Filo Sureste on Cerro Torre in Patagonia, the ultimate dream. By Franceso Ratti

This year, along with Alessandro Beltrami and Manuel Chasseur, we decided once again to bet on Patagonia and head to this land known for having the world’s worst weather, with the dream of climbing the mountain: Cerro Torre! And the ultimate dream would have been to climb Cerro Torre via the famous Southeast Ridge. It’s an iconic route, the line of the celebrated and controversial Compressor Route opened by Cesare Maestri in 1970, during which hundreds of bolts were placed using a pneumatic drill. In 2012, many of those pressure bolts were removed by the Americans Hayden Kennedy and Jason Kruk, restoring the route to its original difficulty, and an ethic more in line with modern alpinism. Climbing this route nowadays means facing Cerro Torre in a cleaner style, on real terrain: rock, ice, and mixed, without the former “bolt ladder."

Sometimes dreams do come true: Right after arriving in El Chaltén, a perfect weather window opened up, and we know well that opportunities like this in this corner of the world must be seized to the fullest. There was no time for a "warm-up" climb; we knew we had to go straight for the main objective. We prepared our gear, even leaving a cache with the heaviest items on the approach to Niponino, and returned to El Chaltén to wait for the good weather. Many doubts arose before setting off: What would the conditions be like? Would it snow heavily the day before the good weather arrived? Thanks also to the invaluable advice from Rolando Garibotti - whom we thank from the bottom of our hearts - the uncertainties gave way to action, and we found ourselves ready to depart for our adventure on this incredible mountain!

On Thursday, 27 November, we left El Chaltén on a day with perfect weather to reach the "Noruegos" camp at the base of Cerro Torre, from where we planned to start the next day. A final weather update from Rolo informed us that Sunday would not be a great day; maybe we should accelerate our schedule and try to be on the summit by Saturday afternoon… All we could do was hope for optimal mountain conditions to move fast!

And as I said before, sometimes, when all the stars align, dreams do come true: on Friday morning we set off from Noruegos, climbing quickly towards Colle della Pazienza, which we reached in about 3.5 hours thanks to the excellent glacier and snow conditions. Here, given the snow quality and the time, there were no doubts: instead of bivying, we decided to continue towards the Ice Towers. From this point, the longest part of the day began: 15 demanding pitches, alternating sections of perfect granite with stretches of snow and mixed climbing in excellent condition. It was a varied and continuous progression that kept us busy until late evening, with one section climbed using aid on the Haston crack. We climbed the final ice pitches of the day in the heart of the Ice Towers by headlamp, immersed in the silence of the Patagonian night. Having reached two pitches below the infamous Head Wall, we dug a small platform in the ice for our bivouac: essential, uncomfortable, but sufficient after such a long day.

After Friday's "big day," we needed rest, so on Saturday morning we started off calmly, confident we could count on another day of perfect weather to tackle the final part of the route.

The ice chimney below the headwall was one of the most spectacular sections of the climb: 60 meters of vertical, narrow, and continuous ice, with sections requiring us to remove our backpacks. Manuel masterfully led this pitch, bringing us to the start of the legendary headwall of Cerro Torre! Here, the heat began to make itself felt, and the rock was streaked with water running off the summit mushroom. Despite the slightly damp rock, the grip on Cerro Torre's granite was good, and Ale and I managed to climb these pitches free, taking turns leading.

At 3:30 PM, we hugged each other in disbelief on the summit of Cerro Torre. Reaching this peak - so beautiful, so symbolic, so difficult to attain - was for us a moment of pure emotion, a mix of disbelief, joy, and gratitude towards the mountain.

During the abseil descent, we experienced a second intense moment: after using some of Maestri’s old belays, we set foot on his famous compressor. Touching that historic object, hanging beneath the summit for decades, was like physically stepping into the history of Patagonian alpinism. A symbolic detail, but incredibly moving for us.

The rest is pure mountaineering chronicle: we bivouacked during the descent on Saturday night. On Sunday, the weather indeed turned out to be less than optimal, with more clouds and wind, but it didn’t cause us any problems as we continued abseiling down to Niponino. Finally, on Monday, 1st of December, we reached El Chaltén to celebrate!

- Francesco Ratti, El Chalten, Patagonia

Ratti thanks: Millet, C.A.M.P., La Sportiva e Samaya