Hiking to Laguna Grande in El Cocuy National Park

Day 61 (August 28, 2018) – El Cocuy National Park, Colombia

We got up in the freezing cold in Hacienda La Esperanza at around 4:15 in the morning, while it was still dark out. We freshened up, packed our day packs, applied some sun screen, and had breakfast at one of the outdoor tables. I ate as much of the fruit, eggs, bread, and cheese as I could manage, knowing that we had a long walk ahead of us. The coffee also helped to warm us up a bit.

Just after starting breakfast, Martha arrived. She was not only the owner of the hotel we were staying at in El Cocuy, but also our park guide who joined us for our two days of hiking. She came with some bad news though. The second cabaña that we were supposed to spend that evening at had closed. We would have been the only people staying there and it wasn’t worth it to them to keep it open. So, we made some minor changes to our plans and decided to head back down the mountains to El Cocuy after our hike. It turned out to be a blessing in disguise. We didn’t know how strenuous of a hike we were getting ourselves into.

Starting the hike through farms and fog.

We left shortly after 5:30 AM when it was just starting to get light out. We were all bundled up in winter coats and hats and walked along the same path that we had hiked the day before. There were a lot of low hanging clouds when we started, but they eventually burned off. We walked through farmlands filled with cows until reaching the waterfall from the day before, at which point we hiked uphill into a valley.

Our first look at the valley of the frailejones.

This was the valley of the frailejones, very strange looking alpine plants that look like small palm trees with miniature sunflowers growing out the top of them. They’re very characteristic of the area because they appeared to only grow at higher elevations. We were also told that some of the taller ones could be between 200 to 300 years old. Crazy to think that they can survive so long up in the cold mountains.

At the time, I was thinking that's a very huge and tall wall of rock. Little did I know that we would be hiking way higher than that.

After crossing the valley, we made it to a stream where we could fill our water bottles. At first, I was a little skeptical of drinking untreated water, but then Martha told us that this same water, coming down from the glacier at the mountaintop, was collected just past the waterfall we walked past and pumped into Hacienda La Esperanza. I had just drank about five gallons of it the day before trying to pre-hydrate, so another bottle wasn’t going to be the undoing of me. We filled the bottles up, had a quick snack, and then continued upwards.

Feeling triumphant, but we had so much further to go.

The hike up was tough. I made a point to stop and take pictures every once in a while just so I could give my legs a rest. Martha was a machine. She took small steps, very slowly. It didn’t matter if she was on flat ground or heading straight uphill, she kept the exact same pace through the entire hike. After walking for a few hours, I sort of zoned out and just focused on putting my feet down in the exact same spots that Martha did. Slow and steady, but I still had to take a breather every so often.

Our first sight of snow.

Maintaining a comfortable body temperature became difficult. The sun was incredibly hot, but as soon as a cloud passed overhead it became cold. When you reached spots on the trail where the wind managed to whip past you it became downright frigid. Exerting energy to walk up steep parts of the trail could make you overheat, but as soon as you got to more level ground the cold would start to get you. The entire hike was spent repeatedly taking on and off hats, gloves, scarves, windbreakers, jackets, and sweaters in an attempt to keep yourself comfortable.

Among the frailejones, in the hat and gloves off position, at least for a moment...

Travis and our guide, Martha.

The uphill trek started to finally level out a little bit and we walked past more frailejones, streams, waterfalls, and small ponds. I couldn’t believe how high up we were. Had you told me in the morning we were hiking up this high I probably would have been dreading it. Better not to know where we were going.

Mostly just rocks from here on out.

Eventually the plants disappeared, and we were hiking through fields of rock. We knew we were hiking to a lake, so every time we saw a body of water Travis asked, “are we there yet?” to which Martha always seemed to reply in the negative. We passed a lot of smaller ponds, but when we came over a ridge and saw a really huge lake we knew we were there. The clouds were close to the ground, but through them you could see the surrounding mountain peaks and their ice caps. It felt other worldly.

We made it!

Laguna Grande, our main destination.

Continuing on past Laguna Grande. Onward and upward!

Martha and Travis hiking up to the snow.

We continued walking past the lake and up into the snow to try and get closer to the glacier. We met up with another group of hikers at this point and went together as far as we could go. Eventually the snow got too deep to we called it good once reaching an arbitrary rock. 

Hiking through the snow.

The random rock that we called the top of our hike because the snow got too deep. It was snowing and freezing and the clouds were obscuring most of the glacier behind us. At an altitude of somewhere just under 16,000 feet, it was quite the accomplishment.

The clouds were still thick, and it had started raining a bit. Just as we were turning around we heard this frightening noise that sounded like someone was unloaded a hundred dump trucks full of boulders. In all honesty, we panicked a little bit and started moving as fast as we could through the foot-deep snow back down the mountain. Just as we got to some more steady rocks we turned around and looked behind us and between some of the clouds we could see enormous quantities of snow and ice tumbling down an overhanging edge of the glacier. We only saw it for the briefest moment, but it was still a bit scary when you think that we were standing just downhill of it. Martha didn’t seem too worried; she said that happens when it rains.

Shortly after turning around we tried to get out of the snow and onto more stable ground.

At this point we started getting pelted with freezing rain and snow. It was hitting my rain jacket, melting, and running down my pant leg. I was glad we had turned around. We made it back to a cave where we could escape the rain and had something more substantial to eat. A candy bar is the most delicious thing in the world after you’ve been hiking for hours.

The view looking out of the cave, where we avoided the rain and had some lunch.

The way back down seemed harder than the hike up. I think the difficulty was that from nearly the top of the mountain you could look down and see the valley where Hacienda La Esperanza was located. It looked incredibly far away. Two hours of downhill hiking later, it still looked incredibly far away. My legs were tired and becoming unsteady as we hiked the last hour of the trail.

Looking down to the valley that, even after hours of hiking, seemed to never get any closer.

I was so happy to walk (more like stumble) into Hacienda La Esperanza. We had been hiking for 8½ hours, give or take around 15 miles, and made it up to around 4,800 meters, just shy of 16,000 feet. My legs barely moved and my feet were in a lot of pain, but we made there and back again. It was worth the effort as we saw some of the best mountain scenery I think I’ve ever seen in my life. 

Shortly after returning, Martha’s husband came to pick us up and drive us the hour back to El Cocuy. We were supposed to go on the second hike the following day, but in the car ride home Travis and I were looking at each other and thinking there is no way we would be able to wake up at 4 in the morning and do this all over again. We decided on a day of rest and delayed our second hike. It felt wonderful to be back in El Cocuy with some slightly warmer weather, a hot shower, and a comfortable bed.