Jukka Ahonen - Jul 23, 2011 4:17 pm Date Climbed: Jul 19, 2011
Denied
I tried to climb Chopicalqui right after a successful summit of Yanapaccha, with just one evening down at Pampa in between to rest. By the time we reached moraine camp at 5000 meters, I realized I was not recovering quickly enough to continue safely. Our weather forecast was also turning from bad to worse, so we had to leave the summit to next year...
It was a beautiful day, but the last few days, and up until late yesterday evening, it had been snowing. Lightly, sure, but nevertheless the trail was gone.
As a result, we spent two hours getting up just 100m from campo 1 (according to my altimeter around 5450m, not 5300 as I had heard before). At that point, we couldn´t find how to continue, and besides, there wasn´t really enough time to find the route to the summit and return during daylight anyway. We didn´t have enough food with us to stay another night at campo 1, or we could have scouted the route by daylight and climbed it the next day, so, instead, we went down. In fact, we went all the way down to Cebollapampa and up to Pisco refuge and climbed Pisco the next night.
I want to go back and try again, because it´s just a beautiful mountain!
bighornmonkey - Jul 4, 2011 10:39 pm Date Climbed: Jun 24, 2011
so close...
Attempted the summit from Moraine Camp on a less that perfect day (windy, cold, poor visibility). Made it to within 100m from the summit but had to retreat after 11 hours of ascent breaking trail. Sugar snow made rappels unsafe.
got within an 150m of the summit. terrible conditions. very cold. need to go back. 3rd peak in the valley after Pisco and Houndoy West.
etai101 - Dec 17, 2010 12:52 pm Date Climbed: Jun 21, 2008
wow
loved tscenery the ice caves and the summit ridge
7summits - Aug 27, 2010 5:43 pm Date Climbed: Aug 26, 2010
Great climb on Huascaran's sister
A few hundred meters lower than Huascaran, but a big mountain nevertheless! On the first day we skipped BC and went to moraine camp. When there a descending party informed us that the main bridge over a large crevasse to glacier camp had collapsed.
2 meter/7ft is not a huge jump, but the huge crevasse made us look for alternatives and we crossed on a very tiny and sketchy bridge. On the way down we had to find a new route.
Anyway, from camp it took about 6 hours to the summit. Very cold and pretty windy, but the route was very nice. The first half in 2 hours, the second in 4, due to steeper walls, wind etc. Top bergschrund was very accessible, just a short climb and then up to the top while the sun chased away the full moon. Wonderful place.
Back down to camp in 4 hours due to some abseils and much downclimbing. Then to Moraine camp in about 2 hours and another 2 hours down to the road, from the summit to Huaraz in 12 hours!
dwalters1 - Oct 20, 2009 1:21 pm Date Climbed: Jul 1, 2007
SW Ridge
Great climb to acclimatize, with some good exposure across the bergschrund to the summit pyramid. Not as technically difficult as the guide book suggested, but there are some sections where pitching it out could be helpful (or prudent). Had a few issues with bottlenecks and guided groups/inexperienced climbers - made things a little more dangerous than i would have liked.
MRoyer4 - Sep 30, 2009 5:34 pm Date Climbed: Jun 13, 2008
SW Ridge
A long route to a high peak without much (if any) technical climbing. Great views of Huascaran and the rest of the Blanca. Conditions were very good, nice to find after reports of heavy snow and no prior ascents during the season.
Reached the summit together with my peruvian friend Julver. The night before we brought a mexican couple down to basecamp because of sorroche, slept 2 hours & started the climb. Some sketchy climbing on the summit mushroom (around 80 degree) with bad protection. Rappeled on a snow bollard and descended to the low camp. Long but unforgetable day!
Brad F - Jul 7, 2009 1:55 pm Date Climbed: Jun 25, 2009
South West Ridge
Amazing climb! It snowed every other day except for our summit day :)
FlatheadJim - Jul 4, 2009 1:24 am Date Climbed: Jun 18, 2006
SW Ridge
Climbed with Peruvian guide, Willaim.
nattfodd - Jun 13, 2009 7:10 pm Date Climbed: Jun 12, 2009
SW ridge
Great climb, good snow conditions in the early morning. A couple of steep snow pitches and an exposed passage on the summit mushroom but nothing too bad.
