Patagonia Travel: Trekking in Torres del Paine – the W circuit

On the morning of Dec 26, we got on the bus at 7am. From Puerto Natales, it took about 2 hours to get to the park entrance at Laguna Amalga. Everybody had to get out of the bus to go into the ticket office. We filled out a form with our info, and how many days we were going to spend in the park, then paid the entrance fee, and finally we had to watch a short video detailing all the rules and guidelines. Due to the growing popularity of the park, they had to enforce some pretty strict rules about where people can eat and sleep, in order to preserve the land and avoid major damages caused by human impact.

From the entrance, shuttles took people to the hotel on the eastern side of the park, the one closest to the iconic Torres. The rest of us got back on the bus and drove to the second stop, were we would board a ferry to cross Lago Pehoé and reach the western side of the “W” portion of the trek.
The ferry crossing was a pretty interesting experience. The boat was fairly small, and, as people in front of us boarded, we could tell that not everyone that was waiting on the dock would fit. In fact, we had to let the first boat go and wait for it to come back to get the rest of the hikers (which delayed us by over an hour). That’s right, there is only one boat that crosses back and forth. This was pretty telling of the incredibly growing popularity that the park has experienced in the last few years, and how the infrastructure hasn’t quite been upgraded to accommodate it – and nor do they necessarily want to. Once on the boat, all the backpacks were piled up near the front of the cabin. Then one of the crew stood behind a little counter in the back, and people lined up to pay for the crossing – in cash only of course. They only checked if you had paid for your ticket as you exited the ferry. Not the most efficient process, but probably one that worked fine back when boats weren’t filled up to capacity on every crossing. A few people who were going on day trips in the park got quite annoyed by the time they wasted having to wait for the boat to come back, but Brice and I were pretty unfazed by it, having now experienced a number of ways that, from our North American perspective, optimal efficiency was not a major concern in Chile – and it was totally ok.

After driving for days on isolated roads and barely seeing anyone, it was a bit jarring to find ourselves on a boat full of tourists. As soon as we got off the boat, we headed towards the start of the trail and got to walking. It was almost 2pm by then, and we only had about 8 km to cover until our first campground – so a pretty chill day to begin with.

The wind on the shores of the lake was pretty strong though, and together with getting used to hiking with a heavy pack, it made the first few kilometers a bit more challenging that I would have thought. The weather was otherwise on our side, with sunshine for most of the way.

The map we were given upon purchasing our ticket had loads of useful information, including elevation profile (I love looking at that stuff!) and estimated travel times. Hiking without a pack, we probably would have been a bit faster than the times on the map, but with extra weight, those ended up being pretty spot on – and a whole lot more reliable than all the signs put up in the park – but more on that later.

Once we arrived at the campsite, Campo Italiano, we first had to check in with the rangers. They checked that we indeed had a reservation for the campground, then we were able to chose a spot to set up our tent. After that, we left all our gear in the tent, changed from hiking to running shoes and hiked up the Frances Valley trail for a bit. We only went as far as the Frances Look-out (about 2 hours return) but the trail went on much longer for a possible 5 hour return trip from the campground. We had a whole lot more hiking ahead of us in the next few day, and we were in bed by 8pm.

The next day we hiked from Campo Italiano to Campo Torre, about ¾ up Valle Ascencio. The trail offered some beautiful views of the Nordenskjold Lake, then after the short cut to Chileno junction, we started going up the valley, along the ridge of a canyon. We again experienced some pretty insane wind. At the highest point of the ridge, just as it curved around the side of the mountain, the wind was so strong you had to really push through to move forward. Brice got blown 180 degrees on his feet while filming, and I’m pretty sure I swallowed some gravel that was being blown in my face.

We stopped every couple of hours for a quick snack, making sure to consume the proper amount of calories to keep us going. Around 3pm we reached the Chileno lodge and stopped for a longer coffee and cookie break. We also started chatting with Jen, a solo hiker who was doing the full circuit like us, and had arrived on the same day – although we didn’t hike at the same pace, we ended up seeing her quite a bit along the way, as she too was following Adventure Alan’s recommendation. It was nice actually to see a familiar face on a daily basis and be able to share our impressions of the journey with her.

