Three go trekking in Chile (Torres del Paine national park, Chile)

The second part of my time in Patagonia with Alex and Rosanna was spent in the Chilean part of the region, where we headed to the Torres del Paine National Park to tackle the 'W trek', a five day trek that, as the name might suggest, forms a W shape on the map. The Torres del Paine national park covers a huge area of over 240,000 hectares of Patagonia wilderness, encompassing numerous glaciers, mountains and rivers and is hugely popular with travellers to the region. 

We arrived back in Puerto Natales after an excellent few days in the Argentinian part of Southern Patagonia and had an afternoon to sort all the supplies and equipment we would need. After hiring a three man tent and sleeping bags for Alex and Rosanna from our hostel, we headed to the local supermarket to pick up enough food and snacks to last us for five days, filling a couple of baskets with plenty of pasta, noodles, and instant mash for our evening meals and enough dried fruit, biscuits, chocolate and energy bars to feed a small army. We just about managed to cram all the food into our bags on top of the clothing and other equipment we'd need before heading out for one last proper meal in a nice Chilean restaurant before four nights of cooking on a small gas stove.

The W trek route

Just before 8am the next morning we caught a bus to the national park, which is around a two hour drive from Puerto Natales. The bus was initially buzzing with the excitement of 50 or so travellers about to set off into the wilderness but before long nearly everyone was asleep, perhaps making the most of a last nap in the dry before several nights in a tent! At the entrance to the park we all had to pay the entrance fee and watch a short video about the dangers of forest fires and how we could take precautions to avoid starting any (and at the same time avoid the threatened hefty fines and potential prison sentence!). The park had suffered a serious fire due to the negligence of some hikers on the W trek last summer, so their warnings were for very good reason, as this fire, started by someone burning some toilet paper, had burnt around 10% of the park. 

Rosanna surveys the damage from last year's fire

After a further short bus ride and then a ride on a boat across Lago Pehoe, we were ready to start. While I had previously trekked for 14 days in the Swiss Alps in 2010 and so had some experience of lugging tents, sleeping bags, and cooking equipment around on my back, this was a somewhat newer experience for both Alex and Rosanna so it took a few minutes to adjust our hiking poles and get our heavy bags on to our backs and arranged as comfortably as possible, but before long we were off.

Rosanna and Alex take the strain for the first time

The first afternoon's trekking was a relatively leisurely (at least compared to the days that were to follow) three and a half hour walk along the side of Lago Grey. The weather was again in our favour and we had largely blue skies and little wind to slow us down, a pleasant surprise given many reports I'd read of strong winds in the park at this time of year. We stopped regularly to take photos of the lake and the surrounding mountains, but by 5pm we had reached our campsite, which sat at the far end of Lago Grey, alongside a refuge for those that preferred a slightly more comfortable (and considerably more expensive) experience. The campsite included toilets, showers, a cooking shelter and a small shop so was well equipped, and fortunately we'd arrived just in time to get a nice flat camping spot.

Lago Los Patos

The Torres del Paine massif

Lago Grey

After pitching our tent for the first time, we took a short stroll in the early evening sun up to a viewpoint just past the campsite which gave us fantastic views of Glaciar Grey, a large glacier which flows down in to the lake. As with the Perito Moreno glacier in Argentina, this glacier was depositing large chunks of ice in to the lake, which were floated peacefully away from the glacier, slowly breaking up in to smaller and smaller chunks.

Our home for four nights

Alex and Glaciar Grey

We awoke on the second morning to further dry weather and after making ourselves breakfast (porridge made with powdered milk) we packed away the tent and set off back down the left hand side of the W, along the same path we had followed the day before. The W shaped nature of the trail meant we would do quite a lot of doubling back like this, but it was good to see everything from a different angle while the fantastic scenery meant it never felt like too much of a chore to be retreading the same paths. By lunchtime we had made it back to Lago Pehoe where we had started the day before so we stopped here at another refuge and campsite for a bite to eat.

That afternoon, we headed east towards Campamento Italiano, the usual stopping point at the end of day 2, but as this campsite was currently closed due to the toilets being broken, we had to press on to the next campsite, Los Cuernos, which meant a longer second day than usual for this route, plus more doubling back the next day. In all we walked around 22km so it was a long day with our heavy backpacks on after our relatively gentle start on day 1. At one point we were stopped in our tracks by loud crashing noises in the mountains above, and looked up to see a huge avalanche of snow crashing down the sides of the mountains above - an impressive sight and one that was fortunately many hundreds of metres above where we would be walking on the trek!

