Cordillera Blanca

The Cordillera Blanca (Spanish for "White Range") is a mountain range in the Ancash Region of Peru. It extends between 8°08' and 9°58'S and 77°00' and 77°52'W. It contains 722 individual glaciers. Part of the larger Andes range, it includes 33 major peaks over 5,500 metres (18,040 ft) high in an area 21 kilometres (13 mi) wide and about 200 kilometres (124 mi) long.

Overview

The highest mountain in Peru, Huáscarán (6,768 m), is located here. Huáscarán National Park, established in 1975, encompasses almost the entire range of the Cordillera Blanca.

The 5,947 m (19,511 ft) Alpamayo mountain was declared "World's Most Beautiful Mountain" by an international survey led by former climber Toni Hiebeler in May 1966 in Munich.

Snow melt from the Cordillera Blanca has provided Peru with its year-round water supplies, while 80% of Peru's power comes from hydroelectricity. The area of permanent ice pack shrank by about a third between the 1970s and 2006.

Peaks

There are sixteen 6,000 m peaks in the Cordillera Blanca with a 400 m topographic prominence, and a further seventeen peaks over 5,500 m.Huascaran Sur, the highest peak, has two commonly quoted heights - 6,746 m from the Peruvian IGM map, and 6,768 m from the OEAV survey map.