Andes travel guide

The Andes are South America’s solid spine, a daunting mountain range over 7,000km long. It stretches from the iciest reaches of Patagonia in the far south, almost as far as the Caribbean in the north, and widens out to 700km in places.

Its highest peaks soar well over 6,000m, but while these are reserved for dedicated climbers, any trekking here will involve crossing passes, plateaus and surreal páramo ecosystems, comfortably above 4,000m. This is a land of crater lakes, extinct volcanoes, calving glaciers and soaring condors, but it is a land, too, with a phenomenally rich culture. In the Andes, the Incas have their most famous ruins, at Machu Picchu, but their culture lives on through their Quechua ancestors. In Bolivia, the Aymara people roam the plateaus at altitudes that leave most breathless. For a more contemporary twist, three of the four highest capital cities in the world are tucked into the Andes, with buildings seemly tumbling down precipitous mountainsides.

Choosing which part of this 7,000km range to visit may seem like a daunting prospect, but most of our Andes vacations focus on the easily accessible regions in Ecuador, Bolivia and – above all – Peru. This was the former Inca heartland, so their history and archaeology features highly on any Andes itinerary, but so too do their modern day descendants, the Quechua (or Quichua in Ecuador), whose vibrant markets, fertile mountainside terraces, traditional food and rather beautiful music and dance bring life to these mountains. Bolivia has easily-crossed land borders with Chile and Peru, while explorations into Ecuador or in the Andes’ southern reaches of Patagonia will require a flight.