Best Hiking in Huaraz: Huascarán National Park

Peru Guide:

Best Hiking in Huaraz

Peru Guide:

Best Hiking in Huaraz

If you're looking for the best hiking in Huaraz, you should start with Huascarán National Park. It is home to the popular Laguna 69 and Santa Cruz treks. The hiking in Huascarán is absolutely incredible. It's home to the world famous Laguna 69 Trek, Santa Cruz Trek, and many more.

We wish we had more time to spend here as we really only scratched the surface during our stay. We came specifically for Laguna 69 but learned so much about what it has to offer. Read more below about how to hike Laguna 69 and what other hikes Huascarán has to offer.

The City of Huaraz

Like most cities in Peru, Huaraz isn't the safest to walk around at night. We felt safe enough walking together as long as we were mindful of our surroundings. Regardless, it definitely felt a little sketchier than Cusco. We were sure to wear our backpacks on the front of our bodies while walking around. This is so we can physically see them at all times to deter people from grabbing them off our backs.

This city was our final destination on our Peru route. We took an 8 hour bus ride from Lima to Huaraz with Cruz del Sur. The ride there was one of the most comfortable bus rides we had, not so much on the way back (the A/C was broken). Our main reason for going to was to do the Laguna 69 trek. As we mentioned before, Peru has some crazy biodiversity going on. To go from the coast at sea level to just over 10,000 ft in Huaraz was an incredible change. When we arrived we could see snow capped peaks of the Cordillera Blanca mountain range the background.

See how this fits into our Peru Route:

Hiking Tours in Huaraz

Alpes Huaraz Hostel is a true backpacker hostel and offers amazing hiking tours. There are plenty of people either doing day trips from the hostel or using it as a 'home-base' to store their belongings during multi-day treks. Not only was the price reasonable, they also offered help with booking any sort of tour you wanted to do.

We mistakenly booked our Laguna 69 tour online ahead of time for $17 USD. At the time it seemed like a great price for a 12 hour guided tour that included transportation both ways. However, the price would have been only $11 USD if we decided to wait and book it in person through Alpes Huaraz. Plus we could have done the hike with some of the cool people we met at the hostel. Despite all that, it was a learning experience. Since then we have found much better deals booking tours in person after arriving at our destination.

Alpes Huaraz Tours

Glacier Pastoruri

Cost: 35 Soles (~$11 USD)

Length: Full Day (10-12 hours)

Laguna 69

Cost: 35 Soles (~$11 USD)

Length: Full Day (10-12 hours)

Chavin de Huantar

Cost: 35 Soles (~$11 USD)

Length: Full Day (10-12 hours)

Santa Cruz Trek

Cost: 430 Soles (~$130 USD)

Length: 4 Days/3 Nights

alpes huaraz hostel near huascaran national park peru

alpes huaraz hikes in huascaran national park

Where to stay in Huaraz

If you're looking for somewhere to stay in Huaraz, there are plenty of hostels ready to be your base camp for trekking. Our personal favorite is Alpes Huaraz because it has an amazing atmosphere and ready to help you start your adventure.

From our experience, we like to use Hostel World to check out potential hostels, then check other booking websites like Booking.com to make our reservations. Sometimes we also message hostels directly to get a better price. We also like to use Airbnb to book accommodations if its a better deal than hostels. Clicking on either of the icons will give you a deal with either of the sites, but are affiliate links so we earn a small commission.