On 13th January, after a quick breakfast and a stop to get some high energy food, I arrived at the Club Andino, and ended up on the second of the 2 small buses that were heading to the ski centre. The bus headed up the zigzag road to El Alto and the altiplano, from where La Paz was visible below, with the massive misty shape Mount Illimani behind. Then the road headed towards the nearby hills to the north, and after an hour it became little more than a narrow dirt track zigzagging its way spectacularly up a steep mountainside.
The ski centre was very rudimentary – 2 small unheated buildings, one perched on the edge of the steep drop. The centre was off the grid and had its own generator for power. The “guide” from the bus started the generator and then organised rental skis and boots for everyone, but the choice of equipment wasn’t great – in fact to get 2 ski boots my size, I ended up with 2 different models of boot, one on each foot.
There is just one ski lift and it is of a type that was apparently outlawed in Europe decades ago. Each person carries a hook with a length of rope. The cable is continuously moving and you twist the hook on to the cable and it jolts you viciously as you start being dragged uphill. At the top you have to untwist the hook to get free. Several people had great difficulty getting the hang of this system. What was worse was the fact that the motor driving it could only really cope with towing a few people at once.
The snow near the start was very icy and even after getting the hang of the hook system, the skiing itself was rather disappointing, with only really the one slope coming down from the top, and the only decent snow being on the upper half of it. But the fact of being at the worlds highest ski centre made the overall experience worthwhile.
After a few runs I rode the lift up and took my skis off, and walked a little way along the summit ridge of Chacaltaya. It hadn’t escaped my notice that at 5430 metres (17,815 feet) the ridge I was on was the highest point I had ever reached – higher than the summit of Tungurahua in Ecuador.
Someone told me that though it was not operating today, the little restaurant in the ski centre building is regarded by Guinness as the world’s highest restaurant.
Some drama unfolded mid afternoon – one of the skiers developed significant altitude sickness, and the day ended sooner than it might have otherwise as the bus took him down to a lower altitude.
Back at Hostal Austria, relaxing in the common area, I found that on the TV they were retransmitting the concert given by Pink Floyd at the Berlin Wall the previous year. I had not seen it before, so I watched it and then went out for a Chinese meal.
Impresionante lugar!!! y que aguante vos para las alturas!!!
The ski lift sounds funny. It’s probably still there!
P.s. some of us have gotten stuck on the regular ski lifts and had to have the emergency stopped button pushed. Several times ??
It probably is still there, unless the scrap dealers have taken it. Sadly the ski resort was abandoned 10 years ago when the remaining glacier melted.