Huayana Potosi 6088m

Situated just out side of La Paz the base of Huayana Potosi was only a couple of hours truck ride away so we started the afternoon off with a small acclimatisation hike from 4700m to the glacier, where the world’s poorest excuse for a mountain guide introduced the group to crampons and ice axes before trying to kill me with what turned out the be the most dangerous top rope set up possible.

Day 2 got off to a better start with a two hour hike to the 2nd camp of 5130m which marks the start of the glacier to the summit. On route however we had to stop off at the ¨office¨ to pay our 10 bolivianos, 90p, entrance fee.

The final day started at midnight and had us roped up into two groups to head up the remaining 958m to the summit. After an hour we had acquired a substantial lead over the other group so had to wait for them to catch up whilst getting colder and colder. Eventual they arrived and we had a third member of our group. Though 2 hours later he was starting to suffer and eventually gave up. So it was back to two of us to climb the final ridge to the top arriving at just after 6am.

A huge sense of relief was felt on finally making it to the top until we remember that “what goes up, must come down” and the worst part of it was we were walking it as there wasn’t a pair of skis in sight!!

So we set of back down the mountain picking up the rest of our group on route and finally arriving at base camp shortly after 3.30 for a well deserved beer.