Jan 11 - 13 - More hiking

We spent the next three days hiking through the park along the 'W' circuit. Although we had to cut out part of it due to time constraints or lack of physical fitness.

After Lago Grey, we hiked back to Lago Pehoe and stayed the night there again. The only real difficulty over the next couple of days occurred the on the 12th when we got to camp Los Cuernos. As we were hiking along the Lago Nordenskjold, the wind really started to pick up. It was lifting sheets of water off the lake and throwing it up the hillside, which was 'refreshing' if you happened to be in the way.


By the time we got to the camp, the wind was actually pushing some of the waterfalls back up the mountain. We'd bought some pretty cheap tents in Santiago and they weren't up to the task. As soon as we got ours pegged and up, the wind just ripped it off the ground and sent us tumbling back trying to hang on to it. Luckily, the campground had some more 'wind-resistant' tents which we were able to rent for the night.

The 13th we hiked from Los Cuernos to camp Chileno, about 2 hours from the actual Torres del Paine, the parks namesake. By a fluke, we ended up getting onto a short-cut that cut a lot of pain out of the day. So we were feeling pretty good when we made it into camp Chileno by 4:oo pm or so. And things got even better when we discovered that the local Refugio accepted visa. So we splurged on cold beers and dinner at the Refugio. Only one more day of hiking and then we'd be able to rest...


The plan was to hit the trail at 3:30am so that we could be to the base of Torres del Paine for sunrise. The changing colors of the peaks as the sun hits them was supposed to be spectacular. 3:30am came awfully early after the night's festivities.