Climbing Lascar volcano amid Atacama’s surreal landscape

Atacama, the volcano peppered landscape seems like a dreamy reality, especially when you're up above 5000m and the lack of oxygen gets to your head.

Before ascending Lascar I actually had no serious plans of climbing volcanoes during my trip in South America, however back in north Argentina I met an adventurous Australian guy named Cody, with whom I continued my laughter filled trip in Bolivia and Chile.

He was dead set on getting up at least one of the volcanoes peppered around the region in his preparation to climb Aconcagua, as part of his endeavor to climb the highest mountain on each continent. Since our guide on the Salar de Uyuni trip refused to alter our itinerary and take us to one of the volcanoes in that country, we continued our quest in San Pedro de Atacama, Chile.

After visiting a few travel agencies we decided to go to the Lascar volcano with a travel agency called Basecamp, which at 5600m is the most active volcano in the region. It came up to USD 115 with transport and breakfast included.
We started at 4am in the morning, with our guide having picked us up at our hostel in town.

I was immediately sorry I didn’t go to bed much earlier the previous night and already saw that the two beers I had weren’t the best idea. We were joined on our trip by two more guys from Brazil and Germany, keeping the group size small, which is also a rule set by the Chilean Government, mandating there has to be one guide per 4 customers at a minimum.

After about an hour’s drive we stopped at a lovely lagoon to have breakfast still in the very early morning hours. Our guide also gave us coca tea, which helps you going at higher altitudes.

Remarkably you can actually drive up with a 4×4 to about 4800m and start your hike from there.

Climbing in high altitude is all about acclimatization and having spent 5 days between 3500m and 5000m in Bolivia prior to climbing the Lascar volcano, I should have been in a decent position to do it. However, I knew that my body does not seem to favor altitude much, since I had mild headaches and problems sleeping throughout my trip in Salar de Uyuni. But hey, I really wanted to do this.

After a brief introduction on our hike, we set off. It became clear very early on, about 10 minutes into our walking that our Brazilian fellow hiker was struggling as we quickly put distance between ourselves and him. We stopped and waited for him twice, but he just couldn’t keep up with the pace, which was not exactly that strenuous although not a stroll either.

Our guide at that point told him that he shouldn’t continue, since if he was already having problems keeping up in the beginning, it would be extremely difficult for him later on.

I have to say that I thought this was a bit odd and expected the guide to take it a bit more easy in order for all of us to have a chance of reaching the summit together. However he explained that he does this on purpose to determine if the person is strong enough. So, we left the Brazilian behind and continued the walk.

Huffing and puffing away.

Soon afterwards, I started feeling dizzy and completely out of breath. For a while I tried roughing it out and tried to keep up with the pace, but I decided this wasn’t a good sign, so I told the guide if we can stop for a minute as I was having a tough time.
Feeling kind of embarrassed at my failure to keep up, I felt better when the guide told me it’s a good thing I brought it up and again reminded me that I need to focus more on my breathing.

Frustrated that I was, I felt annoyed and told him that I’m already doing that, but he said that I need to exaggerate and audibly breathe in and out. And who ought of thought, it really did help. In fact every time that I let my thoughts wonder, I noticed that I again had some difficulties, so I completely focused only on the act of breathing and walking.

After about an hour and a half, we reached the crater of the volcano and were awarded with some awesome views. Of course a celebratory picture followed.

Damn, that view!

Lascar is the most active volcano in the region and while you can’t see it filled with lava from the edge of the crater, you most certainly can see all the toxic fumes rising from it. Those fumes are the reason why it’s mostly not possible to climb all the way to the highest point, but I didn’t really care too much about that. I was just immensely happy to be at the crater, see the crazy views and knowing I was at 5500m elevation. Be it Lascar or some other volcano in the Atacama, it surely makes for one of the best places to visit in South America.

Half an hour or so later, we started our descent and surprisingly enough we met the Brazilian who was part of our group, slowly ascending with another group of people. Kind of bizarre that another climbing guide took him up with him and here our guide made a mistake in letting him continue. That resulted in the rest of us waiting for well over an hour for him to return, completely exhausted. He really shouldn’t have let him do it, for everybody’s sake.

By the time we got back to San Pedro de Atacama town, I developed a splitting headache and went to sleep immediately. That time I’ve decided high altitude climbing (yes I know this isn’t really that high up yet), maybe wasn’t for me. However now I’d want to do it again, maybe it was just the two beers that previous night that didn’t agree with me.