How to get there:
Chos Malal is a good point of reference. Drive Hwy. RP-43 north-west to location
South 36.69355, West 70.62067, turn right here
and continue to the end of the road
at location South 36.68086, West 70.51716, elevation near 2460 meter. This is the parking and
the trailhead.
Route description:
The trail starts out on the short remaining road,
then descends to the
river, crossing it on a wooden bridge. Next, the route follows this river
on its right hand side up the valley. The trail becomes clear and unique
a short distance after the bridge. This trail ascends into the upper basin
with several small ponds. The area called Base Camp is reached at the
uppermost pond, elevation near 3050 meter. Several large tent structures are
permanently established here.
From BC, a good trail will continue uphill to High Camp. In order to start
out correctly (there are several trails), proceed uphill on the trail that
has a pretty large number of zig-zag bends, clearly visible from the BC area.
This trail is easy to follow and walk, it will lead to the area for high camp
located in a small col behind a pinnacle at 3800 meter of elevation.
The next section continues uphill,
but soon traverses left, then climbs to
a distinct col at elevation near 4150 meter. This is an important waypoint since
there is a trail fork here. One trail leads uphill to the pretty big slope
above. Do not go there! The other trail forks right near location South 36.64964, West 70.43314,
it is important to take this trail.
This route traverses a few gullies to
reach a main ridge that may be followed uphill.
All pretty straightforward. Near elevation 4340 meter, the route/trail turns more
right and continues to the base
of the final uphill section that will reach a flat
area (crater area), before a final, gentle trail
continues to the highest point. Comments:
We drove to the trailhead and camped there.
The next day, first hike
to the base camp area.
I arrived there after about 2 hours of walking.
A group from the Argentine army
had attempted the peak this morning, I talked briefly
to a few that had turned back.
We had a long stop here,
before doing the 750 meter ascent to high camp. Two parties were there.
One ready to break camp and descend, we inherited
their spot.
The other party came down from their summit day pretty late.
They planned to spend a night down at base camp, thus departing in the
8late) afternoon.
We agreed to start our summit push at 0430, since the plan was to get out
to the car and even possibly drive back to Chos Malal this day. Thus, it was
still dark when we arrived at the col. Following what looked like the biggest
trail soon had us zig-zag up towards the big slope above. The trail ran out
and we continued to scramble uphill. However, the terrain soon became quite
unfriendly. Steep and loose, with insecure footing. We sat down to consider
how to proceed. A good sized rock came whistling by, just to ¨confirm that
this was a nasty place.
We decided to carefully descend down, back to safer terrain, then look for
alternatives. It was clear that
we now needed to see better.
Daylight was slowly arriving,
as this scramble/visit up here
easily took the larger part of one hour.
With light, we next spotted the traversing trail
below us. Obviously, anything looked more promising than where we had just
been.
This turned out to be a good route.
It is sort of a mystery why/how
a pretty big zig-zag trail leads directly
up into these difficulties.
The rest was trivial, but the final hill took more time than expected. I finally
arrived on top at 0830, so 4 hours, including the time spent in the wrong area.
Franco followed shortly behind me.
The morning was nice and the views very good.
No rush, but time for
some summit photos.
We left at 0845 and returned back down to our tent by
1030. It was time to relax and have breakfast. We continued down to
base camp at 1130, arriving there at 1250. A brief stop, then hiking back
out in slightly less than 2 hours. Ready to drive by 1500. We found a pretty
nice hotel in Chos Malal as well as a good dinner, completing a very nice
outing to the Patagonia high point.
