Chilean Volcano Trip

On this adventure, Chris Rubens, Eric Hjorleifson, the Rocky Mountain Sherpas and I ended up in northern Patagonia to ski  a volcano named Mt.Puyehue.  After waiting out weather, the clouds cleared and we all got to experience a new aspect inside a volcanic crater.

After a long flight I woke up to this amazing view of the Andes as we neared Santiago.  The mountains here are spectacular.

After landing in Santiago we hopped on another plane that brought us further south to a city called Osorno.  From Osorno we met our guides Jorge and Nico from Andes Cross and drove 2 hrs south to a farm at the base of Mt.Puyehue.  We drove in on a beautiful sunny day and had our first glimpse at the volcano.   This farm house was our home for 5 days as the weather moved through.

Yup, that’s a block of cheese and big slab of ham.  Our days here consisted of trips to the local ski hill, checking out hot springs, and day touring on the pass between Chile and Argentina.  Although it was raining in the valley, the knowledge that it was snowing in the mountains kept our spirits high.

After 5 days of waiting out the rain we loaded up 17 horses with all the supplies we would need for the next 10 days.  These horses carried us and the gear 8 kms up the volcano to the next cabin.

This part of the adventure took us along the rolling hills of the farm, through the bamboo jungle and up into the fresh snowfall.  In some spots the horses were trudging through 2 ft. of snow.  These horses proved themselves as the ultimate all-terrain vehicles as we encountered super steep sections and crazy narrow traverses.

Yup, home sweet home… this was our ‘humble abode’ for the remainder of our stay on Mt.Puyehue.  Although we didn’t have running water or electricity, we had everything we needed.   We had a  roof over our head, firewood and a stove, a volcano above us that had never been skied (on the inside) before, and we were more than ecstatic to be here.

The day after we made it up to the cabin the weather wasn’t great but we could see the top of the volcano, so we decided to punch it to the rim and bring some gear to leave at the top.  This was my first touring trip and I was really enjoying the pace that we were approaching the mountain with.  As we neared the top the weather moved in and the wind picked up.  Although we made it to the top, unfortunately  we weren’t able to see into the crater.  After stashing the gear we proceeded to ski down in the flattest light I have ever skied in.   We were trying to use our boot pack and skin track as a guide, but the wind had blown most of those tracks clean, leaving me feeling a little vulnerable.   We made it back to the cabin safely and spent the next 2 days totally enveloped in fog, not being able to see much more than a few hundred feet around us.

We didn’t have much communication up there but we did have a satellite phone to help keep up us to speed with the weather.  After 3 days of being socked in, the forecast looked grim; overcast at best.  We went to sleep after giving a solid effort of drinking it blue and singing the night away.  Our guide woke himself up the following morning due to a dream.  In this dream he saw stars and immediately woke up and started speaking the words,”I’m sorry to disturb you, but the volcano is open.”  We woke up in confusion, not knowing if the volcano was blowing up or if it was just a door ajar in the cabin.   Luckily that morning we had that early wake up call and got going as soon as we could.  We had 2,000 ft. of vertical to skin to get to the rim, so we quickly found our pace.  We wanted to get there quickly, but it was hard not to rubber neck and enjoy the views of the surrounding volcanoes and the lush lake country below.

After 2 1/2 hrs. of skinning we arrived at the rim, welcomed by the view of the 1.5km wide crater.  I was amazed to see that 80% of the crater was worthy to ski.  I wasn’t really expecting anything more than some mellow terrain taking us into the crater, but as you can see from the photo, it is quite substantial terrain.  This photo is the south facing portion of the crater.  Throughout the day we skied 4 lines inside the crater.  The snow was soft and stable and we got ourselves into position as quickly as possible to take advantage of the day that had been given to us.  We followed the sun as it wrapped around the crater and proceeded to hike and ski as much as we could.  We skied the west, south, and east facing slopes that day.

These tracks are the first to have made their way into Mt.Puyehue!  We proceeded to put 14 more tracks into the crater that day.  By the end of the day we estimated to have skinned/climbed about 5,500 vertical ft.

After having our fair share of excitement inside the crater we made our way back down to the cabin amongst one of Chiles classic sunsets.  Our run down the outside was truly amazing as we hooted and hollered all the way down.

We woke up to stars again in the morning and got going as soon as we could.  It was Rubens birthday, and he went straight for the prize.  You can see his tracks right next to the shadow of our guide Nicos face.  I looked at this line from the top, and I can tell you that it was really steep.  Hjorleifsons tracks are on the left.After Rubens bagged that line we all met up in the center of the crater and couldn’t believe how hot it was getting.  Lines that we scoped the day before were melting by the minute.  We were seeing natural avalanches all around us and decided to pull the pin.  We made our way out of the crater and counted our blessings as we hiked to the rim.   We skied back to the cabin and celebrated with the last bit if Gato.

The following we day said farewell and made our way back down to the farm to eat an amazing meal and celebrate Rubens birthday.

If any of you want to check out Mt.Puyehue or any South American adventure,  contact Jorge at andescross.com

If you want to check out more rad photos from this trip check out   http://www.rockymountainsherpas.com/news/sherpas-latest-project-allican