Nevado del Ruiz

Trip Start Feb 06, 2007

332

Trip End Jan 14, 2008

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Flag of Colombia Manizales, Colombia
Sunday, April 1, 2007

April 1st 2007, Mountain House, Manizales
The day dawned better than many for a while, and we were optimistic that our tour to Nevado del Ruiz would turn out well. We could see the tops of the hills, no clouds. A taxi picked up us and the Canadians, Amy and Nancy, and took us to a bus already crowded with people heading to the snow. We had the raised back seat, but it was OK. The first stop en route was at a glacial lake at about 3700 metres. We were interested in watching churns of milk being loaded on to a truck. Later we saw men in the middle of a field, surrounded by milk churns, milking their cows by hand. No milking machines here. Later we stopped for brunch, around 10am. This was a bowl of 'tea', (agua de panela), very sweet sugar cane juice in hot water, a piece of very rubbery cheese that most people broke up and dunked in their tea, an outsize arepa and a tasty empanada. Next stop was at the National Park HQ. A ranger gave us a talk in breakneck-speed Spanish, about the national parks of Colombia, a bit about this park, and advice on what to do if getting altitude symptoms, including 'Don't panic!'

Frailejon

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The road wound upwards and soon left vegetation behind. The last plants we saw were at a place called the Valley of the Tombs, where the indigenous people formerly held their burials. There were many small stone cairns, but more than likely most of these were very recent. The road really is most amazing. You would never expect to find a road winding its way up to over 4800 metres, through glacial moraines. We were told it is the highest driveable road in the world. The scenery was truly spectacular, with good views of the ice and snow on top, debris left by former glaciers, almost a moonscape. Vehicles parked only 300 metres below the highest point that you are allowed to walk to which is 5140 metres above sea level (over 5 kilometres up, that is awesome). To get there you puff upwards along a path of just over a kilometre. It was very hard work. We are of more than average fitness, but walking uphill at that altitude, where oxygen is thin, is very difficult. The legs don't work properly. What you cannot see from further down is that there is a glacier on a plateau above you. We romped around on this, chucked snow at each other, and joined in the photo-taking frenzy. Getting down was fun too. Instead of going down the 'up' path we took a little path that is a bit steeper with lots of thick sand that you can almost run down. Pete went too fast and landed on a muddy bit and dirtied his new raincoat all over the back.

Laguna Negra

The bus was supposed to start back downhill at 2.30pm, but some stragglers did not get back to the bus till well after 3pm. Luckily for them the bus waited. Some of them were wearing sandshoes, very unsuitable for such a walk. Sandshoes don't provide enough grip on the dusty and sandy path. Our hiking boots were much better.
The last visit of the day was to thermal pools part way down the valley. We were not at all keen to have cold bits of body sticking out of the pools, so contented ourselves with watching the others dunking themselves in the hot water, and also seeing where the water came out of the ground. It was very hard to work this out, there was no bubbling of water at all, just a very hot stream. There was an army camp just up the hill, and the army guys were trying to keep warm near the hot stream. We couldn't work out why there should be so many army in such a remote place. Was there a threat ?
The trip back to Mountain House was very slow indeed. We thought the bus must have lost its brakes and be using a low gear to keep its speed down to below 30kph. But when we got back to Manizales speed increased to 55kph, so maybe there was a bus speed limit of 30kph on the wet winding downhill run, and he was sticking to it. No matter, we were euphoric at having walked up to over 5000 metres. It was a wonderful day, and well worth the 75,000 pesos each we had paid.