a really long one (that's what she said!)

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Hello everyone! I just got back from an extremely jolly excursion in Patagonia! Last week 4 of my friends and I decided to go to Torres del Paine National Park, which is in the far south of Chile. We booked our flights kind of impulsively and with little knowledge of what Patagonia would entail- in my head I was imagining penguins and ice, which was sort of wrong in retrospect. However, what I did end up seeing was way better!...

It was kind of a long process getting down there, despite residing in the same country; And to think- people come to Patagonia from all corners of the earth just to see what was technically a few hours away from me! But it wasn’t that simple; first we had to take a bus to Santiago (the capital), and then a 4 hr flight to Punta Arenas, which is one of the very last cities in the southern hemisphere before you hit Antarctica. It was despicably freezing there, especially coming from such a warm climate like Viña del Mar. Then from there we took a 3 hr bus ride up north to the city of Puerto Natales, where we stayed the night in a really cheap hostel. Omar, the owner of the house and an avid hiker himself, was able to give us some helpful advice about what the heck was going on because we honestly had no idea what we were getting ourselves into! But when it came down to it, we had to plan our own trip and figure stuff out for ourselves, and this way turned out better than I ever could have imagined.

We didn’t have a ton of time to work with, so we were unsure as to whether or not we’d be able to complete the notable “W” circuit. But really, we decided that we didn’t come all the way down to Patagonia just to wander around on over-priced, guided tours so we decided that we’d just have to make it work. We’d heard that usually the route takes hikers 5 days- we had 3 nights. With this in mind, we got up early and endured a 2 hour bus ride to get into the actual park. The view driving into Torres del Paine was incredible; almost worth the trip itself. We could see the three towers that the park is so famous for, but more importantly, we saw Guanacos (like Llamas!)~ I was so happy about this.

We got off the bus and took a quick power hike to a gorgeous waterfall called Salto Grande. It was so extremely windy there; I’ve never experienced anything like that! It was the kind of wind that punched the air out of you and made your eyes juice involuntarily! Then we got on a “catamaran” boat that took us across Lake Pehoe so we could start our real excursion. The lakes in Patagonia are the most entrancing and mesmerizing shades of light turquoise! It’s hard to accurately portray how amazing they are. Got off the boat thing and commenced our hike to the first landmark Glacier Grey! It was a long, rocky walk and the sun was shining- we wandered through woods and across streams- by the way, it’s safe to drink the water in Patagonia so when we were running low we would just fill up our bottles in the brooks. I’ve never tasted better, colder water! We finally got to the glacier and enjoyed the scenery a bit, when we noticed the scariest cloud ever in the near distance. That’s another funny thing about Patagonia; it can be sunny and warm one second and it can start pouring the next. We could see that it was raining a little ways away so we had to cut our adventure short that day, we actually took off running to try to beat the storm home but we ended up getting caught in it anyway- there’s no outrunning mother nature, right?

We got home wet and cold to the Refugio Paine Grande, where we would spend our first night. Something about the refugios (shelters for hikers located sporadically throughout the park); seeing as they are the only means of accommodation besides camping, they are in a position of power because they can charge ridiculously high prices and no one can do anything about it! We intended to rent tents and sleeping bags from the refugios every night to save money, because a bed at these places runs for about 80 dollars per night (and also because it is undeniably festive to sleep in tents in a place like Patagonia). We ran into a minor teensy dilemma, however, when the refugio man told us that they didn’t have any tents left! In a really senseless moment of panic and chaos, we briefly entertained the idea of sleeping outside without any cover at all, because none of us could afford to buy a bed. In hindsight, that was one of the dumber things we managed to discuss. Don’t ask me how this worked, but after a bit of confused haggling, he let us have beds for the same prices as it would have cost us camping- but we didn’t have any sheets or blankets. It was a cold night!
The next morning we woke up to a rather intense storm, but the schizophrenic weather cleared up within a few minutes. We were still carrying our bags at their heaviest points; we brought all of our food and it weighed more than you’d think, so it was kind of a brutal hike. Our next sight to see was called the Valle Frances, a lovely wooded valley between the granite mountains and towers of the park. It was a foresty-wonderland! Definitely my favorite hike out of our trip; some parts reminded me of northern Minnesota. We hiked up a rocky mini-mountain and along its spine where we could see all the lakes around us, then we got to this magical clearing where we were surrounded by massive rock formations created by glacier movements ages ago that weirdly jutted out of the ground. Then we had to hike for another 5 hours or so to get to our next camping destination, passing more opaque-blue lakes and Los Cuernos, which are two different types of rocks (granite and something else) so they are two colors, and finally got to Refugio Los Cuernos where we camped for the night.

The next day we let ourselves sleep a little extra in the morning because they day before our group had incurred some injuries (two sprained ankles) and we had a long hike around the last leg of the “W”. We went some of the way with our festive Australian and British friends who we met on the first day of our journey, and it was a charming time. However, because we did our trip the last week in March, which is the very end of the season, the next Refugio we intended on visiting was actually closed. We had to change our plans and go elsewhere, to a more touristy Refugio. It was nice that it was closer because it started raining and we were falling all over the place (I fell in a river and my feet were soaked) so it was very nice to sit by a crackling fire. The only problem was that it made our hike the next and final day (to see the towers) extremely long- like 8 hrs! After all this traveling and hiking, though, I decided that I didn’t come all this way to miss out on the highlight of the park! Two other girls were with me on this one so we set our alarm for 3:40 am and went to bed (more like a power nap) in our snuggly tent.

Sorry this is so long, almost done!
…So we woke up ungodly early- that’s honestly the earliest I’ve ever had to get up. It was pitch-black outside but we had two surprisingly powerful headlights to help us out. Despite this, it was slow going up an extremely steep incline. After walking upwards for an hour straight in the absolute darkness, we stopped and turned off our lights and looked at the stars; I’ve never been able to see so many! It was really cool. Then it started to rain and we had to continue up the horrible mountain. It was actually really dangerous because we almost walked off a cliff at one point, and we had to cross over the tops of waterfalls on rocks in the dark night. On our walk home hours later when we could see everything in the light of day, we decided that it was best we couldn’t see how far away the top of the hill was and how far down the valley was, because it would have made it much harder to do! Finally the sun started to rise- we got lost/turned around only once and had been walking for 3 hours when we finally got to the base of the towers. From that point we had to ascend another huge, incredibly steep hill; it was basically rock climbing! The further we got, the colder it grew and the rain started turning into sleet and then finally into snow! It was the craziest thing ever when we got to the end of the trail after another hour of scrambling over boulders, but it was such a rewarding feeling! We stood there in a wild blizzard and appreciated the outrageousness of our adventure and the marvels of nature, then we took a picture and started back down. My friend Alison and I jogged the rest of the way home and it started clearing up and was a gorgeous view! Needless to say, when we got back to the refugio, we were entirely exhausted in the best possible way and ready to go home. So there you go!

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Photos

Glacier Grey
...with the storm coming in

the end of the trail
Las Torres del Paine