On Sunday at church, I had talked with Clemens, a short-term missionary here, about going hiking on Monday. He said he would be going up to the radio transmitter with Brad to help work up there. The station has been off the air for about a week because of generator problems. Monday morning was nice and sunny so I happily set off from my house at about 9:30 looking forward to a nice hike. I was passing by the mission compound so decided to stop in and see if they had left yet. I thought maybe I would ride up with them to the antenna site on the canyon rim and then have more time to explore up there than if I hiked up. There are some old tombs up there that I had heard about but had never seen, so wanted to look for them.

They were just about ready to leave, and had enough room, so I rode along with them. Of course as often happens, there were a number of last minute things, including tracking down the gas station owner at the bank so that we could buy fuel. It was about an hour later that we finally were on the road going up there. I had worked on the antenna site previously but hadn't been up there since it was finished so I wanted to see it as well. When we got there I found out that they needed to install some lightning dissipaters on the top of the tower. These look like long wire brushes that would be used to clean out stove pipes. Brad was planning on climbing up and when I mentioned that I used to work on poles and towers, he asked if I wanted to help him. Always ready for a climbing adventure, I agreed to do it. The only problem was that I was dressed for hiking in shorts and a T-shirt, not working on the top of a 100 foot tower at close to 14,000 feet elevation.

I put on my long sleeved T-shirt and a light windbreaker and figured I would be OK as it was a nice sunny day. After making a rope harness and attaching a rebar hook to it, we started climbing. It had been about 40 years since I had done this, and as I reached the half way point, I began to wonder if maybe I was too old for it now. The wind was getting stronger (and colder) as we went up and the tower had just enough movement to it to induce a bit of anxiety, especially looking down at the cement wall covered with razor wire down below us. However upon reaching the top and seeing the great views of Nevado Solimana and other mountains covered with fresh snow it was all worth it. We pulled up the lightning dissipaters and looked at what we needed to do to install them. About this time my rebar hook noisily slid a bit on the angled rung of the tower, which gave us both a start, but all was OK. Well, our feet were starting to ache from standing on those same angled rungs and my legs were covered with goosebumps from the cold wind, but other than that all was OK!

It was a little tricky installing the dissipaters, which were like trying to hold on to pin cushions, with the points all sticking out, but we managed to do it and even get a few photos of the process. By the time we were done, our feet were more than ready to be off the tower, as well as I needed to stop half way down to give my hands a rest. When we reached the bottom and were out of the wind, it seemed like a different world, all nice and warm. By this time it was 2:00 pm, we were all hungry and enjoyed our lunch in the warm sunshine. After lunch I went looking for the tombs but never found them, but I still had a nice hike back down to Cotahuasi, arriving just before dark.

Unfortunately they were not able to get the generator running, hopefully the new fuel filter that was ordered will arrive today and that will solve the problem. Please pray that the transmitter will soon be back on the air and for no more problems. If you would like, you can also join me in praying for a miracle. The Claro cellphone company has a tower for their antenna a few hundred yards from our radio antenna. They installed poles and an electrical line to get power from Cotahausi. They weren't interested in selling us electricity but I am praying that they will give us electricity as a public service, in exchange for a large sign thanking them for their contribution.