Worn Out on the ‘W’

Torres del Paine National Park, Chile
By Patrick Wenckebach

Torres

Four days of sitting in busses had made me restless. Nervous energy was about to burst out of my body through my toes and fingertips. Luckily, help was on its way, in the form of Torres del Paine: one of the South America’s most beautiful national parks, and a perfect way to burn off some of my excess energy. All I need to do is figure out how much time I can spend there, since I’m slowly running out of time. I had been traveling through South America for five months, and only have three more weeks left before I move on to Easter Island and Australia. So for the first time in my trip, I have to do some planning.

The shortest trek, the ‘W’, called this way because of its ‘W’-like shape, is a five day hike, which is a bit more than I can spare, so I ask around to see if it could be done in less. ‘Yeah, sure four days shouldn’t be too much of a problem.’ ‘OK, good. How about three?’ ‘Hmmm, well, yes, you’ll have to make some long days, but if you’re a good hiker, I guess it can be done.’ Perfect, I decide there and then that I’m a good hiker. I guess in the next three days, I’ll find out if I’m right about that. After all, with the time to get to the park and get back to town, I’ll only be left with two full days to walk the trail, so, to make it easier on myself, I decide not to go camping and instead sleep in Refugios (literally safe havens – basic cabins in which you can spend the night). This way I won’t have to carry a tent around. I still have to carry food, cooking gear, a sleeping bag and some dry clothes, so my pack still weighs a ton, but it will have to do. But seriously, it really can’t be that bad, can it?

I have to leave tomorrow morning, so I better get moving on doing the prep work. But, since everything in this little town is tailored to a trekker’s needs, it only takes me an hour and a half to get everything done. Now I think I deserve a drink. A stupid idea of course, because that one drink turns into several, so when my alarm clock greets me the next morning at 6.15, the last thing that’s on my mind is going for a hike. As I get up, I’m cursing the fact that I decided to go on this hike. Yeah, yeah, I know, I just should have made sure to be in bed by ten instead of two, but it’s a bit late for that now. Anyway it’s about a three hour bus ride, so I can catch some ZZZs on the bus. How wonderful…some…more…sleep… By the time I wake up again, we’ve arrived at the park. Groggy and still half a sleep, I stare out the window. I’m not really sure if I really woke up. With my eyes still half closed, the azure lake and yellow mountains are an impressionist painting framed in the bus window: what a magical place. Until now I felt that the most beautiful parts of Patagonia were the Patagonian skies. Granted, they still are some of the greatest you’ll ever see, but here the land that lies below it is at least as stunning.

Early Morning

The Refugio where I’ll spend the first night is close to the park entrance, so I can drop off most of my gear before I start today’s trek. Two modern luxury hotels near the entrance accommodate nature lovers of a somewhat lazier persuasion, so it’s not until I’m over the first hill, and these ugly stains are removed from the landscape, that I really have the feeling I’m in a national park. Today I’ll make my way up the first valley to the famous ‘Torres’ that give the park its name: three long, thin granite spikes that literally pierced through the much softer rock around them. It strikes me how amazingly varied this valley is. Within a single hour, I move through grasslands, flowing hills, and dense forests, crossing little river valleys, barren plains, and rock rivers, all against a horizon of steep, jagged mountains and distant lakes. And it’s not just the scenery that changes continuously: one minute a clear, blue sky, the next thick, grey clouds, pregnant with rain.

There are not too many people around today, and I’m sure that will only get better as I move deeper into the woods, but I can see the traces of the crowds that must visit the park in high season. Along the steeper parts, trees are smooth and shiny, polished by the thousands of hands that hold on to them as visitors make their way down the mountain. I’m slowly getting closer to the goal of today’s journey: the ‘Torres’. I’m climbing up and over a big river of boulders. I can’t see the ‘Torres’ themselves yet, but the summit is in sight now. Then… hey… what was that? Was that…No that can’t be. I’m only at 3000 feet or so. It can’t be. But it is. It’s snowing. And what started as just a few flakes, so little that I couldn’t even be sure whether it was snow, or I just developed an acute case of dandruff, within a matter of minutes turns into a minor snowstorm. I’m standing there looking in complete amazement and disbelief about the snow that surrounds me, and in contrast, the completely clear, blue sky over the lake in the distance.

Grey Glacier

When, half an hour later, I get to the top, the snow is getting less and less, and within five minutes it’s all summer over my head again. Some lost flakes, blown from a distant cloud, circle around me, but even those are gone in a few minutes. Only then do I get a chance to fully admire the view. Three high, narrow peaks, rising out of nothing. Nature’s version of the Twin Towers. Below that in the depth, an oval lake, with on the farther end, a smooth, slightly curved wall, created by the endless movement of the glacier. Almost like a hydro-dam. So here, in one view I’m looking at nature’s version of the Twin Towers and the Hoover dam. I would like to sit here for hours and hours, but it’s really getting cold, so I start my downhill race back to the Refugio.

