After ages in Huaraz it was about time for a 6000er mountain so we headed to Quebrada Ishinca. A beautiful valley near Huaraz, easy reachable in a day's walk, two 6000er mountains nearby and a big refugio in the middle of it. A perfect location, not only for us, but for everybody else as well. Frequent tourists with small backpacks were strolling the same way up, followed by masses of burros, porters and cooks. And us, being our own burros with 30 kg on our back, wondering if it's all worth the trouble. Even tough I'm allergic to crowds, sharing this valley with all those people wasn't really a problem. It seems they like to place their tents in the open and unprotected, so our temporary home between some of the boulders at the side of the valley was quite peaceful.
As before we brought all our food and equipment and had no use for the refugio, except for one thing, Raphael recommended us the coffee there. And he was right, after the first time we had to drop by daily. They had real Italian moka! A luxury we just had to enjoy. The author of our guidebook describes the refugio as the ruin of the whole valley. Except for the coffee our view was not as black. They keep their stuff organized and clean. It's questionable what is worse, the organized sanitary system of the refugio or all the tourists who leave their shit and toilet paper all over the place and not buried underground!
To warm up for Ranrapalca, our first 6000er, we chose Urus Este 5420 m. From there we had a nice view to the north face of our next target! We started kinda late and had to climb around a group of guided japanese guys who were crawling up the hill as well. An easy day climb, not too steep with a little rock scrambling at the end. We made a good time, 3 h 45 min to the top – Ranrapalca we're coming!