{"id":815,"date":"2016-08-31T20:18:28","date_gmt":"2016-08-31T20:18:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/?p=815"},"modified":"2017-09-21T15:13:27","modified_gmt":"2017-09-21T15:13:27","slug":"adventure-on-aconcagua","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/2016\/08\/31\/adventure-on-aconcagua\/","title":{"rendered":"Adventure on Aconcagua"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"TFM_Summer_Web_Page_39_Image_0001\"Jeremy Rogers is not a man you easily forget. When you\u00a0meet him, he looks right at you and immediately wraps you\u00a0up in a story. He uses the word \u201csuper\u201d a lot. His intensity is\u00a0balanced by a robust laugh and soft spot for his 5-year-old\u00a0daughter, Taylor. And while all that is Rogers stirs your soul\u00a0and renders you somewhat unbalanced upon each encounter,\u00a0so too does his mission: to change the world. A large part\u00a0of that mission is the Tallahassee Adventure Club, a local\u00a0nonprofit organization geared towards creating and leading\u00a0adventure experiences in the Southeast.<\/p>\n

Standing at the summit of Mount Acatenango, an inactive\u00a0volcano in Guatemala, Rogers decided it was his\u00a0purpose to share adventure with others, and the idea of a\u00a0local adventure club emerged. This idea became a reality\u00a0that eventually would lead Rogers up another, much bigger\u00a0mountain. Mount Aconcagua in Argentina is the second\u00a0highest of the Seven Summits, second only to Mount Everest\u00a0in Asia. Friend and co-founder of the Tallahassee Adventure\u00a0Club Greg Bargo suggested that Rogers make the\u00a022,837-foot journey up Aconcagua to bring awareness and\u00a0support for their organization. Greg\u2019s brother, Brandon Bargo,\u00a0a world-record holder in mountaineering, was leading\u00a0an expedition. Rogers signed up and rallied the community\u00a0around the cause. Through meetings with local leaders, coverage\u00a0from WCTV, and a GoFundMe page, Rogers raised\u00a0the recognition and resources to fuel his adventure.<\/p>\n

The 22-day expedition began with a 30-hour flight from\u00a0Orlando to Mendoza, Argentina where he met his guide and\u00a0two other adventurers from Austin, Texas: Vella Karman\u00a0and amputee Denish Ranasingha, both of whom had successfully\u00a0climbed Mount Kilimanjaro. On the two-hour bus\u00a0ride from Mendoza to the trailhead, located in the small ski\u00a0resort town of Los Penitentes, Rogers felt nervous. \u201cThere\u00a0was a lot of uncertainty and pressure. A whole community\u00a0was following me and backing me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nerves gave way to thrilling scenery and demanding\u00a0terrain during the three-day, 40-mile hike to Base Camp.\u00a0Mountaineers refer to this part of the expedition as \u201cthe approach\u201d\u00a0to which Rogers appends \u201cthe fun part,\u201d although\u00a0certainly not free from adversity. The climate was arid and\u00a0the path was jagged, but rocks in delightful hues of pinks,\u00a0blues, and yellows\u2014a result of minerals from glaciers that\u00a0long ago formed the trail\u2014interjected the days\u2019 challenges.\u00a0Camaraderie grew when Rogers taught Karman and Ranasingha\u00a0breathing exercises and meditation. Rogers and Bargo\u00a0found stress relief in solo rock climbing.<\/p>\n

\"TFM_Summer_Web_Page_40_Image_0001\"The four made it to Base Camp, but the final day of the\u00a0approach\u2014said to be the second hardest day of the entire\u00a0expedition due to the varying terrain and a rapid elevation\u00a0increase of a few thousand feet\u2014proved to be too taxing for\u00a0one adventurer. What was scheduled to be an eight-hour\u00a0hike took 15 hours due to difficulties Ranasingha faced\u00a0from his prosthetic leg. \u201cHe was grinding,\u201d said Rogers.\u00a0\u201cWatching this tall, muscular man with arm braces negotiate\u00a0rivers and scramble over boulders was incredible. He\u00a0was like a robot.\u201d Unfortunately, Ranasingha\u2019s health and\u00a0safety check revealed a dangerously low oxygen saturation\u00a0level and forced him to withdraw from the expedition. Rogers\u00a0expressed his admiration for the attempt. \u201cIt was really
\nhard for him. He pushed himself harder on that day than\u00a0Kilimanjaro.\u201d Karman withdrew as well.<\/p>\n

