This morning, Garret and I decided to go for a hike. What better way to escape the smog and bustle of the city than to go hiking on the Pichincha Volcano, which borders the city of Quito on its Northwestern side. I might have underestimated the hike a bit – the way I understood it, we were going to take a gondola ride up to a station on the side of the mountain, and then walk up the ridgeline up to the top of a hill. Technically, that’s all it was. However, the top of the hill was Rucu Pichincha, one of the summits of Pichincha Volcano which stands at 15,413 ft.
There were lots of people out enjoying the views. Some were there with small children, and weren’t really there to hike; just ride the cable car up and back. I couldn’t help but feel a tad overdressed ( I was wearing thermal underwear top and bottoms, pants, base layer, fleece, Gore-Tex jacket, gloves, and beanie); especially next to the young woman in the gondola with us who was wearing a short-sleeve shirt, jeans and heels.
The cable car is called “El Teleferiqo”, and it took us from about 10,000 ft. to 13,000 ft. in about 10 minutes. Then we started hiking, and the views were superb. The clouds and fog moved in and out throughout our hike, and at times we couldn’t see anything because of the fog; but then it would clear and we could see again Quito sprawling in the valley below.
The first things to hurt were our ears; but soon it was our heads giving us the most trouble. We took some Advil for the headaches, and continued on the grassy ridge trail for about an hour and a half, admiring the flowers and alternating views and clouds.
By this time, we were about as high as Mt. Whitney (14,500 ft.) and we were just at the beginning of the final ascent to Rucu Pichincha’s summit—a steep section that included some scree and a little bit of route-finding through rock fields.
At some point while we were making our way up I thought it might be a good idea to turn around, because the visibility was pretty low and my hands were freezing! We found cairns marking the way through the fog though and were able to make our way to the top where we sat and had lunch. I couldn’t feel my hands at all so Garret had to open everything for me.
The way down was much faster, and we felt better and better as we descended. Back at the apartment we are loving our low elevation of 9,350 ft. Our first hike into the Andes was great; hope the pictures make you feel like you were here too!
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