21 April 2015

Patagonia part 1: Torres del Paine

After an all day bus from Ushuaia to Punta Arenas, a rush around to try get a ticket that would connect another ticket I had a friend get for us about 5 hours away, a night, a forgotten camera on a bus, we made it to Chiles famous national park, Torres del Paine. 

 Our ferry that broke up the 12 hour bus ride. 

Running around trying to book transport and accommodation was pretty funny only using pointing and "por favor" not being able to speak any spanish. A challenge but not impossible. With our backpacks full of all sorts of shit that sometimes just got pulled out to say we used it we embarked on a little whirlwind tour of Patagonia.
Because of our lack of time (always the case) and info that we had received from a couple of mates who had spent heaps of time here, we did only the front portion of the complete circuit around the massif called "The W".

Our first night was at a camp, Campmento las Carretas, that it appeared not that many people visited which was a surprise and it suited us perfectly. 

 We woke up to a super hot day which set the scene for the rest of the trip really. No wind, lots of sun, pasty Jamie got BURNT!

 Some hilarious looking Guanaco

That is the massif in all of its glory. A crazy granite bubble that bubbled up under the ground and then everything eroded away leaving a sweet mountain.

That night we stayed at Campmento Italiano which is right in the middle of that valley in the middle of the mountain. It was a super popular spot and tents were packed in like sardines. Rather than follow the masses in the morning we got an early night and an even earlier start. The first of many sunrise missions.

 The top of French Valley was the goal for sunrise. We kinda saw it as we walked the final Kilometer.. pretty pretty though.

 If I was a rock climber I'd be in heaven. Craaaaags mate for days!

 Some glaciers that you can see from the camp.

 French Valley.

We started walking past the crowds just before we made it back to camp and were pretty happy to have had the views up there all to ourselves. Next though was the march across to Campmento Los Cuernos and there was beer there and a platform to keep you out of the dirt.. Expensive but.

Spreading everything everywhere just to cook some dinner.

The next day was super cruisey because we got shafted with our next campsite. We were off to get as close to the towers as possible for another sunrise mission but it booked out and we missed out. All that it really meant was an easy day which was much appreciated and a slightly earlier morning the next day..

 And this day was pretty similar to the day before until we began heading up the valley Rio Ascencio.

And once again there was a refreshing cold one at the camp which made us happy and forget about the sardine situation.

The following morning was a good honest early start to head to see The Towers  light up with the rising sun. Very cool. Last year I was dissappointed that I missed out on it because it was cloudy so it was great to see it in all of its glory. Then it was back in a bus to head back to Puerto Natales for a hot shower and a meal not cooked by us before we headed north into Argentina.

1 comment:

Nico Gildemeister said...

Amazing my friend! Keep posting,
Big hug from Chile