Baltazar Ushca climbed Chimborazo twice a week
The last Ecuadorean ice-harvester died on October 11th, aged 80
Sometime in 1822 Simón Bolívar, the Great Liberator of Latin America, fell into a delirium. He dreamed he had climbed the slopes of Mount Chimborazo, Ecuador’s highest peak, in the tracks of Alexander von Humboldt. But Humboldt, in 1802, had not reached the top. No human foot had ever trodden the “ice-white hair” of Chimborazo, Bolívar wrote, or “blemished the diamond crown placed [there] by Eternity”. He dared to. At the top he was possessed by the God of Colombia and met Time, a bent old man. Time, having first scorned Bolívar as nothing, then showed him the secrets of the universe.
This article appeared in the Obituary section of the print edition under the headline “Baltazar Ushca”
Obituary November 16th 2024
From the November 16th 2024 edition
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