
An Alpine Ascent of Pico Del Teide via the Montaña Blanca Trail. Pico Del Teide is a Volcano and is the heightest point in Spain at 3718m.
Unfortunately the summit was off due to gale force winds - no one had made the summit that day.
My summit was 3550m at La Fortellenza viewing platform. I was really happy to achieve my summit.
I took my time ascending taking the trail I had planned which took me off the easy track and needing careful navigation in the dark. As I ascended further up the mountain the trail began to zig-zag up the mountain and I passed the Huevos del Teide, or ‘Eggs of Teide’, which are huge round basalt rocks. These rocks were ejected during an ancient eruption from the main lava flow. I got to see these rocks when I descended in the light, although I did take some photos at sunrise with the Eggs in the foreground which was awesome.
I was ok with the altitude but was very slow after 2500m.
It’s weird that lower down the mountain the weather conditions were perfect, however higher up it was like walking into a jet stream!!! I had a great sunrise as well - whereas everyone else heading for the summit had stayed in a mountain refuge (Altvista Refuge 3260m) for the night to summit early, they didn’t get to see the sunrise as the cloud was down from the refuge to the summit.
Descending I took a slightly different route which took me through a lava field, this was very interesting and much care was needed. I found I neeeded to scramble to grade 1 on my descent.
The lava formations were fascinating - I didn’t realise how light these rocks were, which made it even more precarious on my descent - more lessons learnt.
The round trip took me 5 1/2 hours moving time (6 1/2 in total).
The summit will be there for me in the future.
Great Times
Great Memories