Day 1: trailhead (4200m) to Moraine camp (5000m), skipping BC. Pretty awful load carrying on a steep trail, maybe a porter would have been a good idea. 4h30 total.
Day 2: Moraine camp (5000m) to High Camp (5600m). Glacier terrain but quite easy, unroped travel possible. Pretty grueling as I was still tired from the previous day. 4h instead of the 2/3 usually recommended.
Day 3: High Camp (5600m) to Summit (6354m) and back to Moraine Camp. Left at 2am, summited at 9am along with two other parties. Snow was in good condition and we didn't see any ice at all. Tracks were already made from the past week. It took us forever to descend the technical parts at the top due to merging with the Columbian party, and 4 persons abseils are very slow. 7h to summit, 5h back to high camp, 45 minutes to moraine camp.
Day 4: Moraine camp to BC (1h30) to trailhead (15 minutes) and taxi to Huaraz.
tbacus - Nov 27, 2008 1:39 pm Date Climbed: Jun 26, 2007
SW Ridge
Spent an extra day at the Moraine Camp to wait out weather. Summited from Moraine Camp and down in a day. long day... Climbed with Peter (see below, I'm one of the Toms..) and a couple of Brits we met at the Moraine camp.
Summited in a whiteout after a hurried ascent to avoid getting stuck away from Huaraz during the strike. Beautiful mountain and approach, wish we could have seen something from the summit though! With Derek, Oscar, and Carlos.
ClimberMan420 - Dec 12, 2007 1:18 am Date Climbed: May 16, 2007
summited?
Were first up for 2007 season according to guides, definetly no signs of others. Plodded steps through deep powder, luckily were well acclimatized from two months trekking and climbing. Made it to summit shoulder but could not climb final pitch, extreme snow wall, no ice, lots of crumbly snow. Hard one to swallow but went down safely to climb again.
gremlin - Oct 24, 2007 1:22 am Date Climbed: Jul 5, 2007
sw ridge
high point so far, super fun except for the guided cluster disaster ahead of us
mtnman455 - Aug 8, 2007 6:47 pm Date Climbed: Aug 3, 2007
The SW Ridge
Climbed with T. Haines. After being a little confused about where high camp was supposed to be and placing the highest high camp ever on the normal route at 5950 m. we got to the summit in no time! Last 400 meters of the mountain are very interesting and included a short section of climbing over an overhanging serac! This route is not in the best condition and right now is probably the grade of D. We got to the summit, broke camp, and got all the way to the road in the same day. 12 hours total.
pvalchev - Jun 29, 2007 2:03 pm Date Climbed: Jun 26, 2007
SW ridge
Great outing with 3 Americans I met in Cebollapampa (John, Tom and Tom)
day 1 - hike into moraine camp (sketchy getting water from glacier)
day 2 - snow on and off all day, wait out bad weather in camp
day 3 - wake up at midnight, 7-8 hours to top from moraine camp, return, pack up and descend all the way to base camp. cold and windy at the top, but not terrible. long day
The weather was sketchy for the past 2 weeks and we seemed to have hit the first good window... surprisingly clear night!
laureljarndt - Aug 15, 2006 9:16 pm Date Climbed: Jun 19, 2005
alsmost there
Fifth Peak (and highest)iin two weeks and I ws pooped. Two many people as Huascaran and Alpamayo were shut down
Tom Fralich - Jul 13, 2006 10:27 pm Date Climbed: Jul 11, 2006
SW Ridge
Climbed with Dave Greenhouse in 4 hours from Col Camp at 18,500 ft. The route was in very good condition with well consolidated snow and no major crevasse issues. Traversing through the seracs at 20,000 ft was a bit scary, with lots of debris already on the ground. In total we spent 6 days on the mountain.
Day 1...Trailhead (4200m) to Moraine Camp (5000m)
Day 2...Carry to Col Camp (5600m), return to Moraine Camp
Day 3...Move to Col Camp
Day 4...Summit (6354m), return to Moraine Camp
Day 5...Rest in Moraine Camp, an extra day in case of bad weather, illness
Day 6...Moraine Camp to Trailhead and taxi to Huaraz
Unfortunately, Dave suffered some reasonably bad frostbite to three of his fingers on summit day and had to return to the US after completing this climb.
