Beautiful, Windy, Amazing Patagonia
Trip Start
Jan 14, 2008
1
17
22
Trip End
Mar 05, 2008
Puerto Natales,
Chile
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
The whole airport cleared out and it was just us left with a nice looking couple who also happened to be going to Remota, our hotel near Torres Del Paine National park. I could have sworn I had seen a Remota Van a half hour before when we were getting our luggage, but I couldn´t understand why it wasn´t in the parking lot. Andrew said,"Maybe they do loops", which made sense to me as I had no idea where we were or where Remota was. As I said before, we just do what we are told, show up and enjoy the adventure. I was starting to think that having a couple phone numbers and doing a little research before arriving at a place might be a good thing. Within 40 minutes of landing there it was, the Remota Van. Long loop I thought. Upon getting in the van and asking our driver in our broken Spanish, "Quantos Tiempo a arriver a Remota". He responded two and a half hours in Spanish. Andrew and I looked at each other and laughed. "Maybe they do loops.." Evidently the Van I saw did a loop to get gas in Punta Arenas before the long drive to Puerto Natalas. Seeing that there would be no places to eat amongst the vast expanse of wilderness, dry arid land with sheep, llamas, ostrich and cows on either side of the road, I offered Andrew some Nerds which we snacked on while we looked at the scenery out the window.
We arrived at Remota on the banks of Lago Sarmiento and were taken back by the spectacular architecture. It literally looks as if it had grown out of the ground and was simply amazing. Apparently it had just won a very prestigious architectural award and I could certainly see why.
We were greeted by Cynthia the manager and shown to our beautiful room with an amazing view of Torres Del Paine in the distance. The room was all white with dark wood finishes and yellow accents and Andrew and I were excited that this was our home for the next 4 nights. We walked around the hotel and visited the spa and beautiful indoor infinity pool and outdoor jacuzzi´s. We walked around the lobby, dining room, relaxation areas and spent an hour with one of the guides who took us through the various excursions that would be available to us. He took us on a virtual tour of the park and made recommendations which we took. After hearing our options, we settled on the glaciers and lakes excursion that would give us the perfect introduction to the park as it covered a lot of ground in 10 hours and had limited hiking.
With our excursion settled we grabbed a pisco saur at the bar, enjoyed some cheese and hors dóuerves and settled in for dinner which began at 8pm. With a nice menu of local Patagonian fare, we had a great meal and followed it up with a 9:30pm dip in the pool and relaxing jacuzzi. The sun was just setting and we caught glimpses of large mountains in the distance through the low lying clouds. What a way to spend a vacation!
We woke up early the next day and had a delicious breakfast before boarding the van that would take us around Torres Del Paine. With us were Udo and his wife Karen (Udo is a famous photojournalist who has done books on Chile and Argentina as well as San Francisco, not to mention done pictures for National Geographic and other popular travel publications). They were there with their friends Gunther and Christina and they were celebrating Gunther´s 50th birthday. Udo claimed he was not working, but judging from some of his photos, I wondered if I might see them in a travel magazine sometime soon. We were also joined by a nice young Australian couple who was pregnant with their first baby and an annoying British couple who felt as if they were entitled to the best service in the wilderness.
We drove for about an hour and a half to the entrance of the park. The mountains in the distance, though partly covered in clouds were spectacular. On our way towards the mountains we encountered Llama like creatures called Guanachos crossing the road, were circled by Condors, saw flamingo´s at a large salt lake and passed by huge lakes, glaciers, and mountains. We walked out to see a beautiful waterfall and snapped pictures of the scenery. It was unbelievable, if it is possible, even more amazing than many parts of New Zealand we had visited.
We had lunch by a beautiful lake and hiked for an hour in strong winds aside Gray Lake to see rare Icebergs that had come off of the massive Gray Glacier that is part of the Southern Ice Fields in the distance. Amazingly the massive icebergs only represented 10% of the actual ice and the other 90% had displaced so much water that the beach to get out to the island was practically gone.