After Chileno, we had another 1.5 hour of climbing before reaching Campo Torre – the sign outside of the lodge said we were 1,2km to the campground, but it ended up being much closer to 3km (that was our first hint that signage in the park was NOT to be trusted).

Once we arrived in Campo Torre, we repeated the previous night’s cycle of putting our tent up, then leaving our gear behind to hike higher up. This time we were hiking to the iconic Torres, the ones that you see in every photo of the park ever posted on social media. The weather had become overcast at that point, so we weren’t sure we were going to see much, but we decided to give it a go anyways. The hike up was pretty steep and we were glad we were able to leave our packs behind. After a section in the trees, the last few hundred meters were up and along a rocky scramble. And finally there we were, inside the postcard. The iconic towers themselves were somewhat obstructed by fog, but the view wasn’t any less impressive, especially with the turquoise blue water underneath. And best of all, we were the only ones there.

Where crowds of hundreds had likely been standing earlier in the day, taking turn to get their Instagram pic on a rock by the water, now there were only us. It was really special, and I’m so glad we went up that evening rather than the next morning, as we would have had a much different experience for sure. It was sprinkling a bit so we found cover against a large rock with a bit of overhang, and just hung out there for a bit, taking in the serenity and quiet of the place.

That view was in a sense – as probably for most of the people who now come this far to see it – the starting point of this whole trip. Images of Torres had started to pop up on my Instagram feed in the last few months and when Brice suggested Patagonia as the destination for our trip, I thought about these images right away. There’s no denying that in that sense, our trip was very much the product of the influence of social media, amongst many other things of course. But I would be lying if I didn’t admit that seeing all these beautiful images of incredible landscapes on Instagram is making me more and more want to go out there and see those landscapes in real life.

And I’m of course not the only one. There have been debates lately about the impact such images have on these places, bringing more and more attention to otherwise hidden gems that were in the past enjoyed by only a few in–the-know. What used to be desolated, wild places up until 5 or 10 years ago are now becoming tourist-central, of similar category as the Louvres or Disneyworld. We’ve experienced this even at home in BC, where crowds are now rushing to places like Joffre Lakes, and in turn posting about it online, perpetuating the cycle. To say that people only go there to get that “I was there” instashot may be a bit of an exaggeration or generalization (or at least I want to believe that it is). But the fact is, putting those places on the map, especially through beautiful photos, might be having an impact, and potentially not a good one on the environment.

But who’s to say that these natural wonders should remain a secret, that the majority of people should not be allowed to know about them or to see them with their own eyes if they want to and have the means? Then again, this is probably a very selfish way to look at it, and a “bigger picture” perspective might be to say that we should be here to serve the Earth and not the other way around, and that leaving those places untouched and their beauty un-tempered with – by not actually visiting them – should maybe be more important than our individual need to have seen and experienced them.
I won’t pretend to know the answer especially since I am no different than the rest of the crowds. The one thing I will say is that thankfully, it seemed that visitors diligently abided by the rules of the park and we never saw one piece of trash on the trail, which was a nice thing to notice.

Rain was picking up so eventually we made our way back to camp. I was glad that we saw this iconic view early on in the trek, as it meant there was more to our trip than just getting that one photo and it wasn’t going to be the grand finale (far from it actually). This way it was merely another perfect moment suspended in time, another gem among the rest of the ones we’d already collected along the way.


Patagonia Road Trip Day 11 & 12: Perito Moreno Glacier and Re-Setting in Puerto Natales

On December 23rd, we headed for El Calafate, and the Perito Moreno glacier. El Calafate was a much bigger town on the shore of Lago Argentino. After the 3-hour drive from El Chaltén, we stopped in town to have sandwiches by the lake, then continued on to the southern portion of Los Glacieres National Park. It was 660 pesos (55 CAD) to enter the park, which seemed a bit much at first but in the end totally worth it to admire the impressive glacier. With a surface of 250 square km and 30km of length, it is the third largest reserve of fresh water in the world.

