Rainbow Mountain is one of the most, of not the most, beautiful places I have been. This colourful mountain was only discovered roughly 10 years ago. The snow on the mountain melted, leaving the beautiful colours exposed. I am so blessed to have the opportunity to visit it.
Booking the day trip
Like many other day trips in Peru, you don’t need to book in advance. When you get to Cusco, there are plenty of people selling day trips to plenty of places. Once we got to Cusco, my friends and myself sat down with a travel consultant from the hostel. We went over a bunch of day tours, Rainbow Mountain was high on our list. It was super easy to book and organise.
Day of the tour
We were up very early (normal for most activities from Cusco). Someone was collecting us from our hostel at 4:20am to take us to the vans. Rainbow Mountain is roughly a 2 hours drive from Cusco, I slept most of the way. We stopped for a breakfast on the way and also had lunch on the way back to Cusco.
Leading up to this trip, both my friends were getting really sick. One had altitude sickness and one had the flu. They were doing amazing to push through and see all the awesome things. But this was the last thing we did in Cusco and they were struggling. One friend opted out of this day, my other friend only would go if we got a horse to the top because she was too sick to hike.
When you first get there, there are people up-selling you a horse ride, we both decided to go with this option. If we were in good health on the day, doing the hike would be the better option. But sometimes you need to do what is right for you in the moment. We took a horse to the mountain, and then we walked back.
The hike is mostly flat-ish, it goes a little up and down, but the hardest thing is the altitude. You never know how altitude effects you until you are there and it has nothing to do with fitness. Once you are almost to the mountain, there is a really steep section for about a solid 5 minutes of just straight up. This part you can not do with a horse, so you do need to do this no matter what. If you are struggling with the climb or altitude, remember you can take it as slow as you need!
This point was the highest we went while in Peru at 5,200 meters (17,060 feet)
The first point is where you see most of the photos online from. There is a huge line to get your photo taken in front of the mountain. One of those, instagram vs reality moments. Once we got a bunch of photos at the base part of the mountain, there is an extra part of the mountain to climb where it is at its highest altitude.
This point was the highest we went while in Peru at 5,200 meters (17,060 feet). This was the only time I felt light headed and sick, I couldn’t stay up there for very long. But it was worth going up there for the incredible views of the mountain and the valley around it, which was just as incredible.
Animal Welfare
Something I did want to touch on was animal welfare. I have learnt a lot more about this topic since doing my Peru travels. But even at the time, it felt a little off to me, but it was so normalised. I did ride a horse on this hike, and the demand for this will go up and up the more tourists that go. Especially due to the high altitude of the hike. We can not guarantee how they are treated and the strain of what they are doing each day in any weather.
The one thing I found to be the worst, all through Peru, was the photo taking with animals. There were many dressed up Limas at Rainbow Mountain for photos with tourists. Some countries have banned this altogether, because of the implications and ripple effect it has on the animals. To enable these photos to happen, animals are caged and treated awfully to ensure control of the animal. Now I am not saying that this is definitely happening with every animal, but the culture of the industry is not good.
I encourage you to take the time to learn about the animal welfare and consider the wider implications of what we do while we travel. I certainly needed to learn more, I have done this in the past and I am not perfect. But in the future I will be more cautious about where I put my money into, because where you put your money is what grows.
Planning a trip to Peru? If you would like to read more about my trip for more tips, you can see all my Peru blogs here.
