Our Ecuador team wrapped up it’s standard climbs over the last few days with an attempt on Volcan Cayambe. Unfortunately recent weather on the mountain created avalanche conditions low down on the glacier and our guides decided that continuing into steeper terrain would be unwise.

After returning to the Cayambe Refuge the team dug into a short class on avalanche hazard, risk assessment, and decision making. Even when, or often, especially when conditions don’t allow for a full summit there is the opportunity to learn a ton about the mountain environment and this Ecuador team got a chance to deepen their understanding of snow and avalanche science.

In the end weather continued to deteriorate throughout yesterday morning with high winds raking the upper mountain. Though a summit would have been fantastic the team was stoked not to be battling through poor conditions high on Cayambe.

From Cayambe it was a short drive down to the famous mountain town of Otavalo for some well earned R&R on the banks of Lago San Pablo. Today the team will visit the world renowned Plaza de Los Ponchos indigenous market before returning to Quito to put a bow on the standard expedition.

Several of the team have opted to continue their climbing in Ecuador with the highly worthwhile addition of climbing Volcan Chimborazo. At 20,549 feet Chimborazo is taller than Denali and is the furthest point from the center of the earth! As our standard team heads home over the next few days we’ll continue to follow the progress of our Chimborazo climbers, stay tuned!

Cheers,

CTSS Team