On the half hour hike back to the van we were pelted by rain and lake water in what our guide said was 100 KM per hour winds. Udo took some amazing pictures of the people trying to brave the gale force winds in their colorful jackets, hunched down at an angle trying to stay on their feet. Oh how I would love to be a photojournalist capturing this moment. On our way home Udo captured another great moment. Andrew who had fallen asleep on the ride home had shifted in his seat and had gently laid his head on Gunther´s shoulder. Gunther leaned his head on Andrew´s lovingly and another fabulous photo was snapped. We all erupted in laughter when Udo showed us the shot that had resulted. Andrew groggily looked up to see what everyone was laughing at... when his eyes focused he smiled and could not believe his misfortune. "Don´t worry" Udo said, "This picture will only be published in Europe". Poor Andrew. It was a great bonding moment for the group.
Upon returning to the hotel, we hot tubed and took a sauna before heading into pick our next days journey. We had dinner overlooking the beautiful mountains, but as the window pane bent, we decided that this was one of the windiest places on earth.
Having opted out of the 9 hour hike to the towers in the park, Andrew and I decided to take it fairly easy with a 3 hour hike to the Milodon caves, followed by an afternoon of horseback riding on an Estancia (farm) with a genuine Gaucho (cowboy). We woke up at 7am and headed to breakfast ready to tackle the day. It looked like a nice day out... overcast, windy of course, but clear enough to see the mountains in Torres Del Paine fairly clearly.
After breakfast, our small group was met by Phillipe, who we soon learned had spent 7 years in the United States and was supposed to marry a girl from Wisconsin in early December, clearly that still had not yet happened. He had been sponsored by Patagonia for Rock Climbing and had appeared in the catalog numerous times. We could tell, as a lot of his gear was from Patagonia.
I had made a new friend by the name of Ann Fyfe. A wonderful mother of two from San Mateo, CA who works in the health care industry at a hospital in Mountain View. Her husband and son had left her to go on the 9 hour hike and like the smart woman she was, she decided to join us on our excursion. Mel and Matt from Australia and an absolutely lovely couple from the UK were also with us. We had a great group!
Philippe guided us over a mountain, under and over fences separating estancias, all while he educated us on the flora, fauna and geology of the area. We saw some ancient cave drawings (looked a little like red crayons on rocks to me) and had beautiful views of the lakes and valleys below. It was a little warmer this day as we did not need 10 layers on to keep us warm. After three hours of hiking we made it to the Milodon cave, an ancient cave that housed humans dating back over 1,000 years ago. We walked through the cave and saw a big prehistoric creature cut out of wood that represented the Milodon that lived around the time of the Sabertooth.
After our hike we headed back to the hotel to enjoy a delicious lunch of salad and grilled chicken and around 3pm headed out for our riding excursion with Phillipe. We were taken to an estancia about 10 minutes outside of Puerto Natales where we were met by a fabulous Gaucho who introduced us to his horses and numerous, dogs, puppies and kittens. After explaining to the Gaucho that it was Andrew´s premiero tiempo on a horse, Andrew became the last to hop on his middle aged mellow horse. I got the smallest of the bunch, but it was explained to me that it was because I was the smallest of the group which made me happy as we have been eating a TON and I am currently not feeling so small. After the 7 of us were on our horse´s we were off with a slow trot towards the mountains.
We went up our first mountain that was covered with cows chewing their cud. One of the sheepdogs had followed us as well as a little one year old street mut that looked a little like a white benji who we came to find was named Chubi. I LOVED this little guy. Having followed the back hooves of my horse for a few minutes he broke off to bark at the Cows who looked inquisitively at us. This tiny dog actually scared the cows and they would run off when he would bark at their feet. We passed through valleys and a couple more mountains before reaching an enormous mountain overlooking the many many miles of valley´s lakes and the National Park. It was a fabulous view and it was at that moment that I was so happy that I could cry.
We got off our horses to take some pictures and Andrew and I played with our new buddy Chubi. He was our new best friend. Phillipe and our Gaucho made a small fire and cooked up some Matte, a very strong South American tea that you share through a silver straw. We sat by the fire, chatted and sipped on Matte for 45 minutes in the cool late afternoon before getting back on our horses to trot back down the mountain to the Estancia. As we hopped back on our horses, one of the horses let out a fart that had to have lasted almost a minute. Andrew was about 10 feet from the horse´s rear end and I thought he was going to choke he was laughing so hard. Everybody loved it, except for the person that had to ride the horse. Andrew´s horse, Morena seemed to need little to no direction whereas my horse needed to be held back a little from getting too close to our Gaucho´s horse´s rear end. The Gaucho said something to me, at which point I asked Phillipe to translate. After a 5 minute conversation between him and the Gaucho I asked what he had said. He said,"Make sure to keep your horses nose out of his horses ass." The rest of the way I had to really focus on keeping my horse in check.