Rosanna crosses a rickety rope bridge on day 2

That night we were woken by the depressing sound of rain on the roof of tent, which continued to fall when we got up the next morning. Fortunately the route for the third day took us back to the middle north/south section of the W route and we would be staying at the same campsite that night, so there was no need to pack up our wet tent. Instead, after a leisurely breakfast while we prayed for the rain to stop (it didn't), we were able to pack a small day bag and set off with significantly less weight on our backs, safe in the knowledge that we could double back to our campsite at any point if the rain became too heavy.

Fortunately, as the day went on the weather improved slightly and we were able to walk the full third day along Valle Frances as planned. Nevertheless, the surrounding mountains were shrouded in thick cloud so we weren't rewarded with the kind of views we could have expected on a clearer day, but it was certainly preferable to a cold day spent huddled in our tent which was the only real alternative.

Gorillas in the mist

Not quite the view we were hoping for!

The fourth morning saw a further change in the weather and a return to clearer, brighter skies. We headed further east along the shores of Lago Nodernskjold and were once again rewarded with fantastic views of the surrounding mountains and lakes. The area gets it name from the indigineous word 'paine' meaning blue, and it was easy to see why as we gazed down upon icy blue lakes and up towards the many glaciers in the mountains above us.

Pleased to see brighter weather on Day 4

Alex and Rosanna cross yet another river

After stopping for lunch, we veered north toward the third and final north/south arm of the W, Valle Ascencio. This was the most spectacular valley yet and we again stopped regularly to take photos of the valley as the path meandered down towards the river. After a brief stop at Refugio Chileno, we pressed on further up the valley to our campsite for that evening, Campamento Torres. Unlike the other privately-run campsites we had stayed at this was a free campsite run by the Chilean park authorities (Conaf), which meant much more basic facilities (no showers and no shop), but a more backwoods feel as we camped under the trees without the temptations of a warm, dry refuge nearby.

Valle Ascencio

The campsite is situated around 45 minutes walk from a viewpoint from which the iconic Torres peaks can be viewed, which for many are the highlight of a visit to the Torres del Paine national park. Although we planned to head to the viewpoint the next morning to catch the sunrise, Alex and I decided to make the most of the good weather and the remaining energy in legs and take the steep path up to the lookout that afternoon, just in case the weather changed overnight. After a steep climb we reached the viewpoint and were greeted by the three main peaks that are featured on almost every postcard in Puerto Natales, along with a huge glacier and small lake that sit beneath them. By this time, the sun had begun to disappear behind the mountains, so the peaks were a regular granite colour, but we were to be treated to an even more fantastic spectacle the next morning...

The Torres peaks on the evening of day 4

It was still dark when my alarm went off at 5.45am the next morning, but Alex and I managed to drag ourselves from the warmth of our sleeping bags and make a second climb up to the viewpoint while Rosanna chose to stay in bed. The sun was beginning to rise as we climbed back up the path, along with several dozen other committed hikers, and we reached the top in plenty of time before the sun began to hit the Torres peaks.

Fellow hikers silhouetted against the horizon as the sun comes up

Once the sun rose sufficiently high for its light to hit the Torres peaks, they slowly changed colour from the granite grey of the night before to a stunning orange colour that my photos below only just begin to do justice to. The skies remained perfectly clear so we were greeted with the best possible views of the mountains without a cloud to be seen.

Once Alex and I returned back to the campsite (and woke Rosanna up!), we quickly had breakfast and put down the tent for the last time before heading back down Valle Ascencio to complete the last leg of the trek. With our bags now significantly lighter due to all the food we had eaten and our legs battle hardened after four solid days of walking, we raced down the last section of the trek and reached the finish by 12.30, a full hour and a half before our bus back to Puerto Natales was due. I think we all felt a great sense of achievement at having completed the trek and were grateful that we'd largely been blessed with good weather, at least for the majority of the time. The scenery we`d walked through had been absolutely stunning and it had been a good mental and physical challenge to walk for five days with all of our own equipment and supplies, even if we did have sore shoulders and feet to show for it.

Racing down the final descent with lighter packs and stronger legs

One last hill!

Once back in Puerto Natales, we had just enough time to retrieve the unneeded clothing and other things we had left at our hostel and head out for a celebratory pizza and pisco sours at a local restaurant, before it was time for Alex and Rosanna to catch a bus back to Punta Arenas from where their flight home to the UK would be leaving the next morning. I was sad to say goodbye to them as it had been fantastic to share two weeks of my trip with them and explore all that Patagonia had to offer together and just generally have fun hanging out together. I now hope they both plan similar adventures to mine in the future so I have an excuse to go and visit them in some far flung corner of the world one day!

Saying goodbye to Valle Asencio and the W trek

I then spent a further couple of nights in Puerto Natales before catching a flight back to Santiago, from where my travels in Chile would be continuing as I head north towards Bolivia, Peru and Ecuador, the countries I plan to visit during the remainder of my time in South America.