Advertisement
Published: March 21st 2007
Torres del Paine
The Towers. We were lucky that the clouds stayed away long enough to see them in their full glory To access Torres del Paine national park we are based in a small town called Puerto Natales. Its totally ramshackle and when we first arrived we thought our hostel was part of the local shanty town.
Surprisingly the buildings are better than they look on the outside and we are actually living in reasonable comfort - hot water showers at least - you always have to put the toilet paper in the bin… most attractive and adding to the relationship building experience…
We also got our first bloody good breakfast. Having been used to a couple of crappy croissants and coffee in Argentina, we were ecstatic to get cereal, yoghurt, omelettes and homemade bread.
We have found a good café which does fantastic vegetarian food. You might be surprised to find us carnivores there but you don´t get much vegetable action in South America so you have to take it while you can. Plus the place has comfy sofas and good coffee.
The bus to the park was pretty mental. We ended up taking the ´not so publicised´ 10am option. As it turns out this is probably because it is more of a food pick up
Torres del Paine
Some perspective on the size of the place and drop off service rather than a direct bus. We ended up in the right place though so all´s well that ends well.
Rather than bore you with full detail of the trek - we did the W which to summarise, it was 50 miles of going up and down hills, scrambling up boulders, and some more gentle bits too, over 6 days and 31 hours of trekking. Not to mention carrying full rucksacks which we guess would weigh about 10 kilos. This was us packing light - considering we lived in 1 top and trousers for trekking and 1 top and trousers for the evening, 10 kilos now seems a little excessive. Will also leave the smelliness of our gear to your imagination…
The trek was amazing, we got to see all the main highlights - the towers, the french valley and the grey glaciar for those that know them. The weather held out for us most of the time, although the wind can literally knock you off your feet. Was very glad not to be camping on a couple of the nights.
We have also met some great people here. Partly as we have been
Torres del Paine
the area surrounding the towers staying in dorms more and sharing bathrooms. Those are the only options in the park. We are starting to meet people who will be doing similar things to us in the future months too so no doubt we will bump into them again. Its good to have some banter with other folks as well as each other.
We are now waiting to take the Navimag - a 3 day boat trip which will take us about a ¼ of the way up Chile to Puerto Montt. It has been delayed getting here due to bad weather so we are getting a stock of sea-sickness pills in. More bonding experience to come
Advertisement
Tot: 0.261s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 11; qc: 57; dbt: 0.2218s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Mum and Dad Hicks
non-member comment
well done both of you
Fantastic pictures, great stories - can't believe you are both still grinning despite the cold winds rain etc etc. However you did have some strops we believe Catrin!!!! Glad you're not absolutely superhuman. Keep up the bonding.