Day two has arrived. This will probably be the killer. According to the map, it’s 16 hours of walking, but these estimates are usually so conservative that even a 70-year old cripple wouldn’t score too much above par. So in reality, it should be around ten hours – or so I hope. If it’s more, I’m in trouble. I’m starting out early this day, so I’m already on my way for two hours, and nearing another Refugio before I run into some other people, going in the opposite direction. I have a little chat with them, and after that I’m all alone again. And that’s just the way I like it. Me, myself and I, alone in this beautiful place. That may sound a bit anti-social, which, trust me, I’m not, but sometimes having other people around is just too much of a clash with nature. No one around to chase the animals away. Hares are jumping away from right under my feet. Birds let me approach to only a couple of feet before they decide to fly away. No one around to disturb me, nothing to spoil it. Just the silence, and the whistling of the wind.

But as I move down along the lake, that whistling grows stronger, and I’m not really sure if you can still call this just wind. I’m walking downhill – or at least I’m trying, so gravity is doing most of the work, but the invisible hands of the storm keep pushing me back, and throw me off balance, so I’m hardly moving at all. After about two and a half hours I reach another Refugio, which according to the map should have taken me four and a half hours, so I’m mildly positive that I might make it in 10 hours of walking. Even if I take a couple of half hour breaks, I should still be there before eight, and in any case, well before nightfall. And since I can afford a couple of breaks, I decide to take one, and go for lunch. I make myself some sandwiches, and drink some of the fresh river water. So crisp and pure, like water from the fountain of life, it instantly washes away my tiredness and refreshes my energy. So let’s go!

Invigorated by my short break, I start hiking up the ‘Valle Frances’, to the source of this wonderful water: the big, blue slab of ice sliding down the mountain in front of me. It’s as if the mountain is sticking out an immense blue tongue at me. The sound of the wind is incredible here. Whistling louder and louder as it falls down the mountain, ever accelerating, until it ends in a loud bang as it throws itself on the rocks. Every once in a while this loud bang causes a miniature avalanche. And even though the initial bang and rumble of this avalanche lasts only for a few seconds, it reincarnates, and lives on for at least another minute as its drumming call echoes between the walls of the narrow valley.

These paths are clearly less traveled. The deeper I move into the valley, the more rugged and inaccessible the landscape becomes. But with nature becoming more rugged, the hike also becomes a lot tougher. Up a steep and narrow path, climbing over large boulders, wading through rivers, I get to a dense, grey forest of dead, dried out trees. It looks like a fairytale forest, with elves and dragons hiding in the caves. But after a while, most trees have leaves again, and the surroundings become softer. As I emerge from this forest, I enter a wide, circular valley that is surrounded by steep, smooth mountains. Snow-caps and glaciers, almost a perfect semicircle. I feel like taking a break, but there’s one more steep climb that will get me to the mountain top overlooking this valley. I can feel my legs here. Air is becoming sandpaper in my throat. I pull myself up. This is not a hike anymore. This is free-climbing. Almost there… Yes, there it is… the top.

Exhausted, I sit down. Here I can see the “Torres” from the other side. They’re not as impressive from this side, as not to distract you from the half moon shaped mountain range in the west. It’s my reward for the steep climb: this wonderful view, a rest and some food. The sun is warming my skin, and making me lazy and sleepy, so I have to force myself to start the last part of the trek. Same way down as up. But since I’m looking at it from a different angle, it looks so completely different that I have to stop every once in a while to make sure that I didn’t get lost. How strange that the same landscape can look so completely different from another angle. Or maybe I just should have stopped and turned around a bit more often.

When I return to the beginning of this valley, I continue the hike along the lake. Here in the open space, the wind is picking up again. I’m walking about 30 feet above, and about 60 feet away from the lake, but the wind is still spraying water from the lake in my face, like rain from below. I’m moving on, but my movements aren’t as supple anymore as they were before. Not counting breaks, I’ve been walking for about eight hours straight. My pack is starting to weigh on me, and my feet are becoming noticeable parts of my body. Except for a couple of small hills, the remainder of the trail is almost flat, so I estimate that I have another 45 minutes to go. A good thing, because by this time my body is starting to tell me in a soft voice that it’s getting near closing time. I take a five minute break: a piece of chocolate for some energy, a sip from the flask to get warm. But I shouldn’t rest too long, and shouldn’t take any more breaks from now on, because at this moment breaks are only making it harder. And then, about ten hours after I left this morning, I reach the Refugio where I’ll spend the night. I walk in, take the load of my back and sit down, determined never to move from this bench again.