Jukka Ahonen - Jul 23, 2011 4:17 pm Date Climbed: Jul 19, 2011
DeniedI tried to climb Chopicalqui right after a successful summit of Yanapaccha, with just one evening down at Pampa in between to rest. By the time we reached moraine camp at 5000 meters, I realized I was not recovering quickly enough to continue safely. Our weather forecast was also turning from bad to worse, so we had to leave the summit to next year...
rgg - Jul 8, 2011 12:24 pm Date Climbed: Jul 5, 2011
Too much snowIt was a beautiful day, but the last few days, and up until late yesterday evening, it had been snowing. Lightly, sure, but nevertheless the trail was gone.
As a result, we spent two hours getting up just 100m from campo 1 (according to my altimeter around 5450m, not 5300 as I had heard before). At that point, we couldn´t find how to continue, and besides, there wasn´t really enough time to find the route to the summit and return during daylight anyway. We didn´t have enough food with us to stay another night at campo 1, or we could have scouted the route by daylight and climbed it the next day, so, instead, we went down. In fact, we went all the way down to Cebollapampa and up to Pisco refuge and climbed Pisco the next night.
I want to go back and try again, because it´s just a beautiful mountain!
bighornmonkey - Jul 4, 2011 10:39 pm Date Climbed: Jun 24, 2011
so close...Attempted the summit from Moraine Camp on a less that perfect day (windy, cold, poor visibility). Made it to within 100m from the summit but had to retreat after 11 hours of ascent breaking trail. Sugar snow made rappels unsafe.
kevin trieu - Jul 4, 2011 5:28 pm
3fergot within an 150m of the summit. terrible conditions. very cold. need to go back. 3rd peak in the valley after Pisco and Houndoy West.
etai101 - Dec 17, 2010 12:52 pm Date Climbed: Jun 21, 2008
wowloved tscenery the ice caves and the summit ridge
7summits - Aug 27, 2010 5:43 pm Date Climbed: Aug 26, 2010
Great climb on Huascaran's sisterA few hundred meters lower than Huascaran, but a big mountain nevertheless! On the first day we skipped BC and went to moraine camp. When there a descending party informed us that the main bridge over a large crevasse to glacier camp had collapsed.
2 meter/7ft is not a huge jump, but the huge crevasse made us look for alternatives and we crossed on a very tiny and sketchy bridge. On the way down we had to find a new route.
Anyway, from camp it took about 6 hours to the summit. Very cold and pretty windy, but the route was very nice. The first half in 2 hours, the second in 4, due to steeper walls, wind etc. Top bergschrund was very accessible, just a short climb and then up to the top while the sun chased away the full moon. Wonderful place.
Back down to camp in 4 hours due to some abseils and much downclimbing. Then to Moraine camp in about 2 hours and another 2 hours down to the road, from the summit to Huaraz in 12 hours!
dwalters1 - Oct 20, 2009 1:21 pm Date Climbed: Jul 1, 2007
SW RidgeGreat climb to acclimatize, with some good exposure across the bergschrund to the summit pyramid. Not as technically difficult as the guide book suggested, but there are some sections where pitching it out could be helpful (or prudent). Had a few issues with bottlenecks and guided groups/inexperienced climbers - made things a little more dangerous than i would have liked.
MRoyer4 - Sep 30, 2009 5:34 pm Date Climbed: Jun 13, 2008
SW RidgeA long route to a high peak without much (if any) technical climbing. Great views of Huascaran and the rest of the Blanca. Conditions were very good, nice to find after reports of heavy snow and no prior ascents during the season.
bledl - Sep 1, 2009 6:12 pm
Normal routeReached the summit together with my peruvian friend Julver. The night before we brought a mexican couple down to basecamp because of sorroche, slept 2 hours & started the climb. Some sketchy climbing on the summit mushroom (around 80 degree) with bad protection. Rappeled on a snow bollard and descended to the low camp. Long but unforgetable day!
Brad F - Jul 7, 2009 1:55 pm Date Climbed: Jun 25, 2009
South West RidgeAmazing climb! It snowed every other day except for our summit day :)
FlatheadJim - Jul 4, 2009 1:24 am Date Climbed: Jun 18, 2006
SW RidgeClimbed with Peruvian guide, Willaim.
nattfodd - Jun 13, 2009 7:10 pm Date Climbed: Jun 12, 2009
SW ridgeGreat climb, good snow conditions in the early morning. A couple of steep snow pitches and an exposed passage on the summit mushroom but nothing too bad.
