A little info on what the Torres Del Paine circuit actually is! Torres Del Paine is a National Park in southern Patagonia that has glaciers, mountains, forests and a rich wealth of flora and fauna. The park has two commonly walked treks; the one we decided to undertake was the 9 day circuit looping around the park and around the mountains at the parks core.
As this is a 9 day hike, we had to carry a lot of equipment, we had:
A tent, sleeping bags, roll mats to sleep on, a stove, 3 small gas canisters, a pot to cook in, cups, bowls, cutlery, 12 kg's of food, warm clothes, wet weather gear and of course Sarahs normal contact lens eye solution, lotions and potions etc etc etc.....
Here is a shot of our food selection!
Day1 - 8/11/2011
Amarga - Seron 15.5 Km's
We awoke at 6 am after a broken nights sleep thanks to a T-REX (Tyrano Snarus Rex) asleep in our dorm. We loaded ourselves up on a full breakfast of fruit, eggs, muesli, juice and coffee and got the bus at 7.30 am to the park.
During the two and half bus journey we were lucky enough to see the famous spires of the Torres Del Paine in all there glory, we were awe struck.
By 10.30 am we had paid the park fees and proudly donned our heavy packs to begin the full circle, while all the other day hikers and short 'W' trek hikers boarded the shuttle to the main park.
We began our 9 day trek by missing the path and spending 30 minutes wondering around! Great start we thought, this should be a fun 9 days!
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| Sarah at the start! |
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| 'Day 1' |
We were soon on the right track through a field of daisy's with nobody in sight and total peace and quiet. What soon became apparent was that James had either become very unfit or the fact that he had the majority of the kit and it was weighing him down - he was requiring a break every 30 minutes. Not good!
Anyway, we wondered along glacial lakes and through scrub land for most of the day and did not see another person for 5 hours, bliss.
By the end of the 15.5 km's for the day, James was not sure that he could continue and was having serious reservations as to going on. We set up camp exhausted in the Seron camp site, ate our standard meals (the same for the entire 9 days) of Instant Potato for Sarah and Pasta in soup for James.
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| Seron camp site- and our small tent behind the tree |
Day 2 - 9/11/2011
Seron - Dickson 20 Km's
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| 'Day 2' |
James had obviously been dreaming about food and woke up with a jolt with the statistic that we would eat approximately 1 kg of food per day on average. We therefore would loose some of the weight he was carrying. However on day 2 most of it was still there!
We plodded on follwing the contours of the valley and river heading towards the huge mountain range of Cerro Paine and Chico Norte. We walked for 6 hours with them getting closer all the time.
The mountain scenery was stunning, we continued our 30 minute stints with breaks but this did mean we took 7 hours to reach our next camp!
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| Glacial lake by our campsite, glacier in the distance |
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| Cooking a 'yummy' Gourmet dinner |
Once we arrived at camp Dickson we were lucky enough to have a luke warm shower while over looking a glacial lake and ice bergs.
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| Slightly cold for a paddle! |
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| Day 2 campsite- note: Bags didn't even fit in the tent! |
Day 3 - 10/11/2011
Dickson - Perros 10 Km's
Today was going to be a relatively short trip, but uphill for 10km, this is easy normally, but not with the packs... Fortunately after leaving the campsite we noticed a pair of hand held bag scales and James duly weighed his bag. To his horror the bag read 23 Kg's!! That meant when we started with the 1 Kg of food a day rule the bag must have been 25 Kg's (55 lbs).....That's why he was struggling the first two days!
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| 'Day 3' |
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| The view back down the valley to the campsite |
We climbed up to the crater edge that housed the glacial lake and were suddenly buffeted by some of the infamous Patagonian winds that whip through the park. The wind was so strong we struggled to stand up right, fully able to lean in to the wind and not fall over (100kph winds were forecasted).
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| James leaning into the wind on the top of the ledge looking at glacier below |
Fortunately it was only a few minutes to our camp site and we settled down for the night.
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| Day 3 camp |
Perros to Paso 12 Km's
This was to be a full-on day, so we awoke at 6.30am. After a quick turn around we left camp at 8.00am to start the 700 meter ascent to the pass.
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| 'Day 4' |
We soon realised that the winds we experienced the day before were not a one-off and it looked like rain. . So Sarah tried on her new Italian designed poncho she bought from D & G in Bolivia.
We trudged through snow and bogs until we reached the moraine field that led to the pass, and we soon realised we had been walking for over an hour with no breaks, it seemed James's bag was starting to get lighter. We even managed to catch a guided group who left 30 minutes before us who only had day packs on, RESULT!
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| James at the bottom of the moraine field |
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| snow path up.. |
When we got to the top the normal jubilation of reaching the goal was short lived as even fiercer winds almost knocked us over. Taking a few more steps forward we realised we were looking at the enormous glacier Grey and it filled our entire field of vision.
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| Sarah at the top in between the gusts of wind |
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| Walking down in the snow with glacier grey |
When we reached the wooded area below we were exhausted and took on water and food to re-charge. We set up camp in a wild un-managed camp site that was deserted and had views the length of the glacier, we were the only ones there.
