Torres del Paine! (Part 2 continued)

Day three began with the same amazing weather as we'd seen on the first two days, windless and sunny. If we hadn't had a taste of it en route to Puerto Natales, and more to the point we hadn't seen whole forests of stunted  trees growing sideways like seaweed in the current, I might have thought all the talk of ferocious Patagonian winds was hyperbole. As it was, though, we quietly thanked the weather gods and hit the trail once more. We carried on along the length of the lake for a few more hours, through mainly open, if steep, country, and came at about lunchtime to the turn off to get to Refugio Chileno, our next destination, which was part way up the final valley en route to the Torres themselves. Things proceeded normally for the next while but as we began to ascend towards the entrance to the valley the wind began to pick up, and for the first time whitecaps were visible on the lake behind us. With some concern we also noted that the path into the valley, right at the start, was marked on the map with a little Windy-Man symbol.

And so we continued to climb, and it continued to get windier. I was initially of the opinion that it wasn`t a bad thing, this wind, since now we could confirm that yes, Patagonia is windy, the legends were true, and those trees were legit. However, my enthusiasm waned as it became clear that the entrance to the valley was a very high, very exposed turn around a sandy, extremely steep ridge. Already at times the wind had become strong enough to require us to hunker down, leaning on our poles, backs to the wind; it seemed plausible that a random stronger gust could knock you over, and at that high turn, over would mean over the cliff. Our progress slowed, but we reached the lee of the turn, if you can say things like that about mountains. Our trepidation mounted: there were neither guard rails, nor posts, nor a rope as either boundary or safety line; it was you, and a two foot wide hairpin turn, and the Windy-Man. We waited for a break and then rounded the corner... and saw that the trail continued on, exposed, for most of the remaining 1.5 kilometers to the refugio. Occasionally there were trees, occasionally we dipped out of the path of the wind. But only occasionally. That was a tough stretch, made tougher by the folks coming the other way, with the wind at their backs, who seemed to us to be trotting along as carefree and jauntily as kids coming home from school. By the time we reached the refugio the wind was lifting water from the river and the clouds had descended to shroud most of the valley. For the first time, I truly understood why refugios are called refugios. Never has a thing been more aptly called, in my opinion. Rather than try to cook in the horrible weather we surrendered and bought our dinner from the refugio.

The next day the weather was fairly overcast and the clouds were still sitting way low into the valley. Nevertheless, counting on the capricious changes in the weather to turn things back in our favour, we set out on a short day hike to the lookout to the Torres themselves. This path was easy for the first half and then super-steep for the last half, weaving in and across the rocks and boulders of the moraine at the base of the Torres. The weather never did improve, but it was mainly dry at least; and when we got to the mirador only the bottom halves of the Torres were visible. Still, it was an awesome sight, a sheer cliff, an opaque green pool at its feet, and the Torres like a fortress disappearing into the mists above it. (This was the scene that made it so clear that evil surely lurked within.) The rest of that dreary day we just relaxed at the Chileno refuge.

And then our final day came. The clouds lifted, and the wind very kindly abated as we headed back the way we came along the exposed path out of the valley, and it was indeed a lot easier going the other way, though we were not quite as carefree as all that since it was still a pretty steep drop, wind or no wind. Once we got all the way out of the valley it was easy hiking down to the hotel Las Torres, where we found our unfresh selves incogruously sipping espressos on leather couches, listening to easy rock hits of the 70s while we waited for the minibus transfer to take us back to the park entrance, from where a larger bus would take us back to town, and hot showers, and restaurant menus, and good beds.

And at the end, as at the beginning, it was AMAZING. To elaborate: I have never camped anywhere more awe-inspiring, or laid eyes on stranger mountains, or seen lakes of so many different colours all next to each other (non-toxic-looking colours, I should say -- there were some very colourful lakes in Bolivia too but they looked like they'd melt your foot off if you stepped in them). In truth this was my first overnight trekking experience, and while all in all I'd still rather go by canoe, you do get some unique perspectives on the trail that you don't get on the lakes, and it's easier to stop and smell the proverbial roses. (Or calafate flowers, as the case may be.)

Oh, and there's a whole other (less famous) half of the park that we didn't even get to glimpse; so I guess we're going to have to come back some day.

Photos still to come, stay tuned.