Andes Expedition
The expedition begins

After weeks of planning and preparation, your expedition is finally going to begin. First you land in Lima, Peru. From the airport, you take a bus that travels over paved highway 400 kilometers to the town of Huaraz. How many miles is this?

If 1 kilometer = 0.6214 miles,
then 400 kilometers = _________ miles.

Huaraz, the closest town to the mountain, is where you will spend a day acclimating and making final preparations for your expedition.

The following day you enter the Parque Nacional Huascarán. Remember, the national language of Peru is Spanish. In English, the park is called Huascarán National Park.

Established in 1975, the park is easy to reach from Huaraz. Hundreds of people visit every year to sightsee, hike, and climb in the mountains. Do you think it is a good thing that tourists are visiting the park? With your teammates, create two lists in your journal. On one list, write down the ways you think tourism could benefit the park. On the second list, write down the unfavorable impacts tourism might have. Share this information with the rest of the class. While you are driving from Huaraz to the park, something on the side of the road catches your eye and makes you pull over to get a closer look. It's a large, spiked plant. The bottom of the plant has long, narrow leaves with thorns at the end, branching out in a ball shape. As you get closer, you realize just how tall it is-at least 30 feet! And it has the biggest flower you have ever seen. There must be thousands and thousands of blooms on the spiked part! Your field book tells you that this plant, called Puya raimondii, does have the world's largest flower with 15,000 to 20,000 blooms. Although it only flowers once during its lifetime-after living for 100 years-it is very productive, flowering for 2 to 3 months and producing up to 10 million seeds. How lucky you are to be able to see such a rare event! As you drive the rest of the way to the park, you see several more like it, but not all of them are in bloom.

Puya raimondii. Photo: Adam Kolff

Nevado Huascarán. Photo: Florencia Zapata

As you approach the park, you begin to see your destination. From a distance, Nevado Huascarán looks like a giant white pyramid. No wonder it's called "Nevado," which means "snow-covered peak." In fact, the top of Nevado Huascarán is always covered in snow, and the mountain itself is composed of white rock, called granodiorite, adding to the white appearance.

Andean peak. Photo: Florencia Zapata

You are close enough to the mountain now that you can see the two peaks, Norte (North) and Sur (South). In between the two peaks, there is a hut. Back in the states, you planned to climb the higher, southern peak. As expected, it will take you four days to reach the summit at 22,205 feet (6,768 meters). This peak was first climbed in 1932 by three Austrian men. The north peak was first climbed by a woman named Anne Peck in 1908. It was one of the first major peaks in the world to be climbed first by a woman!

When you enter the park, the first thing you need to do is register yourself and your teammates. Have you ever registered yourself at a trailhead in the United States? Hiking and mountain climbing can be very dangerous, especially at high altitudes, so park officials need to know who is in the park and what they are doing. That way, in case of an emergency, like a volcanic eruption or avalanche, they will know who needs to be rescued.

Waiting to greet you inside the park is Walter. Walter, a 19-year-old man from Peru, will be joining your expedition crew. He is a climbing guide apprentice and your cook's assistant. You also meet your "arriero," your burro driver, and your burro. For many years, burros have been used as work animals in the mountains, carrying heavy loads up and down the slopes. As long as your base camp is located below 16,300 feet (4,970 meters), this burro will carry most of your supplies there for you. This will certainly make the expedition much easier!

Finally you are ready to begin climbing! After taking just a few steps you can already see the incredible plant diversity that exists on Huascarán. Even though you've read that the Andes are a biodiversity hot spot, this observation is surprising because you can't imagine plants surviving in the harsh mountain environment. As a visitor to this area, you know you should not damage any of the plant life by collecting samples. Instead, you decide to keep track of the plants you encounter as you climb Nevado Huascarán in your Mountain Plant Log. Make sure you have your altimeter turned on so you can identify the elevation at which these plants are growing. These observations will help you determine how these plants are able to survive in the mountains.

