King of the Andes: Whymper and the Carrels Conquer Chimborazo in 1880

A Reunion of Matterhorn Rivals

Fifteen years after the dramatic and tragic conquest of the Matterhorn in 1865, Edward Whymper turned his eyes to South America. European alpinism had entered a new phase: having conquered the major peaks of the Alps, the world’s greatest climbers sought virgin cordilleras across the globe. Whymper chose the equatorial Andes of Ecuador, determined to investigate the physiological mysteries of altitude sickness and claim the unclimbed crown of Nevado Chimborazo (6,263 m).

To ensure success on equatorial ice, Whymper knew he needed the most formidable icecraft in Europe. In an extraordinary act of reconciliation, Whymper hired his former Matterhorn adversary, the legendary Jean-Antoine Carrel of Valtournenche, alongside Carrel’s exceptionally agile cousin, Louis Carrel. The bitter rivalry of 1865 was set aside in the service of high-altitude exploration.

“We were feverish, our faces were flushed, our breathing was quick and laborious… it seemed that our bodies were suddenly incapable of work.” — Edward Whymper, Travels Amongst the Great Andes of the Equator

The Agony of Acclimatization

Arriving in Guayaquil in December 1879, Whymper and the Carrels marched inland across rainforests and ascending paramo valleys to establish their base camp on Chimborazo’s western slopes. On December 27, they established a high tent camp at 5,000 metres.

Within hours of arriving at 5,000 metres, all three men were struck down by acute mountain sickness with unprecedented violence. Jean-Antoine Carrel lay prostrated in his sleeping bag, gasping for air; Louis Carrel suffered excruciating headaches; Whymper himself experienced fever, burning lungs, and dizziness. Unlike modern climbers with pressurized gear and pharmaceuticals, Whymper studied their misery with clinical detachment, recording pulse rates, body temperatures, and barometric drops every hour.

After four days of enforced rest, their bodies adapted. On the morning of January 4, 1880, roped together under freezing starlight at 5:35 AM, the trio stepped onto the virgin glacier.

Conquering the Equatorial Dome

Louis Carrel took the lead, wielding his long Valtournenche ice axe to cut steps into steep 45-degree firn ramps. Scrambling past the colossal basalt buttress later christened El Castillo (5,350 m), the climbers surmounted crevasses and brittle penitente fields. Above 5,800 metres, where Humboldt had been turned back seventy-eight years before, they traversed the western upper plateau.

At 3:45 PM, gasping in the desperately thin air, they conquered the western crest: Cumbre Veintimilla (6,230 m). But as the clouds momentarily parted, Whymper spotted a second, higher snow dome several hundred metres to the east. Despite debilitating exhaustion and fading daylight, the Carrels refused to claim a partial victory.

Trudging through waist-deep, powdery snow where every step required three deep gasps, the three men reached the highest point of the plateau at 4:45 PM. Standing atop Cumbre Whymper at 6,263 metres, they stood higher than any humans had ever climbed. Due to Earth’s equatorial bulge, they were standing at the point on Earth’s surface furthest from the planetary core—closer to the Sun and the stars than any living soul.

Silencing the Skeptics

When Whymper and the Carrels returned to Quito, they were met with polite incredulity. Local residents and foreign diplomats refused to believe that foreign climbers had stood atop Chimborazo, a peak deemed unclimbable by generations of locals.

Infuriated by the slur on his honor and the Carrels’ skill, Whymper staged a masterstroke. On July 3, 1880, he returned to Chimborazo and climbed it a second time—accompanied by two Ecuadorian companions, Francisco Campaña and David Beltrán—via an entirely new route on the northwest flank. As they stood on the summit, Volcán Cotopaxi sixty miles to the northeast suddenly erupted, sending a colossal black ash plume twenty thousand feet into the sky. Whymper sketched the dramatic scene from Chimborazo’s icy summit, securing irrefutable proof that forever silenced his detractors.