 
A network of stairs and platforms were built in front of the lake, providing multiple vantage points of the glacier. As it is often the case when staring at an immensely large landscape, it was hard for our brains to grasp the scale of this giant, and realize how far we actually were even though the lowest platform made us feel like we could almost touch it. We were there later in the afternoon, which apparently was good timing as it was the best time of day to witness large shards of ice breaking off the vertical walls and falling into the lake.


The sound it made was incredibly loud, probably amplified by all the crevasses and cavities in the ice and reminding us of the real size of the beast. It’s pretty funny to think that with growing popularity, tourists flood the park every year to take a look at – ultimately – a huge chunk of cracking ice. But what a mesmerizing chunk it was.

We spent a couple of hours marveling at the natural phenomenon. Then we took a quick walk on the shore of the lake further away before leaving the glacier behind us, probably one of the most memorable sight of this trip.

Our favorite app led us to a free campsite on the southern side of the lake with firepit and mountain view. The perfect spot for our last night on the road before we reached Puerto Natales, our base camp before embarking on a 6-day trek around Torres del Paine.

The next morning we had to cross the border again to go back to Chile. The 60km of road prior to the border were some of the roughest we’d driven on, with once again not much to look at. Thankfully we had loaded up the ipod with podcasts, so that kept our minds entertained while driving on these long stretches of road for hours.


The border crossing near Rio Turbio was quite a lot bigger this time, with a good number of people going through. We went through the Argentinian side first, to exit, then drove 3km to the Chilean entry point. We had been warned that you couldn’t bring any food in Chile, but they let us go with what we had left – again it was mainly canned and dry food, no fresh produce, so it looked like it was fine. As we were crossing the border, we noticed we had another flat tire. So we had to pull over a bit further and replace it with the spare once again. We were only 25 km from Puerto Natales so we just kept going on the spare.


We arrived in Puerto Natales around 3pm. The first thing I wanted to do was buy food for the first few days of the trek (we had read that there were small shops in every campground so there was no need to buy for the whole week). Since it was Christmas eve, I thought stores might close earlier than usual, and they would most definitely be closed the next day. So as soon as we arrived we looked for a grocery store. We found one on the main street (Manuel Baquedano) in the center of town. The store was of decent size but not huge and we were able to get everything we needed, including a couple of nice freshly made empanadas for lunch. Turns out there was also a big Unimarc a couple of blocks away, but it’s a good thing we avoided it as apparently, the lines to the cash registers where insane that day. Once we had all our supplies, we started looking for accommodation.
Puerto Natales is the starting point for anyone going to Torres del Paine. As such, it is a pretty big tourist hub, and accommodation is everywhere. We walked around the center of town to check out hostels in the area, but then decided to drive just a few blocks away from the center, where it would be quieter.
There were “Hostal” signs pretty much every block, so we went into a few of them to check them out. Eventually we settled on Hostal Carlitos – the selling point was the big wood burning stove in the main room that gave the place just the amount of cozy we were looking for.
Hostal Carlitos was a family run business. There was a big Christmas tree in the main room, with presents underneath. The girl at front desk told us that the whole family was getting together that night and was having a traditional Christmas eve dinner, and that we were welcome to join. Dinner would be at 12am. Although we were honored that they invited us, the chances of us still being awake at midnight were pretty slim – and sure enough, we were out by 9:30pm.

The next day was December 25th, and everything in town was closed. We took this opportunity to take a “day off” from traveling, and reset. In the morning we took a walk around the town and along the water. We also found out that the bus station was only a few blocks away, so we first headed there to see if we could book our tickets to go to Torres del Paine the next day. At first it looked like everything was closed, but a couple of companies counters were open. We bought our tickets from Buses Fernandez, but there were about 8-10 different companies there offering trips to multiple places, including Ushuaia and Punta Arenas, the city we would be flying out from to return home.