The bark of a quenual tree. Photo: Adam Kolff

As you hike up to 12,500 feet (3,800 meters), the vegetation begins to change. Up until now, you've been surrounded by trees with paperlike bark. The trees have been about 30 feet tall. Sometimes sheets of bark get blown across the trail and they look almost red. Your field book identifies these trees as Polylepis sericea, or quenual. You notice there are many plants growing underneath these trees and many birds flying around under the canopy. At one time, the entire lower slope of Huascarán was covered in quenual forests. Unfortunately, after years of wood extraction for firewood and charcoal, and the burning of land to create fresh pastures, these forests are disappearing. In fact, quenual forests are one of the most endangered forest systems in South America! The loss of these forests affects humans and birds alike because both rely on the steady supply of resources, including water, provided by alpine forests.

Quisuar flower. Photo: Adam Kolff

Opuntia flocossa. Photo: Adam Kolff

You've entered a zone (13,000 feet/4,000 meters) where the rock beneath you is white. It must be the granodiorite we were talking about earlier! This change in rock type is accompanied by a change in tree type. Now you start to see forests composed of trees with silvery leaves. The tallest trees are about 13 feet tall and 20 inches in diameter. The flowers are small orange clusters that have a sweet smell. You are able to use your field guide to identify these trees as quisuar (Buddleia incana).

At 13,200 feet (4,025 meters), you notice a cactus plant growing close to the ground. It almost looks like a pincushion because it grows in clusters with spines and hairs poking out of it. Some of the clusters are as long as two feet! The flowers, which are bright red with yellow centers, help you identify the plant as Opuntia flocossa.

Gynoxys flower. Photo: Adam Kolff

A little higher up, at around 14,000 feet (4,300 meters), the quisuar trees are no longer by themselves. Now they are mixed in with Gynoxys oleifolia trees. These trees stand about 23 feet tall with bright yellow, daisylike flowers. Even though the flowers are small you can smell their sweetness as you walk along. The leaves of this tree almost look like the leaves of the quisuar trees because they are grayish-white on the underside.

Lupinus flower. Photo: Adam Kolff

One of your teammates points out that as you have climbed higher and higher, more and more of the trees are deformed. Now that she mentions it, you notice many of the trees have a lot of growth on the side of the tree that faces the mountain, but the trunk is bare on the side of the tree that faces out. What could be causing these trees to become so deformed? Have you seen something similar happening to trees on mountains in the United States? If so, where?

Off to your left you start to notice beautiful bluish-purple plants that are 3 to 4 feet tall. As you walk along, these shrubs grow in number until they have completely replaced the trees. The individual flowers have small yellow centers and the leaves, which feel fuzzy, are shaped like a hand with fingers extended out. There are some grasses and herbs growing with these Lupinus mutabilis shrubs.

Llama. Photo: Florencia Zapata

"Look! Llamas!" your team Zoologist exclaims. Although llamas are bred and not wild, it is still exciting to encounter them at this elevation as they graze in the grassland.

At 14,800 feet (4,500 meters), you check your altimeter because you're surprised to look down and see another cactus growing at your feet. Growing out of the brush, close to the ground, on the slope under your feet is a beautiful, bright pink flower. It has a barrel-shaped stem with long spines. You use your field guide to identify this flower as Matucana conocephalus. What a beauty! Make sure you record this sighting in your Mountain Plant Log.

Gradually, the ground beneath you is becoming thinner and more rocky. You note this change as taking place at 16,400 feet (5,000 meters). Tucked away into cracks and crevices you see small, low-growing flowers. At this elevation, these plants must be covered by snow in the winter. You recognize alpine gentian (Gentiana nivalis) by its bright blue flowers. You take care not to step on this beautiful herb that is only about 2 inches tall.

Not too much further on, the ground is completely covered in ice and snow. At 17,700 feet (5,400 meters), you've reached the nival zone, where snow falls year-round and never melts.

Vegetation changes on Nevado Huascarán. Photo: TMI

Take a moment now to look at the list of plants you recorded in your Mountain Plant Log. On the basis of some of your observations, can you categorize the plants you found at different elevations? Are you able to divide these plants into groups and decide what the common characteristics are for plants in each group? Why do you think the same plants are not found growing everywhere on the mountain?