Tom's Adventures in South-America: oktober 2013

Anxiously looking forward to explore the Cordillera Blanca, I arrived together with Sara -a friend from Italy- in Huaraz, Peru. Huaraz is the Chamonix of the Cordillera Blanca... The base to start your 'expeditions' in the mountains and above all the place where you can relax, take a hot shower and enjoy plenty of good food and drinks after having completed a trekking or climb!!

One day after arriving I headed off with Sara for the Santa Cruz trek, some guidebooks say 'one of the best hikes in the world'. I don't know if that's true, but for sure it was an amazing 5 days with stunning views and amazing campsites in two of the nicest valleys of the Cordillera Blanca!

Sara had to go back to Europe for work, so I started looking for climbing buddies for my next project: Nevado Pisco. With its 5752m an easy to slightly difficult mountain with superb views over many of the other well known mountains of the Cordillera Blanca. It took me two attempts to summit this mountain. In the first attempt I teamed up with Joris and Libby, a French-British couple, but the weather destroyed our plans... we stayed three days at the base camp (winterraum of Refugio Peru), but saw only lots of rain and snow. The second night we decided to give it a try, but after hours of walking in drizzling snow and breaking trail on the glacier in knee-deep snow, we stranded in a complete white-out at the col at 5300m. Back to Huaraz to relax, have good food and... make plans for a new attempt, because they predicted better weather for the coming days! I meet my new climbing partner Korbi over a capuccino in one of the many cosy bars in Huaraz. Since we feel both well acclimatised, we decide to do a 'blitzkrieg' on Nevado Pisco: half a day to reach the Refugio, have a siesta, eat a lot, have again a nap, start climbing in the night, summiting around sunrise and back in Huaraz the next day in the afternoon. Everything worked as planned... we set off under a clear sky accompanied by the full moon giving a magical touch to the glacier and the snow ridge. Korbi and me were the only two people on the mountain, we made our own trail on fresh powder snow and enjoyed the sunrise over the Cordillera Blanca at the summit of Nevado Pisco!!

The agenda for next days: some rock climbing in Hatun Machay, the highest rock climbing area in the world (if I can believe Vincent)!

Santa Cruz trek day 2... looking back at the distance we covered already :-)

Santa Cruz valley with one of the lagunas.

Meditating at Punta Union, highest point of the Santa Cruz trek and pass to the next valley.

The next valley: Huaripampa valley...

Huaripampa valley 'guarded by' Nevado Paria.

Sara and me at the end of trek, standing on top of the Llanganuco valley with the beautiful lakes!

Making it cosy in the winterraum of Refugio Peru :-)

First attempt on Nevado Pisco with Joris & Libby... and lots of snow.

Panorama with the Huandoy group on the left, Piso in the middle and Chacraraju on the right.

Magical sunrise over the Cordillera Blanca

The Huandoy group at sunrise...

Korbi on the summit ridge of Piso!

Chacraraju seen from the summit of Pisco.

How many 6000ers can you fit in one view?!?

From left to right: Chopicalqui, Huascaran Sur, Huascaran Norte and the Huandoy group.

Jeje, made it to the top!! In the background the highest summits of Peru: Chopicalqui & Huascarans.

Korbi and me on top of Nevado Pisco, what a team!

Sunday 23 September, 00:00

Several alarm clocks are going off in Refugio Ribas... It's barely 3 hours ago that we finished our last game of UNO. "Why exactly are we doing this, Tom", asks Martina, a girl from the Czech Republic. "Because it is fun...", I answer while crawling out of my sleeping bag and without being really convincing. Luckily we have Chris in the team, a British guy who starts playing 'Eye of the Tiger' on his mobile phone... in no time our backpacks are ready and we are trying to eat as much as we can, which requires quite some effort at this nightly hour and at an altitude of 4800m.

At 01:00 sharp we start walking from the Refugio to the glacier and soon we put on our crampons and start the climb of the Cotopaxi Volcano! We switch off our headlamps, an almost full moon shows us the way to the top. It's almost magical climbing up this volcano in the moonlight, while deep down and in the distance we see the little lights of Quito... We manage to keep a good pace and we only stop a few times to drink and eat a bit and to put on some extra layers. Up, up, up... You never really have the summit in view, but then suddenly some faint smell of sulphur, a big flat snowfield, the dark crater rims and a beautiful sunrise! We are at the top of Cotopaxi!!! 5897m and one of the highest active volcanoes in the world!

While the first sun rays are warming us up, we enjoy the wonderful view we have on all the surrounding volcanoes: the Illinizas, Cayambe, Antisana and even the Chimborazo! It's clear that we are right now in the middle of the 'Avenue of the Volcanoes' in Ecuador :-)

At 09:00 we find ourselves again in Refugio Ribas for our second breakfast of the day! All very excited about the great Sunday morning we just had...

Cotopaxi seen from the top of the Ruminahuia volcano, climbed one day before Cotopaxi

Cotopaxi, the stereotype of a volcano...

Serious preparation for our summit bid!

Sunrises don't get much better than this one on top of the Cotopaxi volcano!

Popeye summit picture - dark crater rim in the background

View on the Illinizas volcanos (Norte and Sur) from the top of Cotopaxi, including its own shadow!!

Thanks Christiaan, Dieter, Jonas, Katja and Yves for joining me on this climb ;-)

Traveling is experiencing extreme emotions... one day after the happiness of climbing Cotopaxi, I lost/got stolen (don't know what really happened) my passport and credit card on a bus. What to do? I am in Ecuador, at the beginning of an 8-months trip through S-America, and I have no passport and no access to cash money.

Back to Quito... to meet the consul of Belgium, a friendly man who has his office (read: desk) in a very unattractive travel agency. The Belgian Embassy in Quito has been closed years ago and all diplomatic affairs and consular services are transfered to Lima, but luckily there is still this -one person- Honorary Consulate in Quito! The consul can provide me a temporary passport for one year, so one problem solved. In the mean time my parents have already blocked my credit card and a new card has been requested, but this will take some time to arrive in Ecuador. Bedankt mama en papa voor alle hulp vanuit Belgie!!

10 days of living on a very limited budget and improvising... but sometimes the best things happen when improvising. Mario, a friend in Quito, and his family were so kind to offer me to stay at their house and we had several nice evenings chatting about Ecuador, baking Belgian waffles and having a great taco party with two French friends of the family who also stayed over for a couple of nights. Furthermore my limited budget was ideal to go trekking and camping for a few days in the Chimborazo area. Chimborazo is the highest mountain (volcano) in Ecuador and even in the world, if measured from the centre of the Earth... I had to go and have a look myself :-) Also for the many vicuñas (family of the alpacas and llamas) one can spot in this area!