Starting the W in Torres del Paine
Trip Start
Unknown
1
12
19
Trip End
Ongoing
Torres del Paine,
Patagonia,
Chile
Friday, April 25, 2008
We eventually reached Puerto Natales and went to stay at Erratic Rock. It seemed cosy but our bedroom had cracks in the windows, a hole behind the heater and was freezing. We'd been spoilt
by the underfloor heating in Argentinian Patagonia. We eventually figured our how the heating worked and our room was toasty.
After having some lunch and withdrawing Chilean pesos, we went back to Erratic Rock for the 3pm talk on Torres del Paine. There were 6 of us. 2 Spanish guys, 2 American-Mexicans and us. Rustin advised us to have 2 sets of clothes - one layer of dry clothes to relax in and one layer of wet clothes to go hiking in. There's no point wearing Goretex whilst you hike he told us. You just have to get wet, it'll eventually dry off. Hmmmm. We'll be walking through ditches and getting wet knee-high. Hmmmm, in my sleepy state, this did not sound appealing. He said that if you're going to miss out any part of the W then it should be the towers.
The American-Mexicans had planned to hike the whole circuit but it was now not possible as parts of it have been closed due to paths being covered by snow. They were planning on camping whereas we were planning on staying in refugios (dorms). Camping in Patagonian autumn did not appeal to us. For a start, we don't know how to put up a tent and secondly, it's cold! Not sure if it would be good time to test out camping. I just have memories of camping in Peru and shivering when it was -10 degrees whilst wearing all my clothes inside a sleeping bag and tents which are catered for those sort of conditions. Camping however would offer a lot of flexibility as some refugios had already closed or were closing. Those 4 guys decided to leave the day after but we decided to leave on Friday to give us some time to get things together.
Our shopping list consisted of:
hot dogs, rolls, cream cheese, pasta, pasta sauces, soup packets, salami, chorizo, olives, dried mangos, porridge, dried apricots, banana chips, chocolate, biscuits, tostadas, pate and dulce de leche.
Lets just say,we had a good meal everyday. We rented a stove and bought some gas. Definitely very useful to have.
We booked our refugios through Carla at Erratic Rock. We had to pay 10% commision and then if you use pesos you get charged more due to government tax. Unfortunately, i didn't have enough US dollars to avoid this. If you want to pay for major things, use US dollars. She couldn't reserve the first one and didn't know why not.
The next morning, there were 7 of us taking the 7.30am bus to Torres del Paine. 2 Americans who looked like they were experienced hikers and campers, very well equipped. One guy from Australia. An American-Indonesian with we think a German girl. They were planning on camping. The girl had camped before but he hadn't. He'd tried out putting up the tent the day before.
Day 1
We were all planning on hiking the W from west to east. The bus dropped us off at Laguna Amarga where we took a shuttle bus to Guarderia Pudeto. We all had to wait for an hour for the 12 noon ferry. Everyone walked around to keep warm. The ferry ride was nice and I had a warming hot chocolate. The ferry arrived at Refugio de Paine Grande. I made sure I was the first at reception and asked if we could stay at Refugio Grey further north for the first day. The guy used his walkie talkie to phone Refugio Grey. There was room but it was their last night so we would have to leave the following day. That suited us fine. It fit in with our plans. We had our hot dogs for lunch and then headed off to Refugio Grey. It was 11km away (3.5 hours walk away). The view was beautiful as we approached the glacier. We met a lovely couple from Texas who were camping. They'd planned to do the circuit but were kind of glad it was closed as they said they weren't too well prepared. They invited us to hang out with them. We wanted to but once we settled into the refugio and had finished eating dinner we felt too cosy and warm too go out into the cold. It seemed that we were the only ones staying in the refugio. Mike, the Texan had told us that some Costa Ricans took 6 hours to do that trek. So long!! They didn't get to camp til 10pm and didn't know how to set up their tent. It was pretty noisy in the refugio as the the staff were celebrating their last night of work. I was shattered so managed to fall off to sleep.
Day 2
The next day we headed north of the trail in hope to get closer to the glaciar. We bumped into the American-Mexicans - Ezra and Pablo we'd met at Erratic Rock. They'd been camping at Campamento los Guardas. They said that there had been an avalanche further up and there was ice under the gravel. We managed to get as far as they did after hiking for 2 hours. It didn't look safe to carry on. We hiked back down to Paine Grande. 5.5 hours back.
Refugio Paine Grande looked more like a hotel. It has a well-stocked shop which we thought would be expensive (according to the Lonely Planet) but it's actually not. There's a shared kitchen which meant we didn't need to start using our gas yet. Since it is low season we had a room to ourselves. The only problem was that the rooms are cold. Everyone would congregate around the fire in the common room to keep warm. That night we cooked pasta with cream cheese and olives, yum!
