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For this trip, I elected to do the route known as the W. The letter basically
describes the route. This route is much more popular than the full circuit
around the Torres del Paine, which can take 7-10 days. The W, in contrast, only
takes about 4-5 days, and I've seen trekkers do it in shorter amounts of time.
I decided to do the route from East to West, though it can be done the other way
as well. The route is basically: Laguna Amarga (entry point) to Campamento Las
Torres; Campamento Las Torres to Los Cuernos; Los Cuernos to Campamento
Italiano; Campamento Italiano to Campamento Pehoe; Campamento Pehoe to Lago
Gray; Lago Gray back to Campamento Pehoe; Exit via the Ferry from Campamento
Pehoe.
I booked a bus from Puerto Natales to leave early morning, and after a few
stops, the bus left Puerto Natales at around 8:00 a.m. There are quite a number
of tour companies with regular departures for Torres, and they are easily booked
from your lodgings. The bus takes about two hours to get to Torres del Paine,
entering through the gate at Laguna Amarga. It makes several stops, so you can
choose your entry point for the various trails in the park. My ticket had an "open" return date, so I could basically jump on any bus headed back any day, and as long as they had room, I could get back to Puerto Natales.
At the Laguna Amarga gate, the bus stops and everybody goes in to pay their
entry fee to the rangers. It was $8000 pesos, or about $12US. They ask you what
route you're doing, how many are in your party, and give you a map of the park. The map was of marginal
utility, but was nice as a quick reference, and I found I used it most while hiking around. The bus drops off your gear at this
point, and you can begin hiking here. However, the route isn't very interesting
up to the Hosteria Las Torres, so most trekkers pay a few pesos to take a
mini-bus that takes you to the hosteria. Hold on to your ticket as it's good for
one night's camping at one of the pay camping spots. After a bit of confusion, I
got passage on one of the mini-buses and headed in. I was dropped off near the
trailhead, and I left directly for Campamento Las Torres.
The trail begins by ascending 1200 feet steeply along a river valley. Once you
reach the top of this uphill climb, you get a good few down the valley and of
Campamento Chileno with its hut. You drop 600 feet to the river to reach the
hut. The hut is one of several run by a few companies in Torres del Paine.
Campamento Chileno is run by Fantastico Sur, and also has a small campsite. The
huts have bunks, flush toilets, hot showers and serve meals. This one didn't
have much of a campstore. I stopped to have lunch, and rest a bit before heading
onwards to Campamento Las Torres. It's another hour or so beyond the hut, and
about 600 feet more of climbing. The trail can be a bit rough with steep ups and
downs, but it's well marked.
Campamento Las Torres is a free campground. It's large and has a flush toilet.
Further on is Campamento Japones, the climbers camp. There are a couple of
streams to provide water. I found a fairly protected spot, and set up. I had
considered climbing up to the Mirador Las Torres, but I was beat.
The next morning, I got up early to try to make morning light on the Mirador Las
Torres. Unfortunately, I slept through my alarm, and was thus too late to make
dawn light. The trail to Mirador Las Torres is only a mile or so, but climbs
1200 feet - the last few hundred feet involves boulder hopping up the moraine.
The trail follows a stream for most of the way, and unfortunately, I lost my way
at the point where the trail leaves the stream and goes directly up the moraine.
The path is marked by paint marks on the boulders, but I missed them. I soon
found myself following what looked like a regular trail, but it went along the
moraine, rather than up and over it. Later, I figure this must have been a trail
used by mountaineers to access the base of the Torres, as it leads right up to
them. I figured I must have been going the wrong way, and climbed the moraine to
see where I was. I was quite a bit aways from the mirador, and climbed back down
to backtrack.
I found the proper path when I spotted other hikers making their way up. The trail climbs up near a large, house-sized boulder. I was
soon at the mirador, and was quite tired from all of the hiking. It was
mid-morning by the time I reached the mirador, so the light wasn't the best, but
it was a spectacular sight, nonetheless. I shot from the top of the moraine, and
then moved to the shore of lake for more shots. The winds gusted pretty
strongly, so it's important not to let go of your tripod, else it'll fall.
