Chimborazo Volcano (6268m) is located in the Chimborazo Province and is the highest mountain in Ecuador. Its main peaks are four: Veintimilla, Whymper (or Máxima), Politécnica and Nicolás Martínez. The first two are frequently climbed; On the other hand, the Politécnica and Nicolás Martínez summits are more difficult and have few ascents, especially Nicolás Martínez, which is the lowest and most difficult of all. There have been numerous explorers who have fought against these glaciers, named precisely in their name: Stübel, Thielmann, Humboldt and García Moreno, among others, and of course, the "Whymper" summit in honor of its first conqueror.
Chimborazo was considered “the highest mountain in the world”, a qualification that probably had its origin in the first explorers who visited it, among them the famous
Alexander von Humboldt. At that time little or nothing was known about the great mountains of the Himalayas and those located south of the Equator. It was this fame that proved an irresistible temptation to the English mountaineer
Edward Whymper; who after conquering the Matterhorn, which was considered one of the last great peaks of the old continent, decided to join the Carrel brothers to go in search of new adventures in lands almost unknown to Europeans. This is how Edward Whymper together with the Carrel brothers were the first to ascend to the
Chimborazo Summit; at a time when no one knew the reaction that the human body could have at those elevations. And well, they were not completely wrong about “the highest mountain in the world”, since in recent times it has been determined that the Chimborazo Summit is the furthest point from the center of the Earth, likewise, the “ closest to the Sun.”