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| Day 4 camp under the creaking trees |
Normally we are quite happy to snuggle up in the tent, but we were well aware of the storm force winds blowing through the trees and were well aware a tree could fall on us at any moment.
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| Sarah's favourite spot with a cup of hot tea |
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| Cooking up a feast! |
Day 5 - 12/11/2011
Paso to Guardas 6 Km's
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| Day 5- too windy to balance the camera to take a shot of both of us |
What we were not reckoning on was that we would be walking through gulleys and along cliff edges in the 100 kph winds!
The first few hours were spent skirting along a cliff looking down to the glacier below, we were praying we were not going to meet it up close! We had to duck down and stop when gusts of wind came to stop being blown off, there were no barriers on the cliff side, it was nuts.
Our next challenge was the gullies that had been cut by the old glaciers. Now normally they have ladders hanging for you to climb in and out of the gullies, but some were broken.Great!
We overcame all of these and finally arrived at our camp site to have a well earned afternoon rest.
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| Day 5 camp |
With no showers we now we were starting to smell and the ear plugs had to be re used for other purposes.
Day 6 - 13/11/2011
Guardas - Italiano 22 Km's
We spent all night listening to the swaying of the trees and the dripping of the rain on the roof of the tent, we both knew we had a 9 hour walk today and it didn't feel good!
When we left the tent at 6.30 am the typical Patagonian weather was here. It was windy raining and very overcast. We packed a very wet dirty soggy tent in to its bag and began trudging our way.
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| Miserable Sarah |
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| Day 6 in the tent together out the rain |
Day 7 - 14/11/2011
Italiano - French Valley day hike 7 Km
We spent the evening listening to the huge glacial avalanches from the nearby mountain, the sound was like bombs going off, it was amazing.
We intended to use this day as a rest day (a short 5.5hr walk) and complete a hike up in to the valley. We left at 10.15am in high spirits with views of the river, glacier and cerro norte spires to inspire us.
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| 'Day 7'- French valley and the weather looked better |
However, little more than an hour in to the hike we had the ominous feeling that the weather was about to change, the wind picked up, the clouds descended and it began to rain! AGAIN!!
We ran down the valley to try to stay dry in our cooking shelter, arriving back 30 other people had decided to do the same thing....After an hour or so they all left in their own directions and we had a silent camp site once more.
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| Day 7 camp at Camp Italiano |
Day 8 - 15/11/2011
Italiano - Torres 27 Km's
With trepidation we peered out of our tent at 5.45 am to see if it was dry...........and it was!!!
We watched the pink sky as the sun started to rise, repeated the adage "Red sky in the morning shepherds warning" and started our hike.
We started leaving the French valley and walking around the granite towers of the Cerro Norte.
What we found as we left the safety of the valley was that it was incredibly windy! It was so windy in fact that the wind was whipping water across the lakes and creating huge plumes of water that rose up the mountain sides.
After an hour we reached the shore of the lake and had to run across the pebbled beach- army style. We had to do this with great timing between massive gusts of water, we were trying not to get soaked by the water whipped up by the once again storm force winds.
We spent the day marching through crowds of day hikers as we strived towards the Torres valley, after 5 hours we finally reached the Torres valley.
With the weather being kind to us we decided that we would journey the extra 1 and a half hours up to the Torres lookout to see the famous Torres spires in good weather. This would take us into our 10th hour.
This place was truly one of the most amazing places we have ever seen a cauldron type effect is felt of light, sounds and weather.
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| 'Day 8' |
We now proceeded to eat all the food we had left over :-)
Day 9 - 16/11/2011
Torres - Amarga 19 Km's
The final day had arrived, we planned to go up to the spires to see the sun rise as a final finish to the trip. This meant waking up at 4 am and hiking the 45 minutes up to the spires under head torch light.
When we arrived there were only 10 or so of us there, we took our gas burner with us so were able to make breakfast and coffee for the wait. Everyone waited with baited breath, however unfortunately due to the clouds the light show was not as a amazing as it could have been but we still got some great shots.
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| Day 9 at 6am after sunrise |
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| During sunrise |
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| After sunrise |
We got back to the camp site for 7.00am and packed up camp for the final time, we skipped down the mountain knowing we had done the whole circuit.
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| James skipping down the moutain with a 'light' pack |
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| Sarah at the bottom- very tired at the same sign we took the first picture |
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| At the bottom needing a sleep! |
At the bottom we washed our stinky feet and relaxed in the sun waiting for the bus to arrive.
On the coach journey home we were lucky enough to see an Andean condor up close on the ground, a very rare sight. These birds have a wing span of up to 2 meters, this picture really does not let you understand how large this bird is!
Needles to say when we arrived back in Puerto Natales we had hot showers, red wine, steak and vegetables to cap of a great experience.
There is not a lot more we can say about Torres Del Paine that these photos do not already say it is a place of un paralleled beauty and wonder. This will rank along the greatest experiences of our lives for sure.
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