After about an hour at the mirador, I made my way back to camp. It was mid-day
by the time I got back, so I decided to burn a rain day here. My next
destination, Los Cuernos, was about 7 hours of hiking away, so I thought it
better to wait until the next day. The next morning I discovered I had a
sprained ankle as it would collapse when I put weight on it. I had twisted it a
few times on the hopping around on the boulders, but I guess it worsened
overnight. Pain killers and tight lacing of the boot seemed good enough to allow
me to continue, so I carried on.
After my descent, I decided to stop by the Hosteria Las Torres to get some
lunch. They have a small snack shop, so I had potato chips, sodas, cookies,
etc... for lunch. It took a couple of hours or so to get down to the Hosteria
from Campamento Las Torres. Los Cuernos is about 4 hours from the Hosteria. I
set out after lunch. The trail is mostly level until it meets up with Lago
Norksjold, at which point there's a bit of climbing, with some up and down,
before it finally descends to Los Cuernos. This is a fairly new trail, and the
path seems well thought out. Unlike other trails I've seen, this one follows the
contours of the land.
Along the trail, there are some excellent views of the lake and the surrounding
plains. The play of light on the water and the clouds made excellent shooting.
As you get closer to Los Cuernos, you get your first views of the actual Los
Cuernos, or Horns, of Torres del Paine. These large peaks are composed of two
different colored bands - one sedimentary and another volcanic - which accounts
for their coloring. I ran into a couple of hikers, Francisco and Harmut, who are
from Santiago. Francisco was shooting medium format, so we got into a
conversation about cameras and whatnot. They were doing the same route as I, and
as Francisco was a photographer, we tended to stop at the same places. So, I
found myself hiking with them for the rest of the trip. They were also loaded
down with camera equipment, so their pace matched mine fairly well. Harmut is a
mining engineer, which is how I know about the sedimentary and volcanic layers
of the Cuernos.
We stopped several times along the way to shoot, and made our way slowly to Los
Cuernos. This campground is at the base of a glacial river, and has a good view
of the Cuernos. The hut has high ceilings with huge windows that give nice
views. The campground is a bit cramped, but I found a spot. The hut is fairly
new, and quite nice. The hot - well lukewarm - showers were excellent. I had
dinner in the hut, as I had decided to carry less food on this trip to save pack
weight. I showed up for the first seating, and the food was pretty good. I had
fish of some sort with a small boiled potato and some vegetables. There was a
cup of soup to start, and some sort of berry mousse for dessert. They also
served wine with the meal. My only problem was that the portions were far too
small for a hiker. I could have eaten three platefuls. I tried to fill up on
bread, but then, so did everybody else. The camraderie of the hut was very nice,
and the dinner conversation focused on our travels on the trail. Later, there
was more singing and drinking of wine around the hut, but I chose to shower, and
then turn in.
The next morning, I discovered that my ankle wasn't any better. I suppose 13
miles of hiking over rough terrain didn't do it any good. I was able to soak it
for 30 minutes in a glacial stream, which helped considerably. The trail is
quite rocky as it leaves the campground. It quickly drops to the lakeshore and
follows a rocky beach for a bit. Soon, it begins climbing before dropping into
the Valle Frances. Here, the views are excellent. We stopped at the top of our
climb and spent about 30 minutes shooting the views down the valley. You have
views of both the Glaciar Frances, as well as, the Cuernos. The trail drops down to
the campground, and gets a bit muddy in parts. Campamento Italiano is right on
the Rio del Frances, and is rather cramped. It's got a flush toilet, and the water
source is the river. It's only a few hours from Los Cuernos. The trail continues
further on up the valley to Campamento Britannico, the climbers camp. There are
a few miradors along this trail giving good views of the valley, but I'm afraid
that my injury kept me close to camp. Francisco and Harmut did head up that evening, and invited me along, but I had to decline. I wish I had a couple of days to spend
here as the scenery was some of the best I'd seen so far. As it was, I hadn't
brought enough food to stay longer, and had to move on.
By evening, hikers were beginning to arrive, and the campground quickly became
quite crowded. A number of them had come from Campamento Chileno that day -
which is about 10 hours of hiking.
