Mount Chimborazo has been anthropomorphized as a man in a stormy relationship with a shorter and more active female companion, the Tungurahua volcano, which is known to belch ash that lands on Chimborazo’s icy slopes. Josefina Vásquez, an archaeologist at the Universidad San Francisco in Quito, said that Chimborazo “has been venerated since pre-Columbian times” and is “still a sacred mountain where it’s thought to be close to God.”

On a recent climb to commemorate the 280th anniversary of a 1736 mission by the adventurer Charles Marie de La Condamine, a research team led by the Institut de Recherche pour le Développement in France found that Chimborazo was about 15 feet shorter than previously thought, but reaffirmed its status as the highest from the Earth’s center.

So why does Everest get all the glory? It’s all about the climb.

Scaling Everest typically requires a 10-day trek to base camp, six weeks of acclimatizing, and a seven- to nine-day trip to the top. Climbing Chimborazo can be done in about two weeks, with a one- or two-day hike after acclimatization, according to Todd Burleson, president of Alpine Ascents International, a mountaineering company based in Seattle.

“Don’t get me wrong, I wouldn’t belittle the mountain,” he said. “It’s an excellent training ground for big mountains.”