Once we had our tickets, we took a walk around then headed back to the hostal. We were due to return the car that afternoon. Enrique (our car rental guy) had told us to just email him with our location and he would send his friend Raul to get the car. Sure enough, around 4pm Raul showed up and after handing him all the paperwork, we said goodbye to our ride.

Then we just hung out for the rest of the day. With no more car to throw our stuff in, we now had to make sure everything still fit into our backpacks, including food. It was impressive to see the amount of stuff we had, when all laid out on the bed, and that somehow everything fit into those two backpacks. Even though we had done our best to pack light originally, we admittedly had a bit too much for the treck, especially the summer clothes we wore in Costa Rica. We could have maybe looked for a place to store some of it, or even mailed some stuff to Canada, but at that point we figured it would be fine. My pack was about 12kg and Brice’s 18kg – before food. So yes, heavier than it could have been, but in the end we managed.
The hostal had a little kitchen that we could use and a couple of long dining tables, so we had breakfast lunch and dinner there and took the day to rest.

Patagonia Road Trip Day 7: Crossing over to Argentina and Ruta 40

On the morning of day 6, we woke up in Valle Chacabuco, to the sight of Guanacos grazing in the field.

When we got back to the car, we realized one of our tires was flat. Ironically, we found out after taking it off that it was caused by a screw, that we probably picked-up in the campground, as we drove on a path that was still under construction. So much for all that rough pot-holed and corrugated Carretera, it was a screw that gave us our first flat tire. In any case, we had to make use of the spare tire, and we also realized we were going to have to drive back about an hour to the town of Cochrane in order to get our tire changed, as it was the closest town to our current location (anything on the Argentinian side was more than 2 hours away).

So we drove back through the park and to the junction of X-83 and the Carretera, and from there headed south to reach Cochrane. Between iOverlander and the guide book, we were able to easily find a place that sold tires. Turns out the place didn’t actually install them, but they gave us direction to another shop that would change the tire for us.

Once that got taken care of, I suggested we found a place to have a proper meal rather than sandwiches. We decided to try the Centro de Comida Lago Brown. Aside from a regular restaurant menu, they offered a lunchtime “Plat du Jour” for 4000 CLP (about 6USD). That’s what we ordered and it turned out to be one of the best meals we’ve had during our trip (aside from all the amazing food prepared for us at Chakra Lodge in Costa Rica). The dish was really simple, mashed potatoes with chicken breast in a buttery herb sauce. But it tasted like our grandmas had made it. The potatoes were super flavorful and the chicken incredibly tender, as it would be after, we assumed, roaming around in one of the local backyards. Somehow the dish had, there again, a taste of childhood…

Since we were in a somewhat bigger town, with potential access to internet, there was one thing I wanted to check before crossing the border. I had read that Canadian residents had to pay a reciprocity fee upon entering Argentina. The fee had to be paid online and the receipt printed to be presented at the border. We hadn’t really worried about it until now, but since we already had to take a detour because of the flat tire, I didn’t want to drive all the way to the border, only to be turned away because of paperwork, and having to drive all the way back to Cochrane again.

So first we walked into a small hotel to see if they would let us use their internet. They say they didn’t have any, but there was an internet café just a couple of blocks away. There were two or three computers available, but the woman at the desk asked if she could be of any help, so we showed her all the paperwork we had for the car, and asked if she knew if we needed anything else. Aside from the reciprocity fee, she said we were missing an international insurance for the vehicle – the one we had was for Chile only. It was actually really easy to purchase, and she was able to get one online for us for about 15,000 CLP – the printing of the paper actually took forever as her computer was old and she wasn’t able to open the pdf file. There was a very frustrating period of about 20 minutes where I watched her try to repeatedly open the file and fail, download the latest version of Adobe Reader and try to install it and fail, then try to open the file again, then try to install reader again…that took place about 4 times until eventually she got on the phone with the insurance company and they emailed her the insurance certificate in some other format that she was able to print for us. Then we paid online for the reciprocity fee (78 USD), printed the receipts and finally were on our way.