The next morning dawned rainy and windy. I waited until mid-morning for the
weather to improve, but it never did. My ankle wasn't responding to any
treatment, so I knew it was gonna be a rough walk out. Fortunately, this was the
easiest section of trail so far. Relatively level, and the trail was well graded
- not too rocky. I crossed the bridge across the Rio del Frances and made way towards Lago
Pehoe. It lightly rained most of the way, and there were strong gusts of wind as
I made my way around the shores of a couple of lakes. Lago Pehoe is about 5.5
miles from Campamento Italiano, and I covered it in 3 hours. Not bad for a gimpy
ankle.
Lago Pehoe has a large campground, an Almacen (camp store), ranger station, and
hut. There is also a boat dock for a ferry that can take you out to the main
road where you can catch a bus. They seem to be building a new, larger facility,
which I imagine is a new hut, though it's too large to be called a hut. Looks
more like a hotel. The ferry makes this a popular arrival and departure point,
so there are quite a number of people here - dayhikers and trekkers. The
campground is very large, but not very well protected. It's out on an open
plain, with a scattering of small trees here and there. There are a number of
constructed windbreaks - 2x4s with fabric netting - to protect some of the
campsites.
As in the other pay campgrounds, there are hot showers. There is also a room in
back of the camp store with picnic tables, a sink and propane stove for use by
the campers. This is quite welcome as the strong winds would make cooking in
camp quite a chore. I took advantage of the campstore to purchase supplies -
namely pasta, cheese, tomato sauce, cookies, and some Jugo de Naranja (Tang). I
was also able to get some pain killers. One should also beware of the mice in
camp. Make sure to hang your food, as a mouse kept me awake at night as it tried
to get into my foodbag which was in the vestibule of my tent. I was able to
string the bag up inside the vestibule, though I did hear the mouse make a
running leap at it once. He gave up after that.
The plan was to move on to Lago Gray the next morning, but I'm afraid that my
injury just wasn't going to allow it. So, I hung out in camp the next day, and
the ankle did show noticeable improvement the following morning, but not enough
to keep hiking. The Lago Gray campground was a 4 hour hike away over rough
ground. I only had one more day in the park, so I decided to grab a ferry ride
out. There are a few departures during the day, and I grabbed the 10:00 ferry.
The ride out across Lago Gray was very nice, and you get great views of the
Cuernos. Everybody dumped their packs inside the catamaran and quickly made
their way outside to watch the scenery from the deck. Francisco and I got
ourselves prime spots and were shooting all the way.
The ferry drops you off at Refugio Pudeto, and the buses time their arrival to meet the
ferry. I had hoped to move on to Camping Pehoe, a campground near the Hosteria
Pehoe, a hotel on a small island on the lake, but it was 7 kilometers away, and
I didn't feel like hiking it. This was perhaps my biggest regret, as the views
from Camping Pehoe are supposedly excellent. The classic sunrise shots of the
Cuernos are taken from there, or from the mirador above the campground.
Francisco and Harmut were moving on to Lago Pingo, and hung out waiting for a
bus headed that way. I was to later meet up with them at Isla Magdalena, and
discovered that the bus never showed up. They instead caught a bus to Puerto
Natales, and moved on to El Calafate to see Perito Moreno Glaciar.
The bus stopped at Laguna Amarga on the way back, and we hung out for several
hours until we had enough people to fill the bus. The trip back was uneventful.
If I had to do it over, I think I would have added more days to do better
photography. I would rent a car and drive the park for a day or two to hit the
viewpoints from the road. I didn't get any good shots of Guanacos, a llama like
animal, as I was subject to the schedule of the bus drivers. I think I would
rent a car, and stop wherever I pleased. There were a number of shots I saw from
the bus with Guanacos in the foreground on a small hill with the peaks of Torres
del Paine in the background. It was killing me to zoom past these set ups. I'd
also make sure to hit the views from Camping Pehoe and other various miradors.
Lastly, I have yet to see Glaciar Gray and Lago Gray, so I definitely want to do
that. I'd also carry more food, and allow for more rain days. The weather was a
factor, and one needs time to do good photography. I guess I'll have to return.
After I returned to Puerto Natales, I caught a bus to Punta Arenas. I was kinda tired of camping and staying in hostels, so I booked a room at the Cabo de Hornos, one of the luxury hotels in the town. Punta Arenas is the biggest city I visited, and it had the amenities you would expect in a city that size. There was some nice architecture, museums, and monuments in the town, but the place struck me as a bit run down. The city has clearly seen better times. My main reason for spending a couple of nights in town was to visit the penguins.