In the second valley the Gaucho whistled and the sheep dog took off in a sprint and started rounding up all of the cattle in the distance. It was amazing to see a dog round up so many cattle in such little time. A few minutes later, Chubi entered the mix and started barking and chasing the cattle, only he was chasing them in the opposite direction of where the sheepdog was rounding them up. Poor Chubi. Our Gaucho just shook his head.
Towards the last stretch of our ride I was the first of the group as I wanted to keep my horses nose to ourselves. My horse took off in the fastest gallop I have ever experienced. Her ears went back and the wind was ripping through my hair. It took all of my strength to simply hold on. The english style of riding I had learned at the age of 12 was replaced with mayhem and I kept telling the horse "Whoa". After a couple minutes of galloping the home stretch, I was out of breath and there he was.. Andrew, the first time ever on a horse, taking over the lead from the rear and he looked really good doing it. When he finally reached the fence, he looked a little frazzled. He said, "Did you see that"? I said that I did and that he looked great. He said something about his horse being able to beat the horses in Hong Kong and quickly got off his horse.
We said goodbye to our Gaucho and Chubi and on the way home Andrew explained to the group in the van that it was official!! "Lisa is trying to kill me," he said, "and you are all witnesses as I will be pressing spousal abuse charges upon return to the states". He explained that on this trip he had been forced to ice climb, get in a two person kayak with me for his first time in a kayak and brave 9 foot swells, hike 36 miles when the longest hike he had ever been on was 2 hours max, river rafted for the first time after a harrowing drive over sheer cliffs, not letting him sleep past 7am day after day, having to drive long distances on the other side of the road and now this... cantering in the middle of the wilderness after having never been on a horse before. I think at that point Andrew had enough. I know deep down that Andrew is secretly happy about all of the above as he smiled while telling his stories of bravery, well, maybe all but the waking up at 7am part.
Upon our return to the hotel, we started to feel a little pain from the ride, but ignored it, ate another great dinner and went to bed early.
The 3rd day included an excursion that was just OK. It was taking a boat out on lake Sarmiento. It was an easy day. We were supposed to do the French Valley hike, but we couldn´t bring ourselves to do a 7 hour hike as our body and back ached from the muscles we used on our ride. So we boarded a small boat at 8am. A nice spanish teacher from Boston gave me Bonine to quell any urges to get sea sick and we departed to see the glaciers on the other side of the lake. We traveled on the boat for 3 and a half hours before getting to the first glacier. We chatted with Ann and John Fyfe and our new friends who were in their late 20´s, Rachel and Dan from New York who were at Remota for a week for a break from their busy jobs. I slept for a little bit due to the Bonine I think and though the first glacier was beautiful, we had really seen a lot of glaciers on this trip. We got off the boat when we got to the second glacier and had a 20 minute hike in the pouring rain to see the glacier up close. Reverting back to our days on the Milford we were the first people to get to the Glacier, we snapped a few pics and headed back to the boat to dry off in the cabin. Our guide Isabel looked perplexed as she saw us heading back and asked if we had made it. We said of course. Yes it was beautiful, but we weren´t about to stay there in the pouring rain to wait to see it move an inch.
We had a delicious late lunch at an estancia on the banks of the river. I have never seen Andrew so happy when he saw the piles of meat grilling in the kitchen. It was like Christmas and we were starving. We had a wonderful lunch and of course the South American´s were taking their time eating so had to be rushed through their meal before the waters got any more rough. So we boarded the boat back, I passed out, Andrew read a book JFK had written that Dan had brought and we got back to the hotel almost more tired than when we left. We swam one last time in the pool and enjoyed our last dinner at the hotel over our bottle of Shiraz we had bought outside of Santiago. We did LOVE the Remota and were sad to be leaving. We hope to one day return to Torres Del Paine as it is an incredible place. If only they would turn down the wind.
