Three-day hike on the Illampu-Janq'u Uma massif

Three weeks ago, Maria and I went again to the Andes montains to see another glacier lake, the Laguna Glaciar, which is one of the top 20 highest lakes in the world (5038m) (number 17 or 19 depending on sources). The lake is located between the Illampu and the Janq'u Uma peaks, both around 6400m, and relatively close to the town Sorata. From there we hired a guide with a mule and hiked for three days on these beautiful mountains. The first day we started from close to Sorata (2678m) to the Chilata lake (4200m) where we camped both nights. The impressive Chilata lake is located at the border of a quite thin rock ridge. On the other side lays a huge sloped rocky mountain which for some reason, the Incas decided it was a good place to build a village. Our local guide told us that during the Universal Flood from Noah's time, the Inca people living in the valley had to move there to avoid the waters.

The next day after a cold night that froze our tent door like it was a wooden door, we hiked up to the glacier lake and back. Once we got to the laguna glacial Maria and I decided to get closer to the glacier front, but when we were around 100 meters from there the big rocks we were walking on started to become very unstable, and after a small incident, we had to walk back thanking God nothing had happened.

The second night was not as cold as the first one, and after packing everything, we hiked back down from the heights into the deep valley.

Left: the Inca village was located on top of the steep mountain's side. Right: Maria is standing at the entrance of the Inca village.

Chilata lake.

These two plants are gathered by the locals and used for decorative purposes during carnivals.

"Base camp" by the Chilata lake, and our guide who is cooking dinner.

Sometimes the view from these heights was amazing.

Contour of a viscacha on our way up to the glacier lake.

The Illampu peak, not the highest but considered the hardest 6000 of Bolivia (in normal route).

At the glacier lake (5038m) with the glacier at the back.

While watching the glacier a sudden small snow avalanche happened and the noise echoed impressively.

A closer look of the glacier.

Llamas.

Details from La Paz

After living in La Paz for almost two and half months, we are leaving tomorrow. And even though we have been here for a while, we have realised that we haven't got that many pictures of the city of La Paz. But we couldn't leave the city without making a post about this impressive place.

La Paz has a beautiful city center with old Spanish style houses and churches from the colonial time, it is also the most touristic area, where you can buy lots af colourful clothes and other things. They also have colourful buses which are very characteristic of this city.

The traffic of La Paz is awful. It seems that there are no rules and that pedestrians are never right. Therefore you have to be extremely careful when you walk around, because even if you have the right to cross a street, a car can turn a corner at top speed and you will never be right.

Consequently, the government is trying to make the cars at least respect the zebra-crossings, using very enthusiastic zebras. We hope it works.

We couldn't talk about La Paz without talking again about the Teleférico. It is a very good way to get through the steep sides of the valley where La Paz is placed in. Only 3 lines are working now, but 6 more lines are coming, which will help very much the already overcrowded streets of the city.

The government supports the culture very much, so there are often cultural activities in the streets, mostly for free. It is understandable in a country with such a rich cultural heritage they have. There are also many museums, which yesterday were all open for free, so we enjoyed visiting the very interesting Etnographic Museum. 

When you walk in the streets of La Paz, you can often get surprised if you look up and see how high the city reaches in all directions. There is more than 1000 meters difference from the highest point to the lowest, so it makes the city the most impressive we have seen so far.

Apparently, La Paz is the city in the world with most demonstrations. It has in average almost one every day of the year!
Even if the social situation in Bolivia has improved remarkably in the latest years, there are still big differences between rich and poor and a lot of corruption, so demonstrations are understandable. At least now they have the right to do it, and are not killed for it, like with the previous president Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada, who killed 64 persons and injured 228 in demonstrations against his exporting plans for the Bolivian gas. Short after that he got assylum in the U.S.A. where he is giving classes at the University about Latin America and Bolivia, even though he is prosecuted for Crimes Against Humanity. Once again, the U.S.A. and their disgusting politics.

Another detail from La Paz are the thousands of cables connecting every corner of the city, without any plan or order. Sometimes small epifitic plants (bromeliads) grow on them, giving a very tropical feel.

Finally, we couldn't finish this post without mentioning again mount Illimani, which has deep significance in the City and is more than once represented in wall paintings and other graphic representations. It is definitely a beautiful mountain.

Notice Illimani depicted in the street art.

El Alto - The City at the Edge of the Altiplano

Bordering La Paz, at the edge of the Altiplano, there is a city called El Alto (The High) bigger than its sister. And it continously grows. However, this growth has no urban planning, causing lots of traffic chaos. The lack of urban planning is obvious when you find broad avenues that suddently finish in a dirt pile, or every now and then long deep gutters on the street to direct the water when it rains, because they have no sewerage system. Huge street markets block the roads twice a week, where you can buy anything, literally. Fruits, vegetables, clothes, broken dolls, bottle caps, random pieces of anything...

As it is on the Altiplano, it has really awesome views over La Paz and the Cordillera Real mountains, which makes it worth a visit, during the day, because at night it is quite dangerous.

Connecting the two cities there are a couple of roads and two lines of the Teleférico, which is always a nice ride.

Huayna Potosi & Zongo glacier

Last weekend Maria and I went to the base of Huayna Potosi, 6088m high, to look at the Zongo glacier and its glacial lake, so Maria can use it for her project.

As soon as we got to El Alto, we could see the beautiful mountain of Huayna Potosi, as well as an awesome view over La Paz and Illimani in the background. It's only a one and a half hour ride to the base of the mountain, and in the way you can see an old tin mine, where our driver had worked until they closed it. We drove by the mine's cementery, which was full of graves from all the workers that died in the mine. Quite a sad view.

Illimani to the left with a view over La Paz. And Huayna Potosí to the right, seen from El Alto.

Once we arrived we found a place to sleep in one of the several "refugios" and hiked up to the glacial lake and around the glaciar tongue. It is clear to see how the glacier has retreated, but it is still impressive. We hiked up to a height above 5000 meters where the glacier was wider and then decided to go down, so it wouldn't get too late. We also found interesting beautiful alpine plants, which Andrés enjoyed looking and taking pictures at.

Zongo glacier with Huayna Potosí in the background.

The upper part of the glacier.

Glacier lake.

On our way down we took an alternative route towards the Zongo valley and lagoon, which is actually a dam. The wind was getting stronger and the path more and more unclear. We think we took a llama-trail and not a real trail. But we arrived well to the "refugio" and slept quite well, even though it was very cold, about -8ºC outside. Andrés had only his old summer sleeping bag, so his feet didn't warm up until next day's walk.

The next morning we started walking down the road towards La Paz with the hope of stopping a passing car and get a ride. On the way we saw many llama flocks, as well as a mountain caracaras (below to the left) and an Andean condor (below to the right). We felt really blessed.

Finally, a car took us down to El Alto, from where we walked to the cable-way and got home. It was a short but intense and great trip.

Gorges, gullies and hoodoos

Around 10 days ago we tried to find something called 'Valle de las Ánimas' (Valley of the souls) in the SE of La Paz, and after asking several people we arrived to this place. We are still not sure we found the right area, but we can say we discovered a beautiful and interesting landscape, full of gorges, gullies and hoodoos. There were quite a few very narrow gorges, which we decided to venture in to. One of them was more than 100 meters long with 10-30 meters vertical walls (maybe higher) and with a width between 0.5-2 meters. Really impressive!