Torres del Paine

Unexpected internet!

I'm going to try to sum up my trip to Torres del Paine in one post... so there will be a lot left unsaid. A brief intro: Abby and I flew south from La Serena to Punta Arenas, from where we traveled the three hours to Puerto Natales and met Will, the other boy on the Midd program in La Serena. The next day our journey began.

Here's the schedule we followed:

This map was fun to annotate.

Los Torres del Paine

At the park entrance we were lucky enough to be able to view the Torres del Paine clearly, albeit from a distance.








Day 1: Refugio Paine Grande -> Refugio Grey
We arrived by catamaran to Refugio Paine Grande, where we ate lunch.

view from the catamaran

We then hiked to Refugio Grey. The hike was a fair amount of uphill hiking and unfortunately my head started to bother me, but thankfully after some short breaks the headaches went away. Unfortunately my camera battery died shortly into the hike.

The views, however, were unbelievable. I had never seen a glacier before - I'd assumed Glacier Grey would be white or gray (as the name suggests), but instead was astounded by the interplay of different shades of blue, gray, and white. The various colors beautifully complemented the folding texture of the glacier.

Day 2: Refugio Grey -> glacier lookout -> Refugio Paine Grande

We heard that beyond the refugio there was a good mirador (lookout) that offered a closer view of Glacier Grey, so before heading back to Refugio Paine Grey, we decided to go in the opposite direction for one hour or so, until we reached the mirador. The hike to the lookout was mostly uphill, roughly following the shore of the lake that the glacier borders. When the trail popped out of the forest or turned more rocky, we could get a view of the glacier. When we were at the mirador I finally got a closer look at the glacier. The blue hues confounded me... So I did research and discovered that, according to NASA, "The coloring is due to the ice’s absorption of red wavelengths of light and scattering of blue wavelengths of light as it is transmitted through the ice." More information here - that site is worth checking out, if only to see the aerial view of the glacier.

On our way to Refugio Paine Grande we got to appreciate de nuevo the beautiful views of Lago Grey and the striking mountains on the opposite side of the trail. Forested sides quickly gave way on the steep slopes to snow-capped peaks.

Day 3: Refugio Paine Grande -> Mirador Francés -> Refugio Los Cuernos
We made excellent time as we passed by the impossibly blue Lago Skottsberg. Weather was perfect, which allowed Will to somehow spot two huge birds (condors?) flying around the peaks of los Cuernos del Paine ("Horns of Paine") FAR off in the distance.

We arrived at a campsite and dropped off the packs there, taking only a smaller backpack to go eat lunch in Valle Francés, the middle "prong" of the W. It was mostly uphill - and therefore tiring - on the way there, but absolutely beautiful. At first we walked along a river of glacial runoff, so the roaring of rushing water accompanied us along the trail. We walked for about an hour into the valley, until we were far above the river. We heard incredible, echoing booms as enormous chunks of snow and ice fell from the heights of the mountains in the valley, encountering glacial ice and rocks on their descent. Every once in a while we heard a particularly deafening one, and the heads of everybody at the lookout would turn in unison to watch the huge chunks fall gracefully into a cloud of snow and finally disappear.

Panorama of Valle del Francés, looking north

Panorama of Valle del Francés, looking south

After lunching we headed back to the campsite and worked our way to our next destination, Refugio Los Cuernos. En route we stopped by Lago Nordenskjöld for a break to enjoy the view, since we were making such good time. Its shore was entirely rocks and Will wanted to try skipping some.

Lago Nordenskjöld

Day 4: Refugio Los Cuernos -> Refugio Chileno -> Mirador Los Torres -> Refugio Chileno


This day started out a bit rainy, which only served to emphasize the beautiful greens of the scenic hillsides. Will and I decided that the hills with amazing color alterations between bright and dark shades of green looked like they belonged in Norway... despite the fact that neither of us have ever been to Norway.

When we got to Refugio Chileno, we discovered that we had shaved at least two hours off of the estimated 6 or 6.5 hour journey. After resting for around an hour, Will and I decided to do the hike to el mirador de los Torres to see if we could get a glimpse of the elusive Torres del Paine. Abby's knees were causing her a lot of pain so she wisely decided not to join us.

The Torres are often viewed as the culmination of the W circuit... but are usually shrouded in clouds. Though exhausted, I found a reserve of energy because I knew I would beat myself up later if I didn't go. On the way up if it's clear you can supposedly get a glimpse of los torres. I couldn't because they were swimming in clouds. But at the top, by some stroke of luck (maybe it was the 10+ four-leaf clovers Abby and I found on the trail...) there was a gap in the clouds when I arrived at the top, through which I had a relatively unobstructed view of the famed peaks. I hadn't expected to see them so close - they were more imposing than I had imagined, which was a humbling experience in person. A bit below the mirador was another one of those lovely lakes. It seemed perfectly natural that it should have its home among the boulders, too, though I originally thought it looked out of place. We only enjoyed the rare view of los torres for about fifteen minutes  - fog returned quickly to claim its territory.

Here's the evolution of the Torres as I saw it. After 20 minutes or so, you couldn't even see the lake.

 

 

Day 5: Refugio Chileno -> Hostería Torres
We hiked down from Refugio Chileno to Hostería Torres as the final stretch of our W circuit. Unfortunately, the hike to the mirador the day before really messed up one of my knees, so I limped the entire way down. Thankfully, it was our easiest day.

At Hostería Torres we took the shuttle to the park entrance and then headed back to Puerto Natales.

People
We ran into a ton of really cool people on our trip, ranging from Dan the Man to somebody who knew a professor from Bowdoin and the professor's parents. Some German patent lawyers urged Abby and Will to patent some of the ideas they are utilizing in Middlebury's Solar Decathalon entry; we played hearts with a fellow Midd student in Abby and Will's year; an Australian woman gifted us a book, two oranges, and an apple; we found a lot of people who we would have invited to play cards with us; etc.

Everybody was incredibly friendly, too - you said hello to basically everybody you passed. Sometimes Abby, Will, and I decided to say hi in different languages rather than the standard English and español (by the end of the trip we covered at least five others, I think). Other people also got creative: we went by one group of 7 guys going in the other direction who said their holas in ascending notes, forming a nice scale.

We came across travelers from Germany, France, Australia, Holland, Japan, Korea, Brasil, Israel, Argentina, India, and more.

Fire
There was a big fire in the park about one year ago (read about it here), and the evidence is still easy to spot. Charred trees dominated some of the landscapes we hiked through, and we passed dozens of "zonas en recuperación."