Volcan El Misti Trek

Last full day in Peru today before fighting with the global transport network from tomorrow afternoon to get back to Arizona.
Yesterday i came back to Arequipa after a 2 day trek up the El Misit Volcano just to the north of the city. Its not the tallest mountain around here or, aparently, the hardest. But at 5825m, its still bloody high and hard work! Friday morning we travelled in 4x4 to 3415m and then trekked quite slowly for about 6hrs to base camp at 4500m. I was in a group of 5 with mixed abilities and 2 guides. By the time we reached base camp, atleast 3 people were really feeling the effects of altitude and we still had 1300m to go! I fortunately acclimatised abit in Cusco and Puno so felt ok. At 1am the next morning we were up for breakfast (cheese and jam on bread! mmmm!) and left just before 2am. 2 people got hit badly with sickness overnight so stayed at base. 3 of us and 2 guides started the long trek up. 1300m vertical ascent doesnt sound much but at this altitude, its a big summit day. We hit about 5100m just before sunrise at 4:30am where a 3rd person dropped out and went back to base with one of the guides. Now it was just me, a dutch guy and a guide left.

Our first aim was the crater rim of the volcano at about 5750m. The last 400m to get here was excruitating. We were both beginning to suffer with the altitude by this point, me a little less i think. We were trekking in 3-4ft of snow with strong winds pounding our faces with snow and ice. Worst of all, i didnt have any gloves but had to have one of my hands out to hold the ice axe. It was cold! We eventually made it to the rim, just. There was a number of times we both thought of calling it a day but we got there. After a 15-20min break, we left our bags there and tried for the summit. The snow here was loose and not easy to walk on. Every step forward you sank a foot into the snow. Although it was only another 75m of ascent, it must have taken us 45 mins or so. We were taking a dozen steps then having a quick breather. I cannot describe how hard it is. Physically, i was ok. My legs weren´t feeling too bad or anything but the altitude made my head throb and less oxygen gets into your lungs. Its like the worst hangover ever, and i mean several-bottles-of-sambuca hangover!

At the top is a 15ft cross, covered in snow and ice when we got there. The views when the clouds broke were incredible. I have lots of photos but will load them up back in Arizona later this week. Getting down was fun though! We walked a short distance to the crater edge which formed an almost perfect bowl. Then just layed down with the ice axe on hand as a brake and slide all the way. You have to be careful to avoid the odd rock sticking out (it can hit some painful places!) but we slide really quickly into the centre and back to our bags. It took us ages to get up and 5 minutes to get back to our bags and another well deserved break.

Getting back down the rest of the mountain was pretty easy aswell. The top 800m was all snowed up so the same technique was applied. After that, until about 3600m it was all volcanic ash and scree. We stopped at basecamp to rest, collect the others and pick up the tents but essentially it was the biggest and best scree running jaunt ever! We lost about 2000m in total and with speed and ease. It was awesome!

Anyway, this is probably my last post from Peru unless i get time to write something tomorrow. Have a good week y´all.
Laters