The journey remained for Bargo and Rogers. Their itinerary:\u00a0Camp I, Camp II, Camp III, and Summit Day. Aconcagua\u00a0has a thirty percent success rate. Atop those odds, the\u00a0third-ever \u201csuper\u201d El Ni\u00f1o occurred, ushering in temperatures\u00a0well below zero and wind gusts above 60 miles per hour.\u00a0Extreme weather conditions resulted in very few people on\u00a0the mountain. Rogers and Bargo pushed on through blizzards\u00a0and malfunctioning equipment. At Camp II, Rogers\u2019s sleeping\u00a0bag zipper broke, so he slept fully clothed. At Camp III,\u00a0their stove misfired, making melting water and cooking extremely\u00a0difficult. Now at an altitude of 20,000 feet, warmth,\u00a0sustenance, and hydration were matters of survival, and every\u00a0task garnered extreme effort. \u201cTying my shoe was equivalent\u00a0to running a one hundred yard dash,\u201d said Rogers. \u201cThis was\u00a0hands-down the most diYcult challenge of my life. But it\u00a0never felt [unattainable].\u201d<\/p>\n

Summit Day arrived. On limited food and water, Rogers\u00a0and Bargo continued climbing. Midday, a looming storm\u00a0moved closer. Rangers and passing climbers urged them to\u00a0turn back. Undeterred, Rogers stuck with his guide and put\u00a0one foot in front of the other, ascending the final 30 degree\u00a0wall. He reached the top of the mountain at 22,600 feet. The\u00a0technical summit was a couple hundred feet away and made\u00a0invisible by the enveloping grayness of a storm cloud. Rogers\u00a0decided to descend. Back at Base Camp and feeling somewhat\u00a0defeated for not reaching the summit, professional mountaineers\u00a0rallied around him and proclaimed, \u201cYou were on top\u00a0of that mountain. Buddy, you were off the couch! Go home\u00a0knowing that this was a successful climb.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rogers returned to Tallahassee with a reception that he\u00a0describes as \u201coverwhelmingly positive.\u201d He used the momentum\u00a0from his experience to launch the Tallahassee Adventure\u00a0Club and generate its first initiative: Every Little Girl Needs\u00a0an Adventure. \u201cI am super certain that this is exactly what I\u00a0am supposed to be doing with my life.\u201d If you ask Rogers why\u00a0he climbs mountains, he would say that he does it because\u00a0it changes him. \u201cAfter every mountain I climb, I come back\u00a0down a different person. It changes me in a positive way.\u201d\u00a0Through the success of Aconcagua, Rogers continues to parlay\u00a0his personal growth into the growth of others through a\u00a0singular method: adventure.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Jeremy Rogers is not a man you easily forget. When you\u00a0meet him, he looks right at you and immediately wraps you\u00a0up in a story. He uses the word \u201csuper\u201d a lot. His intensity is\u00a0balanced by a robust laugh and soft spot for his 5-year-old\u00a0daughter, Taylor. And while all that is Rogers stirs your soul\u00a0and renders […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":816,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_cbd_carousel_blocks":"[]","footnotes":""},"categories":[3,202],"tags":[241,40,240,239,242],"class_list":["post-815","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-community","category-outdoors","tag-adventure","tag-child","tag-climbing","tag-mountain","tag-outreach"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/815","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=815"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/815\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1294,"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/815\/revisions\/1294"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/816"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=815"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=815"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=815"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}