Click on the image to enlarge

Torres…Los famosos

View into the Valle Frances

Dan up high in the Valle Frances

Glacier Grey, and Dan too

Looking down at the massive ice

Really happy for some Trail mix

beautiful view from the pampas

Torres del Paine (January 23 - 28)

After a good night sleep we decide to head to Torres del Paine, one of Chiles most celebrated National Parks. We buy our supplies for the estimated four days of hiking and camping, and head out of town. The park is a day and a half away on bike and in the opposite direction of our anticipated route on bicycle so we take a bus. Our food storage capacity on bikes would not have allowed three days riding to and from the park and five days on the trail. We might have been able to bike in and have a couple days hiking, but the park seemed like it deserved more of our attention. We plan to start riding at the exact spot where we left off.

We arrive at the park at about 5pm just as the clouds have begun to grey the sky to the North. This has been a daily sight, seeing the sky close up and feeling the beginning mist of what will certainly become rain. It is three hours to the higher camp (the free one), just below the famous Torres. Pushing into the wind, and our sore legs, we crawl up the slope. The first stretch of the hike seemed miserable. We had a hard day yesterday, pulling into Puerto Natales really needing a break, and somehow we have landed ourselves on the side of a mountain with the wind again in our faces. But after about a half an hour we are again laughing at the weather. The park is set up with lodging for all those who plan to hike in leisure. We arrive at one of these refugios filled with warm mate drinkers, but pass through to camp below the Torres. The camping routine has become so second nature that we have the tent pitched at dinner simmering within fifteen minutes. The next day we are blessed with beautiful weather and the Torres are clear. It is very common to hear people getting to the top and finding the whole area deep in a blanket of clouds.

The whole park is amazing. We walk for five days, visiting the Torres, Valle Frances, and Glacier Grey. In the French valley avalanches form small flowing snow rivers. The wind whips up the valley, sometimes blowing small waterfalls back up toward the sky. Towards the Glacier, there are a series of lakes, and the wind plays games on their surface, picking up water in seemingly impossible quantities, lifting it in misty bundles and dropping in again kilometres away. One lake is especially impressive because it is at the end of our trek, way high up in the mountains. As we pass the high lake the Glacier becomes visible in the distance, split by an island. The ice is massive beyond words, and although the island gives the illusion of somehow holding the ice, the power of the Glacier is clear. It lurches forward without moving. The final day leaving the park gives us clean view of the entire range as we head away through the pampas. We revel in the moment, sit down and eat some chocolate.

And now we are back in Puerto Natales, and pumped for the ride to Calafate. We'll be leaving tomorrow at 3:00 a.m.