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This year I did one of the sub summits Las Rodillas on Ixta and climbed Pico de Orizaba.The year before I attempted Cayambe on a two day trip to get some experience. I'm hoping to put together my two weeks of vacation for next year. Not sure when our vacation bid is going to happen. I work for United airlines so I can travel to almost anywhere. I'm curious what a good next step up would be. I can never find partners so if anybody wants to do anything let me know because I don't want to keep spending money on guides every time unless it's affordable.

xDoogiex wrote:This year I did one of the sub summits Las Rodillas on Ixta and climbed Pico de Orizaba.The year before I attempted Cayambe on a two day trip to get some experience. I'm hoping to put together my two weeks of vacation for next year. Not sure when our vacation bid is going to happen. I work for United airlines so I can travel to almost anywhere. I'm curious what a good next step up would be. I can never find partners so if anybody wants to do anything let me know because I don't want to keep spending money on guides every time unless it's affordable.

Two weeks is too short for higher elevation peaks (i.e. > 17k), but the 'Next Step' in terms of difficulty for your time constraints could be the Washington Cascades (Rainier, Baker, Shuksan, etc.), the Alaska Range (Ruth Gorge or Kahiltna Glacier peaks), British Columbia Coast Range (Waddington, Combatant, Serra, etc.), Canadian Rockies, Bolivian or Ecuadorian Andes, Tetons, or Wind Rivers. Your choice will also be influenced by how much technical experience rock climbing, ice climbing, glacier climbing, etc. you have.

I'd recommend at least looking at Peru. Two weeks is enough to climb some of the moderate peaks and acclimatize. Peru is pretty cheap as well, even if you did use a (Peruvian) guide. There are lots of mountains that you can climb without guides as well.

Two weeks is too short for higher elevation peaks (i.e. > 17k),

Everyone acclimatizes differently, but most climbers can go above 17K in two weeks (for example, no one takes two weeks to climb Kili). Of course many might not be able to though and the more acclimatization you can get, the better). Personally, I'd consider peaks up to the 20K range (with proper acclimatization of course) but not much higher than that.

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Anyway, when are you going? I already have trips booked up for December and March, and then will be too busy at work to do a big trip until later in the year.

Scott wrote:
Everyone acclimatizes differently, but most climbers can go above 17K in two weeks (for example, no one takes two weeks to climb Kili). Of course many might not be able to though and the more acclimatization you can get, the better). Personally, I'd consider peaks up to the 20K range (with proper acclimatization of course) but not much higher than that.

Certainly most climbers can go above 17k in two weeks, but once you factor travel time, time spent in country buying food and fuel, waiting out bad weather, etc., that two week trip becomes 11 days or less, which is a mighty short window for bigger mountains.

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Anyway, when are you going? I already have trips booked up for December and March, and then will be too busy at work to do a big trip until later in the year.[/quote]

I summited Orizaba in 4 days. Luckily I live Colorado so I have a lot of options for acclimatizing

Scott wrote:I'd recommend at least looking at Peru. Two weeks is enough to climb some of the moderate peaks and acclimatize. Peru is pretty cheap as well, even if you did use a (Peruvian) guide. There are lots of mountains that you can climb without guides as well.

Two weeks is too short for higher elevation peaks (i.e. > 17k),

Everyone acclimatizes differently, but most climbers can go above 17K in two weeks (for example, no one takes two weeks to climb Kili). Of course many might not be able to though and the more acclimatization you can get, the better). Personally, I'd consider peaks up to the 20K range (with proper acclimatization of course) but not much higher than that.

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Anyway, when are you going? I already have trips booked up for December and March, and then will be too busy at work to do a big trip until later in the year.

Not sure. Trying to ideas for which weeks to take off. I deff wanna go above 20,000

Go and Snowboard off of Cho Oyu.