My last day should bring me to the Grey glacier. Like the first one, the last day is only half a day. No Patagonian sky today. Just a uniform grey sky, like a November day in good old Holland. Normally, I don’t like rain on a hike – and who would, but the rain makes the forest smell fresh and mossy. Countless little streams suddenly spring from the mountains. And again everything looks so different that I’m actually glad it’s raining. After walking around for about 45 minutes, I move around a cape and all of the sudden there it is – the Grey glacier. Wow, that thing is big. But I’m even more surprised that I’m already that close. The big blue looks almost close enough to touch. It can’t be more than 30 minutes away. But an hour later the blue monster is twice as big, and I’m still not getting any closer. With every step I take the glacier grows – there has to be an end to this, it can’t keep growing forever. But it does, and by the time I get there I can only be amazed by the real size of this huge blue mountain. I sit down and watch how immense chunks of ice break off the glacier – the sound of thunder as they break and fall down. I watch them bobbing up and down as they float away into the river until they’ve become nothing but ice cubes in a huge cocktail.

But it starts raining again, so it’s time to head back. It’s a walk in the park, an easy stroll. Partly because it’s mostly downhill, but more because I reached my final destination. From here it’s a walk home. The ecstasy that comes with completion is carrying me forward. So, in about an hour and a half, I’m back in the Refugio, warming myself with hot tea and rum, waiting for the ferry to bring me back to the entrance.

Information Torres de Paine National Park, Southern Chile

Torres del Paine is one of South America’s most beautiful and renowned National Parks. Its natural beauty consists of lakes, rivers, waterfalls, glaciers, forests, steep mountains and incredible wildlife. This variety in wildlife and scenery makes it a must for both serious hikers and wildlife observers. There are numerous well-marked tracks, and options range from easy one day tours to ten day treks around the entire park. There are several Refugios (basic cabins) that provide shelter (and sometimes simple food) as well as a large amount of camp grounds.

Location and how to get there
The Torres de Paine National Park is located in the South of Chile. Starting point for treks in Torres del Paine is Puerto Natales (about 70 miles South East of the park entrance).

To Puerto Natales
Puerto Natales can be reached by boat from Puerto Montt (which is a recommendable experience in itself – www.navimag.cl), or by land through Argentina. From Santiago there are daily flights to Punta Arenas. From here there are frequent busses to Puerto Natales (approx 190 miles, 3 hours)

To the park entrance
There are three daily (public) busses to the park entrance – 3-4 hours. Alternatively chartered busses to the park entrance can be booked through travel agencies, hotels and guesthouses. The park can also be reached by (rented) car. Directions to the park are signposted.

When to go
The park is open to public and treks can be made all year round, though temperatures are more agreeable during spring and summer. Consequently the park is also more crowded during these periods (especially the sites that are easy to reach).

Where to stay
In Puerto Natales
Accommodation is readily available in Puerto Natales, and ranges from basic to mid class. Generally speaking, reservations will not be necessary, but the town can become crowded in high season. The town has a variety of restaurants serving both local and international food.

In the park
There are two luxury hotels close to the park entrance. Inside the park there are several simple ‘refugios’ – basic cabins that provide shelter and in some cases food. Reservations are advised. There are many designated camp grounds. These camp grounds offer no amenities. To preserve the park camping outside these campsites is not permitted.

Other information
Most guesthouses and the town’s numerous tour-operators provide excellent information about the treks, sell maps, provide reservation services for Refugios, and rent out camping gear. The ranger station at the park entrance also provides a wealth of information on the park, its flora and fauna, the park regulations and sells maps of the park. Additional information can also be found on www.gochile.cl.

Brief Description of the story

For the past five days I’ve been watching the Patagonian landscape through the greasy-hair-stained windows of a bus. My butt’s sore and my legs are restless through lack of use. So when I get to Torres del Paine, I literally jump at the opportunity to go for a hike. Short on time and with a surplus of energy, I decide to do the five day ‘W’-hike in three. In the three days that follow I am torn between hating nature for torturing my body and loving it for its always surprising beauty. When on the third day, I finally reach the Grey glacier, and sit down to watch a big chunk of blue ice break off, with it, all pain mysteriously flows out of my muscles, and floats away with it into the distance. As much as I enjoy this euphoria that comes with completing your goal, it’s time to move on, because as always, the journey is more interesting than the destination itself.

About the author

Patrick was born and raised in the Netherlands. Living in a country where a two-hour drive brings you to its borders, made traveling a natural part of his life. By the time he finished his Master’s degree in Quantum Physics and studied Econometrics, Europe held no secrets anymore, so it became time to discover South America, Australia and Asia.

Patrick has been a Marketing Strategy Consultant for blue chip companies for the last eight years. He is a well-respected speaker and published writer in the consumer goods industry. Even though he managed to devote several months a year to travel, eventually the lure of exploring foreign countries and cultures became too strong, and Patrick started a new career by founding Living Footsteps. Apart from traveling, Patrick also has a passion for outdoor activities, cooking, photography and writing. Patrick speaks five languages and is still working on making this a longer list. In the years of traveling abroad (both as business traveler and backpacker) he has visited over 45 countries. His biggest fear is that at some point in his life, he may run out of new countries to visit.

Patrick currently lives in London and is preparing a two year overland expedition through Africa.