Joune

Sunday, January 14, 2007

Torres del Paine

Off i went for a new hike.. 5 days in Torres del Paine..

On top of being mad expensive the refugios had to be booked in advance.. and i just hate booking things in advance!.. so it would be camping.. at least i can take off whenever i want and change my mind at any point.. that's more like me!

Camping is actually pretty easy in this park, especially if you do the most common "W" circuit, as you can just camp on the lower points of the W and do the branches as day hikes, so you don't have to carry your tent most of the time..

Altogether it felt quite easier than the Kepler.. and i was much better prepared too, with a proper ration of pasta for every night!

Anyway.. i won't make you dream with beautiful lights (as some people had sold it to me!) but here's what it looked like..

An old jetty in Puerto Natales, before leaving..

the entrance of the park..

the first hike was the steepest and not the most interesting, but eventually the view on the famous "torres" was nice.. so there i am, posing for the tourist shot..

the second day was much better (eventhough i had to carry my tent this time!) with beautiful walks along the lakes..

third day.. i've left my tent down by the lake and climb up the "valle frances"..

the 360 degrees panorama of sharp peaks at the top of valle frances is hard to render in photo (especially with this weather) but very impressive!

fourth day, i walk up to glacier Grey..

and get to see icebergs! man, i love them! what's more beautiful (and more cold) than icebergs? Women maybe! and yet never so consistently! ;-)

for the return i had an option of taking a boat accross the lake back to the entrance, but my legendary cheapness took over me again and i prefered a nice 5 hours walk in the rain instead!

a model of the park, with the lakes, the glacier on the top left corner, valle frances in the middle, and the torres.. well you still have to know where!
of course only when we were driving out of the park did it start to clear up!