We headed back to Chacabuco park and after driving through the reserve on some of the roughest stretch of road we had seen so far, we eventually made it to the Paso Roballos border crossing. We first had to go through the Chilean Exit office. Pretty much in the middle of nowhere, the border office was small, and the border officer welcomed us in by shaking both our hands – quite a different experience from our usual US/Canada crossing. We gave him all our paperwork, including the car’s. After taking a look at it, he pulled out a form, and placed it on top of a piece of carbon paper, with another copy of the form below it (did I mention that this whole country felt like the 80’s?) Then he handed us the stack and asked us to fill out the information. The documents that we had been provided with by our car rental guy worked perfectly, especially the notarized authorization to take the car outside of the country.

After taking care of all the paperwork, we drove about 13km in dry and windy no-man’s land.



Then we arrived at the Argentinian border. We thought the office on the Chilean side was small, but that was before we saw this one.
We entered a small wooden building and then it wasn’t even the 80’s anymore, it was the 50’s. The friendly border officer was wearing a military green uniform made of thick canvas fabric. A wooden chest of drawers in the back corner was bursting with notebooks and forms. He sat behind a small wooden desk right in the middle of the room, pulled out a pen from a pencil case and a large notebook with lined pages from a drawer, and then proceeded to write down our name and passport numbers into his register. There were more carbon-papered forms to sign but the whole process took less than 5 minutes.
The officer asked if we were carrying any food and when we showed him the content of our food bag, he didn’t ask us to remove anything (we had a bit of cheese left, but no fruit or vegetable, mainly canned food). Seeing that we had some firewood in the trunk, he did give us a warning about making camp fires, and being very careful about preventing wild fires. In this dry and windy area of Patagonia, human-caused wild fires were one of the highest threats to the bio-diversity. With that he wished us a good trip and sent us on our way.

And then we were in Argentina.

From the border, the nearest towns were Lago Posadas, about 70km south or Bajo Caracoles, 100km East. Lago Posadas was a detour as we had to drive through Bajo Caracoles anyway to get to Ruta 40, the main North/South road in this part of Argentina (the Argentinian equivalent of the Carretera Austral). But it was getting a bit late so we decided to go to the closest one, even if it meant adding more distance to our trip the next day.

When planning for this trip, I had done some pretty extensive research about the Carretera Austral. I knew to expect the rough roads and the remoteness. Once we got there, we quickly realized that even if the towns were small, and nature was everywhere, there was always some trace of human presence, familiar and inviting…On the other hand, I had paid little to no attention to the Argentinian portion of our trip, other than noticing on the map that Ruta 40 was a long stretch of road that seemed to spread in the middle of nothing.


The first 20 km after the border felt like we were driving on Mars. After the greens and blues of Chile’s vegetation and lakes, we found ourselves in a dry and dusty canyon, landscapes in shades of red and brown as far as the eye could see. And isolation here was of a whole different scale. Along the 70km of road to Lago Posadas, we saw a total of three vehicles (2 cars and one guy on a motorbike). All of them actually stopped to ask where we were headed, making sure we knew where we were going and that we weren’t just lost in the desert. Although that environment felt all of a sudden much harsher and a lot less inviting, it was also a nice surprise to be experiencing remoteness at a whole new level…

30 min after the border we came to the first intersection in the road, facing an imposing mountain range in front of us. We turned right on route 39, heading to our destination for the night.

Planted in the middle of the windy desert and surrounded by low, brown mountains, the town of Lago Posadas felt like a little oasis. The road leading up to the arched entrance was lined with tall poplar-like trees, providing both a nice pop of green along with some wind protection. Once again, following the directions from iOverlander, we drove through the town and all the way to the lake, and found a spot to set up camp for the night.

Battered by the wind, the lake felt almost out of place, with its incredible shades of blue popping out amongst sand dunes and grey mountains. We set our tent behind the cover of the sand dune. No fire for us tonight in those conditions, which we were fine with. At this point, it was 10pm before the sun showed any intention of hiding below the horizon. This was probably the most remote camping we had ever done – in Patagonia or anywhere else.