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Published: October 15th 2008
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Oct 9 - 14, 2008
Torres del Paine National Park, Chile
Thursday morning we took an all day excursion from our hotel around the mountain range and onto a boat across Grey Lake for a close up ( very close up ) view of the mountain range from every possible angle and the face of the Grey Glacier.
The Torres del Paine are spectacular but for us the Cuernos del Paine are even more impressive. There are more photo ops in this day than you could ever imagine !!! ( isn’t digital wonderful ?? I hope I have a big enough hard drive in my laptop to backup all the pictures !!)
This is a great day trip and we enjoyed the company in our small group ( 5 + driver and guide ). Took way too many pictures of the mountains, fauna, flora and the glacier. Somehow I never get tired if the glaciers and their spawn !!! For any one traveling to this area this is a must do excursion.
Friday we took a short nature walk in the morning and a very nice horseback ride for a couple of hours in the afternoon
into the valleys, through some streams ( and rivers ) and back to the hotel. GREAT day !! With a few hours on the horses we found a few new muscles we didn’t know we had but it was a very enjoyable day through some very peaceful and beautiful countryside. ( I’m sure the horse has few comments about hauling me around for a few hours !! ) They gave me one of their biggest horses named Tostada Grande ( Big Toast ).
Saturday we had a relaxing morning lounging around and took a 3 hour trek in the woods in the afternoon for a closer look at the Cuernos, part of the mountains that make up Torre del Paine National Park. Started out as a pretty decent day but we finished our walk in a little bit of light rain.
We enjoyed our stay at Hosteria Los Torres. This is a very comfortable resort with a spa, billed as 5 star. Not quite a 5 star but a very good 3 star or maybe 4 star. They could use a little more imagination with the meals as most people stay for a few days and the variety
was not great. Good food but could have been more interesting. We were all inclusive so food, drinks, wine etc were all included as well as the cost of the “day excursions”. This could be little pricy if you were paying for food etc as an extra. Maybe it was the fact that we were early in the season, but the hotel housekeeping and reception staff could have been better trained. The guide we used most of the time, Pedro, was excellent in all regards and we enjoyed his company on all of our excursions. Pedro is very knowledgeable about the area and history. All said it is a beautiful place in a spectacular location in the park and we enjoyed our few days here.
Sunday, Monday and Tuesday were travel days with a 5 hour drive to Punta Arenas and a flight Monday morning to Santiago for an overnight stop on our way to Bogota, Columbia on Tuesday.
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