Day 1: trailhead (4200m) to Moraine camp (5000m), skipping BC. Pretty awful load carrying on a steep trail, maybe a porter would have been a good idea. 4h30 total.
Day 2: Moraine camp (5000m) to High Camp (5600m). Glacier terrain but quite easy, unroped travel possible. Pretty grueling as I was still tired from the previous day. 4h instead of the 2/3 usually recommended.
Day 3: High Camp (5600m) to Summit (6354m) and back to Moraine Camp. Left at 2am, summited at 9am along with two other parties. Snow was in good condition and we didn't see any ice at all. Tracks were already made from the past week. It took us forever to descend the technical parts at the top due to merging with the Columbian party, and 4 persons abseils are very slow. 7h to summit, 5h back to high camp, 45 minutes to moraine camp.
Day 4: Moraine camp to BC (1h30) to trailhead (15 minutes) and taxi to Huaraz.
tbacus - Nov 27, 2008 1:39 pm Date Climbed: Jun 26, 2007
SW RidgeSpent an extra day at the Moraine Camp to wait out weather. Summited from Moraine Camp and down in a day. long day... Climbed with Peter (see below, I'm one of the Toms..) and a couple of Brits we met at the Moraine camp.
hhsilleck - Jul 22, 2008 6:25 pm Date Climbed: Jul 9, 2007
Route climbed: SW ridgeSummited in a whiteout after a hurried ascent to avoid getting stuck away from Huaraz during the strike. Beautiful mountain and approach, wish we could have seen something from the summit though! With Derek, Oscar, and Carlos.
ClimberMan420 - Dec 12, 2007 1:18 am Date Climbed: May 16, 2007
summited?Were first up for 2007 season according to guides, definetly no signs of others. Plodded steps through deep powder, luckily were well acclimatized from two months trekking and climbing. Made it to summit shoulder but could not climb final pitch, extreme snow wall, no ice, lots of crumbly snow. Hard one to swallow but went down safely to climb again.
gremlin - Oct 24, 2007 1:22 am Date Climbed: Jul 5, 2007
sw ridgehigh point so far, super fun except for the guided cluster disaster ahead of us
mtnman455 - Aug 8, 2007 6:47 pm Date Climbed: Aug 3, 2007
The SW RidgeClimbed with T. Haines. After being a little confused about where high camp was supposed to be and placing the highest high camp ever on the normal route at 5950 m. we got to the summit in no time! Last 400 meters of the mountain are very interesting and included a short section of climbing over an overhanging serac! This route is not in the best condition and right now is probably the grade of D. We got to the summit, broke camp, and got all the way to the road in the same day. 12 hours total.
pvalchev - Jun 29, 2007 2:03 pm Date Climbed: Jun 26, 2007
SW ridgeGreat outing with 3 Americans I met in Cebollapampa (John, Tom and Tom)
day 1 - hike into moraine camp (sketchy getting water from glacier)
day 2 - snow on and off all day, wait out bad weather in camp
day 3 - wake up at midnight, 7-8 hours to top from moraine camp, return, pack up and descend all the way to base camp. cold and windy at the top, but not terrible. long day
The weather was sketchy for the past 2 weeks and we seemed to have hit the first good window... surprisingly clear night!
laureljarndt - Aug 15, 2006 9:16 pm Date Climbed: Jun 19, 2005
alsmost thereFifth Peak (and highest)iin two weeks and I ws pooped. Two many people as Huascaran and Alpamayo were shut down
Tom Fralich - Jul 13, 2006 10:27 pm Date Climbed: Jul 11, 2006
SW RidgeClimbed with Dave Greenhouse in 4 hours from Col Camp at 18,500 ft. The route was in very good condition with well consolidated snow and no major crevasse issues. Traversing through the seracs at 20,000 ft was a bit scary, with lots of debris already on the ground. In total we spent 6 days on the mountain.
Day 1...Trailhead (4200m) to Moraine Camp (5000m)
Day 2...Carry to Col Camp (5600m), return to Moraine Camp
Day 3...Move to Col Camp
Day 4...Summit (6354m), return to Moraine Camp
Day 5...Rest in Moraine Camp, an extra day in case of bad weather, illness
Day 6...Moraine Camp to Trailhead and taxi to Huaraz
Unfortunately, Dave suffered some reasonably bad frostbite to three of his fingers on summit day and had to return to the US after completing this climb.