Peru - Ausangate Trek

The final big trek of our year off was the one that had been on our wish list the longest – Ausangate. The trek winds around the mountain of the same name. Ausangate is the highest mountain in southern Peru at  20,945’ and is a sacred mountain or Apu, in Incan mythology.  When we visited Peru back in 2008 we heard about the hike just southeast of Cusco, but didn’t have the time to do it. We brought home a topo map though, and finally made it there in 2015.

We were rapidly running out of time, so we caught a flight from Huaraz to Lima, then another onto Cusco. We spent a day in Cusco buying food for the hike, then were up early the next morning to catch the 6:15 bus to the small town of Tinki, just over three hours away. This was the lowest point on the trek at 12,437’.

As the dirt road gently climbed out of Tinki, the houses thinned out and the rain started. A black dog hanging around the back of a house spotted us and began following us, then shortly after that, another dog joined us. Despite out best attempts to shoo them both away, we remained a foursome for the rest of the day.

We enjoyed a bit of sun in the afternoon, and managed to get our tent set up and cook dinner near the tiny village of Upis before the rain and darkness arrived. We completely ignored the two dogs’ hungry looks and figured the lack of food combined with the cold rain would discourage them from sticking around. We were half right.

The little village of Upis, with Nevado Ausangate in the distance.

Peru - Alpamayo Trek

 After completing the Santa Cruz trek we took a few days to clean up and relax before heading out again. It was also an opportunity to plan our last three weeks in Peru. Losing ten days to illness meant we wouldn’t be able to fit in everything we hoped to do, and in the end we decided to focus on trekking. This meant cutting out a second visit to Machu Picchu (we were there in 2008) as well as several other destinations. But given we were already fully acclimatized to the high elevation and in good hiking shape, and the undeniable fact that we weren’t getting any younger, this seemed like a good time to knock off two very difficult hikes we’d been talking about for years.

First up was the Alpamayo Base Camp trek. This is actually just north of the Santa Cruz trek we’d just completed, and is sometimes done in combination with it. We left Huaraz on the 7:00 AM bus and after an eight hour death defying ride back over to the east side of the Cordillera Blanca, we arrived in Pomabamba where we found a hostel and a good roast chicken dinner. The next morning we were up early again for a 6:00 AM collectivo ride up to the tiny village of Jancapampa where we started our hike. Just like the Santa Cruz trek, the Alpamayo runs west across the width of the Cordillera Blanca to Hualcayan, just north of the Santa Cruz endpoint of Cashapampa. It’s a much more difficult hike though.

Almost twice as long at about 90 kms, Alpamayo also includes five passes over 14,700’. Our starting point in Jancapampa was 11,500’ and this would be the lowest we’d be until we approached Hualcayan at the other end. From Jancapampa we wandered up the valley of the same name for a couple of hours until we reached the start of the serious climbing towards the Yanacon Pass at just over 15,000’. We stopped a couple of hours short of the pass as the inevitable afternoon rains came. We’d scheduled six days of hiking and an off day to cover the 90 kms, and our decision to finish the day shy of the pass meant we’d have to do two passes in one of our remaining days, or sacrifice our off day.

Looking up the Jancapampa valley.