Day 3
We woke up early and started hiking in the dark. Our aim was to hike up Valle Frances and then get to Los Cuernos (10.5 hours). The trail from Paine Grande to Campamento Italiano was a nice easy hike. We decided to stop there for breakfast. We heard someone chuckling. Hmmm, we've heard that laugh before, it was Ezra. Him and Pablo had just woken up. They were planning on staying at Refugio Cuernos too. We chatted to them for a while and then headed up Valles Frances. The track was quite challenging, it was like an obstacle course. As we got further up it started snowing and soon we bumped into a guy coming down. He said that the snow became knee high. The scenery reminded me of House of the Flying Daggers where the seasons change suddenly. There would be huge gusts of snow. When we reached Campamento Britanico, 2 of the Americans we'd met on the bus from Erratic Rock were resting under a shelter someone had previously made. We didn't chat for long as we still had a long day ahead of us and it was cold. We reached the mirador and cooked our hot dogs there. Later on the 2 Americans appeared and then Ezra and Pablo too. Everyone had bumped into the Asian guy at some point. He had got lost. There was some snow but none of us had reached snow up til our knees. Despite being the first ones there, we were the last ones to leave. Perhaps we left a bit too late. When we reached Campamento Italiano, we saw the Texans setting up camp. We stopped to chat for a bit but had to rush off as it was now 5pm and sunsets around 6.20pm. We still had to walk for 2.5 hours. We actually thought it was going to be an easy trail but it still involved going up and down and clambering over rocks. We started walking though prickly bushes, ouch they hurt. "Jim, do you think this is the right way" I asked. He reassured me it was. It was a clear path but just with prickly plants. We reached a stream but there were no markings. We crossed it and then Jim decided to go upstream. By this time it was getting dark. He took my headtorch and whilst I was waiting for him it turned dark. He came back with no luck. "I'll try further down" he said. "Don't leave me, I'll come with you". I didn't want to be left alone in the dark. We went to what seemed like a clear trail but again this was a dead end. There were piles of rocks in the way. I wanted to climb over but Jim said it'd be best if we find some shelter and leave in the morning. I so wanted to climb over the rocks as I knew we were 20-30 minutes away. There was a warm bed waiting for us.
We managed to find a sheltered area under some trees and then gathered branches to create a small shelter. You're not allowed to create shelters in Torres del Paine but this was an emergency. We had no tents or sleeping bags. Luckily, we had a stove, food and a pot so we cooked our pasta. We put on all our clothes and slept in a black bin liner. We would wake up throughout the night shivering so I put my rucksack across our legs which seemed to help. The wind was ferocious, it sounded so scary but luckily we were sheltered. We were so lucky that it didn't rain. The night passed a lot quicker than we thought it would.
Day 4
After having breakfast and with the sun now up, we felt a lot better. We retraced our steps and then saw the mistake we had made. Before the prickly bushes, we should've taken the trail to the right towards the lake instead of heading straight. Even in daylight, the path we took looked like a such a clear path.
When we reached Refugio Los Cuernos, Ezra and Pablo were still there. Everyone staying there had been partying the night before so were hungover. We were gutted. They said that they were worried bout us and asked the staff if anything could be done to find us but they said "no". They had got lost for an hour around the same place we had got lost. Luckily, they still had enough sunlight to find their way to the refugio. We chatted to French guy called Sam. Him and his friend had got lost in the dark and the rain when they had come down from the Torres. He said they saw a puma and there were lots of goats staring at them. They had to wade through a river which came up to their knees. They however eventually made it down to Hosteria Las Torres. Their story sounded worse but he thought our was worse as he didn't have to sleep under trees.
After resting for a while, we headed to Refugio Norte Torres. The easy 4 hour hike seemed like eternity as we were tired from the night before. We had originally planned to try and get to the Torres that day (12-13 hours in total) but we'd now scrapped that plan. At that moment in time, we didn't care about finishing the "W". We were lucky enough to have our own room again. The refugio was nice with a made bed. It was so comfy, it had a hammock in the common room. The showers were good and there seemed to be hot water 24 hours day. After dinner, we went to bed. Had such a fantastic sleep. We woke up before sunrise and decided to head to the Torres. According to the map it would take us 8-9 hours altogether but we had a bus to catch at 2pm. We decided just to walk for 6 hours, see how far we get. Somehow, we reached a lot further than we had expected. We were now at the point where we were 45 minutes away from the mirador. We could see part of the Torres. We didn't have time but I felt disappointed as we were so close. Jim and I were debating whether or not it would be worth going up and missing our bus and having to stay another night at the Refugio (18 pounds each). We decided to head back and then we stopped again. Jim could sense my disappointment. Then we bumped into Ezra and Pablo, they had gone up for sunrise. We then decided to go up but when Jim reached the signposts he said that it had turned cloudy so we decided to head down to the refugio and catch our bus. You can see were quite indecisive people. I soon got over the disappointment. Instead we walked up a hill near our refugio and enjoyed the view of the Torres from there whilst eating our lunch.
It was nice coming back into town. My legs, bum and lower back were aching.
