Sunday's was similar.
What Happened (Javier and Jim perspective)
3 photos taken from the same trip!
The Friday ascent went to plan and they arrived at the refugio mid-afternoon. Overnight, it started to snow. They were not aware that on the Saturday morning AEMET had changed the forecast to an "Yellow Alert" notification, with blizzard conditions over the mountains.
On Saturday morning the conditions were not great, but deteriorating rapidly. Javier wisely chose to stay put at the refugio. They had a quick excursion up the Cerro de Caballo (3009m) in the morning to try and to obtain mobile phone reception and get some information from base. Nothing.
Saturday afternoon the blizzard worsened with heavy snowfall above 1800m. Javier and Jim made themselves as comfortable as they could. They had plenty of reserve fuel and food.
The slopes to Collado de Caballo
Sunday morning the picture was, if anything, worse. The blizzard was in full swing. Again no possibility of going anywhere. Many times they both tried to send text messages and make contact with base. To no avail. On good days you can normally get some signal but in a full blizzard, very unlikely.
The blizzard blew itself out on the Sunday evening. On Monday morning Javier waited until he was sure that conditions had settled and left the refugio at 8am. They dropped down through deep, windblown snow NE into the Rio Lanjarón and then followed it south to the acequia which they took to get back to the Ventura.
They met our party at the Ventura and we all walked back to our waiting transport and a return to civilisation.
Life in the Refugio de Caballo
A bit damp inside the refuge
We have been working with Acción Sierra Nevada to restore the Refugio de Caballo (in April 2011 there was no door or window!). At least the refugio provided basic shelter from the storm. There are a couple of points to make regarding long term stay at the hut
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The roof leaks. From 2pm to 6pm it dripped constantly. After 6pm it turned to ice and remained that way until 2pm the next afternoon
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They utilised the old door to raise the sleeping area above the floor and covered it with a tarpaulin to stop the drips
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There is very little light when the door is shut. The window has a few small holes that bring in a glimmer of light. Is this important? Normally no, but some natural light would have helped the feeling of being locked in a prison. Kindles could have been read etc
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There are still people leaving litter at the hut! Why? Thanks to Javier for bagging it all up and bringing back out with him, despite the pressure of the situation.
##3 What happened (from our perspective)
Deep snow in the Rio Lanjaron
When we realised that the weather was going to significantly worsen we sent a text message to the mobile phones. From late afternoon Friday until late afternoon Monday we were to receive no further communication from the group.
This was a worrying time. We were confident Javier would not risk moving location unless he was sure, but even so the lack of communication when your friends are trapped in a mountain blizzard makes you feel very helpless. We made an excursion to Tello on the Sunday in case they did return, but heavy rains and sleet drove us back.
We suspected the mobile phones were not working and kicked ourselves that we had given our Yellowbrick Satellite Communicator to another group on the Friday. All it required was one signal saying, "We are ok" and we could all relax.
As it was, on the Monday morning we left town early and went up through deep snows to the Refugio Ventura. This is where they had planned to return to. The amount of fresh snowfall staggered us, especially on eastern leeward slopes.
It was with some relief that Javier and Jim arrived Monday mid afternoon at the Refugio Ventura.
Conclusion
Yellowbrick 3
Satellite communications are absolutely essential for multi day trips in the high Sierra Nevada. You cannot rely on mobile phone reception. Our group did exactly the right thing given the circumstances, but how much easier would it have been for us at base if we had confirmation that all was ok?
With our Yellowbrick Tracker we can send and receive messages anywhere in the world. We could have let them know when the storm was receeding and when to leave. There would have been full backups in place.
We will be investing in a second Yellowbrick to back up all our high mountain trips in the future. In the meantime we have reactivated our Spot Messenger