How to get there:
This nice mountain is located south of the town Malargue. Drive abouth 20 kilometer
south on Hwy. 40, find Hwy. 186 going left and continue on this. You will arrive at
a new fork where Hwy. 186 forks left, however your route is the road that forks right.
This is Hwy. 181. This road had a lot of washboards (2025), however, it is perfectly
ok with a normal car. Continue to location S35.90386, W69.46178, where a smaller road
serving a single farm, forks right. Take this road and park just next to a dry river
shortly before the farm. (The buildings are in a local cluster of trees.)
This is a good trailhead and place to park.
Route description:
If you have a high clearance 4WD, you may try to drive more, see the track posted
on Peakbagger. A rough road continues from near the fence of the farm, it is a bit
hard to see in the beginning, but then becomes a clear 4WD track.
Continue to the farm and find the 4WD track mentioned above, then follow this until
it runs out. Looking across the large, open area before the mountain, head straight
for the distinct, small hill that
extends out towards you (left in the pic.), this bearing will be
somewhat left of the the line towards the summit. (See or use the track on Peakbagger.)
Continue on the south (left) side of this hill, then traverse gently uphill to the ridge
connecting this hill to higher terrain.
Cross the ridge and continue into the valley
that extends directly towards the mountain. Walk up and into this valley
on the left side until it narrows.
(There may be a nice little creek with good water here.)
Ascend more steeply (many tracks) on your right passing a distinct rock feature
on the right hand side, then follow trails more horizontally to reach
a large slope
that extends uphill to your right. This slope is easy to ascend (but long), continue
uphill to the horizon col. From here,
you will see the peak across. Contour around
on the upper side of a pinnacle, to reach the final ridge to the summit. There are
trails here, best to ascend up on the left side. The summit has a short ridge
with 2 high points, a cairn at
the far end. The first high point may be
about as high, walk across it to reach the cairn.
Comments:
After my unsuccessful attempt to climb Plateado
there was time for a "Bonus Ribu" before returning to Mendoza. Cerro la Mocha was the
obvious choice.
I left Malargue after breakfast. The road RP-181 was slow, but I was still ready to
walk around 0900. I decided to follow the dry river and after a few hundred meter I checked
that I did indeed follow a track I had downloaded from Wikiloc.
It did look very reasonable as
I continued walking in the dry river. However, when I made a second check, my track had gone
way left. Sort of surprising, but I decided to cross left and follow the track. Thus, my track
to the mountain would be far from optimal. The large open area that had to be crossed was soon
in front of me. Still, easy walking got me up into the more narrow valley and before long I was
ascending a very nice slope. Not very steep and with good footing. I arrived at the summit
after 3:20, obviously, my mistake in the beginning had taken a little more time than a correct
route. From the summit, I could see
the way back to the farm
and I decided to ignore my
route of ascent and rather follow the river on my way back.
I had a good rest and visited
the other high point on the short ridge on my way back.
The return hike was easy and somewhat surprising, I discovered a 4WD track quite a bit
before returning. This could be followed back to the farm, easier to walk than the
dry river. Thus, I believe that my return track (see posting on peakbagger), may be
the best route to this summit.
The return had taken 2 hours and I was back in Malargue with time to spare before dinner.
This concluded my March 2025 trip to Argentina. The next day, we drove to Mendoza. I ended up
with a spare day there before my Tuesday flight back home. I had a good, concluding
dinner with Franco, he would continue north to Tucuman on Monday morning.
Many thanks for a good time together, 4 of 6 (planned) Ultra prominent mountains
visited. One failed due to inadequate preparation (by Franco!) to deal with the
Argentine buraucracy for this National Park (Pajun).
I had asked him to get a permit almost 2 months earlier, it turned out that indeed the
park authorities require 2 weeks to issue a permit.
Thus, it was too late when we talked to the park authorities 3-4 days ahead of a
possible visit.
It certainly seems that the park
authorities try they best to PREVENT visitors. This is indeed a very bad policy.
The second "missed ultra" gave us a memorable 3 day trip where we learned a lot
about HOW this peak may be climbed. Unfortunately, a few (elementary?) mistakes were
made, see my trip report for Cerro Risco Plateado.
Walking to the center on my last evening,
I ran into a big parade with flag and banners,
music and lots of people chanting and singing.
It turned out that March 24th. is an Argentine
public holiday to remember the Coup d'Etat in Buenos Aires, in 1975, "Dia de la
Memoria por la Verdad y la Justicia."
I had a final good dinner at my (now) favorite restaurant,
La Marchigiana Centro, (Italian, but
with an extensive menu). This time, Asada (BBQ meat), and a close to perfect Malbec.
