Torres del Paine

After Calafate, I wanted to head for what I thought would be one of the big highlights of my trip, Torres Del Paine, Chile's most famous national park. In order to do this, I had to go to the town of Puerto Natales in Chile. This involved a five hour bus journey and a right palarva at the border. Apparently, the Argentinians haven't gotten on with the Chileans ever since the latter decided to assist the UK in retaking a certain group of islands from the former. This dislike now manifests itself in many ways, two of which are (1) the terrible road between Calafate and Natales and (2) the apparent need for two customs check points about a mile apart, each with their own slow and protracted crossing procedure. Anyway, once that was over with, we soon arrived in Natales.

I headed straight for a hostel I found on the internet. The landlady is an hotelier/taxi driver/travel agent and sorted me out with a trip to the park for the very next day - and a bus ticket back for the follwing day. Meanwhile I headed into town to hire a tent, buy a torch and stock up on provisions for a couple of days in the park. There are "refugios" in the park, which are little hostels placed at strategic points along the trails. However, I had heard that these were very expensive and that it was much better to camp.

The next day a minibus came and picked up Waturu (a Japanese guy who's studying in Santiago but who I was dorming with in Natales - we had to communicate in Spanish!) and myself. There were only seven people on the bus, so the driver said we could stop whenever we wanted in the park to take pictures.

I had heard that the weather in the park was generally really windy and wet but we actually had glorious sunshine all day for our tour. This meant that all the water in the park, which must have had a high mineral content, glowed bright blue. The tour was excellent and we got to see lots of amazing sights and take pictures. So when the end of the day came and it was time to shoulder my rucksack and start walking while the others went home, I must admit that I was wondering if it was really necessary. Anyway, I set off in the direction of the refugio/campsite in which I wanted to spend the night ("Camp Chileno"). The first section was all uphill and with tent, sleeping bag and lots of water, it wasn´t that much fun. However, once I reached the top of the frst climb and looked back down at the amazing view, my mood lifted and I reallly started to enjoy it. Things got even better when I reached Chileno in just over an hour, when the guide had said two. Better still, for the small camping fee of three punds fifty, I was able to pitch my tent in a sheltered spot and use the facilities of the refugio (i.e. showers!).

The next morning, I got up reasonably early and set off for "Base Torres", which has the most amzing view of the "torres" (big jagged rock things) in the park. The last 45 mins of this involved climbing over lots boulders up a steep slope - only at this point did I think it might have been an idea to have left the tent at Chileno! When I reached the top however the view was amazing and the only other people there were an English couple who were just leaving - so I had the place to myself for about ten minutes. The view was amazing as the mist had almost competely lifted. Headed back to the entrance to the park after this to catch the bus back to Natales.

Trekking in Torres del Paine is definitely the best thing I´ve done so far. Am now in Puerto Natales taking it easy for a day or so, catching up on the blog and planning my journey north.

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