El Misti

I've got a Peru specific bucket list. It's too long to check everything off before I leave in December, which means I'll have to come back sometime, but two weekends ago I checked something off the list.

Mt. Misti is a 5,822/19,101ft volcano that sits over Arequipa, Peru's 2^nd most populous city. Climbing it is a 2 day trek that involves sleeping on its barren, sandy slopes and lots of trouble breathing. Lauren and I left Andahuaylillas made the climb the volunteer way.

Mt. Misti over Arequipa

The volunteer way has the benefit of being cheaper, but it's a lot more complicated

The morning we left Arequipa for Misti, we forgot the name of the street where we'd be able to catch the bus to the base of the mountain. Several taxi drivers shook their heads when we asked if they knew the place. Finally one man said he knew it, and even though he was probably overcharging us, we climbed in his cab.

After a 15 minute ride (he was definitely overcharging us), he stopped on a nearly deserted street and pointed to a corner “The buses stop here. There's none now but if you wait half an hour, they'll come.” That sounded fishy to us, so I got out and talked with some shopkeepers. They all confirmed that the buses did not stop on this street, and that they weren't sure where we'd find them. So Lauren and I grabbed our bags and started to walk off. The taxi driver came running over.

“Where are you going? The buses stop here?”

“No, sir, they clearly don't stop here.”

“Yes they do,” he protested, “I know they do.”

“Sir, if they stopped here, then the people who work on this street everyday would know. I've talked to all of them and none of them know where the buses are. This is not the place. We're going to find a cab driver who does know the place.”

“Ok. But you have to pay me.”

“Pay you for what? The pleasure of riding in your taxi?”

He started to get angry. “I brought you all the way here from Tingo (the neighborhood where he picked us up). A ride of that distance costs 10 soles and you have to pay me the money because I brought you here.”

We shook our heads. “We don't want to be here. We asked you to take us to the place where the buses to Misti are. You brought us to a random street. We aren't paying 10 soles for that.”

“Well at least give me 5 for the gas I've used! I drove you here and you're going to pay me!” He stepped forward.

I loosened the straps on my bag so I could drop it quickly if he decided that 10 soles was worth starting a fight over.

“Listen carefully,” I told him without stepping back, “the deal we had was that you'd bring us where we want to go, and we'd pay you 10 soles. We're not where we want to go. So the deal is off. We're finding a different taxi driver that does know where to take us. That's it.”

He must have decided that it wasn't worth a fight because he got back in his car, complaining loudly the whole time, and drove off. The next cab we found took us straight where we wanted to be.

We got on the bus to Misti and were riding comfortably when Lauren reminded me that I hadn't bought water. In the excitement with the first cab driver, I'd forgotten that all I had for a 2 day hike up a mountain was a half liter of liquid. Not enough.

At the next bus stop I told the driver to wait a moment and dashed to a corner store and bought a giant 3-liter bottle. The bus was creeping forward when I came out, a sign of the driver's impatience, and I jumped on before he left me. Lauren was grinning. “He was going to leave, and everyone on the bus had your back – 'No wait for that guy!'”

The bus dropped us off on the side of a highway. Misti was easy enough to spot, but we were very far from the base, and there was no clear path forward. We walked a little ways until we met and old lady.

“Do you know where we should go to climb Misti?” we asked her.

Her directions were like something out of a book: “Just keep walking till you come across a white door. Knock on the door and they'll open it for you.”

So we did just that. The people who opened the door were all smiles.

“The way to Misti?” we asked.

“Just go allllllll the way that way,” said a woman gesturing toward a dirt road. 

It was a 2 hour walk up the road to get to the trailhead. From the trailhead it was another 4 hours up to base camp. We arrived at base camp exhausted. We set up the beat up old tent on loan from my host family (which, due do some missing pieces, is the saddest tent I've ever slept in), and fell asleep. After a 2 hour nap we woke up to find the day ending. Lauren prepared some dehydrated chicken and mashed potatoes using the only camp stove left in all of Arequipa (seriously, we spent an hour and a half walking around searching for a stove to rent). The food was Mountain House brand, which was fitting, and actually pretty good. After taking an excessive number of photos of the sunset and a game of cards, we went to sleep.

Dinner! 

We got up at 5:30. After a breakfast of rehydrated apple crisp we set out on our long climb. We left behind the tent, the stove, and the sleeping bags, since Lonely Planet assured us that it would only be 4 hours round trip from base camp to the top and back.

Lonely Planet was very wrong. It was 4 hours just to the top. We live at altitude, which means our bodies are more efficient at using oxygen than most, but Andahuaylillas is 10,000 feet above sea level, which means the peak we were climbing was almost twice as high. By the end we were resting almost every five minutes. I got sick right before we made it to the lip of the crater, so I curled up behind a rock and took a nap while Lauren climbed the last 30 minutes to the very highest point.

When she returned we began our descent, which was much quicker than our climb. The sand nature of much of the mountain makes climbing exhausting, but descending is done at a casual easy glide, like going down a sand dune at the beach. When we arrived back at the base camp, it was past noon. We were concerned about finding transport back to Arequipa, and asked a guide if he knew someone who could meet us at the bottom. The cost was well beyond the money we had. We deliberated and decided to try to dash down the mountain because we were running low on water.

We packed up the tent and rushed down the slope, gliding whenever possible. After a few hours we reached the trail head. We had 2 hours left till full dark. We walked the whole distance back to the white door in just over an hour (which had taken 2 hours the day before). We got the the side of the highway just after the sun set, and just after the bus was leaving. We sat down and flagged down the next car. The driver charged us 5 soles to take us back. We arrived back to the Jesuit residence very tired and thirsty, and very pleased with our feat.

I'm so glad I did it, but I don't think I'll be climbing to 19,000 feet again any time soon. Life down by the sea is much nicer.  

Sunset over Arequipa. Beautiful.