Getting high in the Andes, until it got complicated

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Were back

Ive only done a ski resort double visit in one year once before. Congratulations!

 

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Today made all the hassles, all the dramas, worth it!

Absolutely sublime.

 

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Some pretty amazing views. Worth all the effort you put in to getting back there

 

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A bit about the lake.

It’s 4km long and 700m wide. Depth has never been reliably measured, but thought to be about 200m

The ancient Incas had a legend about the place, which held that it is the burial place of an Inca princess who fell off one of the surrounding cliffs.

In the summer, the lake goes an emerald colour, and they say this is from her green eyes.

The Incas believed the lake was so deep that it connected to the ocean.





The text reads:

The Legend of the Laguna del Inca


Across the crystal blue waters of this lake, on full moon nights, one can hear the strange cries that stir the winter calm. It is perhaps an enchantment that produces those mournful lamentations.


Legend tells that the spirit of the Inca, Illi Yunqui, haunts the watery tomb in which he buried his soul-mate, the Princess Kora-Illé, who had tragically fallen from a cliff during a royal mountain banquet (a nascu).


The Inca Yungui, whose grief shook the mountain, believed that no earthly grave could compare with this lake, Shrouded in white linen, she was lowered into the blue depths in the presence of the grief-stricken imperial court. From that moment, the waters were tinted with the emerald shade of the beautiful eyes that the heir of the sun could awaken no more.


This tale of love and mystery is blanketed by the deep shroud of the wintonow and only the sad cries of Illi Yunqui remain to remind us of the story.