After hanging out in Puerto Natales for a day to do some shopping and get ourselves organised we took the morning bus to Torres del Paine to start our 5 day trek. We opted to do the ¨W¨ rather than the full circut as we aren´t all that fit these days and weren´t sure how we would go with an 8-10 day trek.
Map of Torres del Paine National Park
We started at Refugio Pehoe, and walked up to Refugio Grey for our first night and the toe of Glacier Grey. From there we backtracked past Refugio Pehoe, where we stopped for Christmas lunch of biscuits, cheese and salami, and up to Campamento Italiano for night 2. Day 3 we left our gear at Italiano and walked up Valle Frances to near Campamento Britanico. Unfortunately the weather wasn´t cooperative and it snowed on us most of the way up the valley and we only got a short glimpse of the view when the clouds briefly parted. It was enough to see that the view would be amazing on a clear day, and whilst we didn´t see much we did see more than most people that day. We then headed back down to collect our gear and walked around to Refugio Los Cuernos for a boxing day dinner in the refugio with a bottle of red. The next day was our longest, from Los Cuernos up to Campimento Torres but by then our legs were getting used to the hills, and our packs were getting lighter, and we managed the 18km in about 6 hours which we were pretty happy with. We even started to overtake the odd other hiker on the trail.
That night was very,very cold with snow on and off all night before getting up at 3:45am in order to climb to the lookout Mirador Los Torres over for dawn. The climb up was a 45 minute scramble up the mountain in the pre-dawn light, made more interesting by the platoons of Isralies who seem to have invaded South America. They attacked the moutain like a Palastinian pre-school, but in their enthusiasum managed to regularly lose the path. The same groups would come charging past us (huffing and puffing our way slowly up), miss a turn in the trail and head off blindly up the mountain, only to have to come back down and then come charging up past us again to repeat the performance. As it turned out half of them ended up at the top of the ridge line well above the lookout, with the other half running around trying to find their mates who had the rest of their breakfast or coffee making gear. Quite entertaining.
Once up to the look out, it was cold. Damn cold. We had been warned that it would be chilly up there at dawn so dragged our sleeping bags, all our warm clothes and our coffee making gear up with to be as comfortable as possible whilst we waited (and hoped) for the sun to hit the towers. As it was the clouds pretty much spoiled the show, with only one brief ray of sunlight hitting the lower cliffs opposite the look-out, but not making it to the towers and then the snow set in in earnest. We hung on for a while hoping it might clear, but with the snow still dumping and the view almost completely gone we conceded defeat and headed back down to a well deserved bowl of porridge before our final walk out to catch the bus back to Puerto Natles where we are now.
Torres del Paine is certainly an amazing place, and well worth the hike. After 5 days we were actually dissapointed that we hadn´t gone for the whole circuit and maybe we´ll have to come back some time and do that. Whilst the weather was average at times, we also had enough sunshine to keep us going and the wind wasn´t quite as crazy as it could have been (only the odd 50 knot gust!).
Tomorrow we are booked on the morning bus to Ushuaia where we will spend new years – hopefully a bit more lively than our Christmas – before departing for Antarctica on 9 Jan for the final phase of our travels.
That night was very,very cold with snow on and off all night before getting up at 3:45am in order to climb to the lookout Mirador Los Torres over for dawn. The climb up was a 45 minute scramble up the mountain in the pre-dawn light, made more interesting by the platoons of Isralies who seem to have invaded South America. They attacked the moutain like a Palastinian pre-school, but in their enthusiasum managed to regularly lose the path. The same groups would come charging past us (huffing and puffing our way slowly up), miss a turn in the trail and head off blindly up the mountain, only to have to come back down and then come charging up past us again to repeat the performance. As it turned out half of them ended up at the top of the ridge line well above the lookout, with the other half running around trying to find their mates who had the rest of their breakfast or coffee making gear. Quite entertaining.
Once up to the look out, it was cold. Damn cold. We had been warned that it would be chilly up there at dawn so dragged our sleeping bags, all our warm clothes and our coffee making gear up with to be as comfortable as possible whilst we waited (and hoped) for the sun to hit the towers. As it was the clouds pretty much spoiled the show, with only one brief ray of sunlight hitting the lower cliffs opposite the look-out, but not making it to the towers and then the snow set in in earnest. We hung on for a while hoping it might clear, but with the snow still dumping and the view almost completely gone we conceded defeat and headed back down to a well deserved bowl of porridge before our final walk out to catch the bus back to Puerto Natles where we are now.
Torres del Paine is certainly an amazing place, and well worth the hike. After 5 days we were actually dissapointed that we hadn´t gone for the whole circuit and maybe we´ll have to come back some time and do that. Whilst the weather was average at times, we also had enough sunshine to keep us going and the wind wasn´t quite as crazy as it could have been (only the odd 50 knot gust!).
Tomorrow we are booked on the morning bus to Ushuaia where we will spend new years – hopefully a bit more lively than our Christmas – before departing for Antarctica on 9 Jan for the final phase of our travels.
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