Like a backcountry ski hut, but for climbers

[Leaving Jo's place in Huaraz- a very comfortable place to stay for both us and our motorcycles] This trip was meant to be a climbing trip. I know, it looks like a motorcycle trip, but a significant portion of our precious luggage space is taken up by rock climbing gear. However, not a day goes by where we don't seriously consider jettisoning our ropes and draws and lightening our load. Sure we are climbers at the core, but maybe we should just focus on motorcycling and do the rock scaling back in the states.

This changed for us after driving the spectacular 85 km stretch of road south out of Huaraz and then the challenging 6 km of road up to the climbers hut at Hatun Machay, one of the most impressive sport climbing and bouldering areas I have visited.

I will start with the drawbacks of this area and then reap praise upon it.

Drawbacks: 

14,000 feet elevation. It is just darn hard to breathe up there. But you get used to it.

Short climbing days. This time of year the fog rolls in around 11 or 12 which effectively shuts down the climbing day forcing us to drink tea and read books back at the hut. Apparently this doesn't happen from May to September which we would be nice to be able to climb more than 5 hours a day.

Praise: Anrdres at Andean Kingdom has put together a climbing area so impressive that it just yearns for climbers to come and visit. In 2005 he built a fantastic Refugio (a refugio is a stone house out in the middle of nowhere that people can stay at) to house climbers. 

This thing is super comfortable with running spring water and a gas stove to cook on and at this moment is staffed by an ultra friendly host, Coco, who greets one with a cup of hot tea and a big smile.

[Coca sending his project] Then there is the climbing. The stone forest of Hatun Machay goes on and on and on. So far, there are about 120(?) developed sport routes (routes with bolts) but if I had to guess I would say there is potential for... hmmm... 6000 quality routes. The area just goes on and on and on. I've never really seen anything like it. 

[A 25 meter mega classic 11b on dead vertical volcanic tuff] One of the issues we have had with climbing on this trip is that the climbing areas can be mis-managed with sketchy bolts and even worse anchors. This is not the case at Hatun Machay. Bolts are all supplied by Andean Kingdom as long as people bolt within the standards of safe routes with no runouts and solid anchors. It is so refreshing to see this high standard of safety and quality upheld in a remote climbing area. Hospitals are far away.

I'm not too much of a boulderer (climbing short problems without the use of ropes but utilizing a big pad to fall on). It requires a lot of instantaneous power which is something I haven't developed in my climbing. It also can be scary because every fall is a ground fall and sometimes the ground is less than desirable (even with pads). As a two very wise climbers, Damien Potts and Andy Seaver, once said when developing a perfect bouldering area: "First you look for flat landings and then you start looking for boulders." Finding one of those two criteria is easy. Finding both is hard.

View Larger Map
[This map is about 1.5 miles across and this is just a section of the climbing.]

If Hatun Machay has potential for 6000 climbing routes, it also has potential for 100 times more bouldering routes that fit these criteria. Unbelievable. As you walk through the stone forest there are countless rock formations that come up out of the soft grass, most of which would make for an interesting problem or two. Some have been developed, but the area is simply too large to develop it all.

We planned on staying one day, but stuck for around for two and I could easily envision being there for a month if the road wasn't calling our name.

[One of the other hosts at the refugio]