Cotopaxi

[Climber123]

I am planning to travel to Ecuador to climb Cotopaxi in June. Has anyone recently climbed Cotopaxi and have any beta on the route conditions from the route from the hut on the north. Any suggestions or advise would be helpful. Thanks,

[crazy_t]

I would recommend a night or two in or around Quito, then maybe 2 nights here: http://www.tambopaxi.com/ with acclimatization hikes before moving up to the hut. Tambopaxi is a great place in the Altiplano at the base of the mountain, with featherbeds, great food, and views. They can give you recent beta too. I just heard that the guy who built Tambopaxi, Reno (was/is head of the Ecuadorian guiding association) made a new place in the same area that may be nicer too. Don't have details for you, and I'm not sure if he still owns Tambopaxi so they might not be the best source.

 

That route is nice, not too technical but interesting, with lots of interesting but pretty stable crevasse travel. Summit days start early, beacuse when the sun comes out in Ecuador things warm up pretty quickly. Rope, axe (just 1), crampons, picket + a couple of screws, which you may not need but there are a few exposed spots. Look at guiding companies' itineraries to get a good idea of a suitable acclimatization schedule.

[crazy_t]

http://www.chilcabamba.com/index.html

 

Reno's new place

[crazy_t]

He'd be great to talk to re: your plans, getting things organized, and route beta.

[chelle]

Crazy_t:

 

Do you know the name of the cool place in the hills above Quito that Oswaldo Freire was developing back in 2002?

 

Thanks.

[crazy_t]

Hi M,

 

I don't but I hear it is up and running, is great and is very popular with people (w/$) from Quito. Mark G at MM was there this spring, he'll have beta.

 

So are you still climbing? I saw a yard sale posting a while back..

[BlackSheep]

Hi,

I climbed it back in November 2005.

The Route was staight foreward since so it is so heavly traveled. From the hut you cross a small glacier tounge then get on all this nasty frozen gravel before getting on the glaicer for real. This section simply sucked and called for still using crampons. Maybe with more snow it would be better.

Anyway there are a few cravasses to get over but none were too bad. When I was there there was this super sketchy ladder to get up a 20' wall of ice which was the summit bergschrund, its that big blob of ice you can see just below the summit. I've heard that in different conditions you can go around fairly easily but I feel that this was the most dangerous part for both the ascent and descent. We bleayed with pickets a few times.

Acclimitization is tricky in Ecuador, the towns are at like 10,000' and the hut at over 15,000' so the jump to the hut can simply wreck you. A few nights in quito, then heading up to the Illinizas. There is a really friendly guy in Lasso that has nice and cheap rooms, is climber orientated and has a a pickup truck transport into Cotopaxi park. Another thing, half way into Cotopaxi at around 12,000' there is an A-Frame hut and a small restaurant of sorts. You can spend a night inthe A-Frame hut (just a roof over your head) for cheap and go for mellow walks to break up the altitude jump to the hut, then hitch a ride the next morning up to the reguigo.

Have fun.

 

[chris]

The lodge is called the Tambopaxi:

http://www.tambopaxi.com/

[paramagic]

Check out Eduardo Agama's set-up on the South side before the word gets out. It's laid back and muy chevere. I think his website is cotopaxi-carasur; it may have a lot of guided oriented stuff on the site if he hasn't updated it, but you can just chose to take advantage of transportation and cool digs. Fun route, and you can avoid the hut nonsense.