Torres del Paine! (Part 2, the trek)

And then we were there. In the park office, paying our entrance fees to a ranger who greeted the Israelis with "shalom" and the rest of us with "buenos dias", with the tips of the Torres just visible over a hill. Behind us a lazy river wended its way through the flats; three guanacos dashed smartly across it and dissolved into the brown landscape beyond. Duties paid, we got back on the bus and continued on to the launch for the catamaran that would take us to Refugio Pehoe/Grey and the trailhead. The stillness of the morning persisted, and the opaque green glacial lake reflected the passing scenery, and the mountains beyond looming much closer now, with amazing clarity. Up to this point I had assumed the Torres, those three thin spires and the park's namesake, were the park's most spectacular formation, but as soon as the Cuernos came into view I realized I had been mistaken. These three behemoths, with their girth, their stark bands of different colours, and their brutally sculpted contours, made the Torres seem slight in comparison. Slight, and evil; after seeing them both up close we agreed that the Cuernos were massive and powerful but ultimately benevolent, while the Torres were stark and foreboding and undoubtedly the gateway to the lair of some evil supervillain.

The ferry let us off at the refugio, and, getting finally sorted, and poles extended and adjusted, and water bottles filled, and bladders emptied, and Snickers consumed, we set off on the hike to Campamiento Italiano, our first stop.

This was a pretty easy hike through meadows and through stunted forests, and along a lake the colour of the night sky, a deep, deep, dark, rich blue verging on purple, but still a whole spectrum away from the blessed inky blackness of Ontario's lakes. Though the hike was not overly long, we were tired from the early start and six hours of journeying to get to the park, and were happy to get to Italiano in the late afternoon. This was a free, unserviced campsite, in the woods by a rushing glacial stream; it was also rather buggy, and dark, and proved to be our least favourite site in the end.

The next day we left our stuff at the site for the morning and did a day trip up the Valle del Frances to see the glacier of the same name. It was a solid uphill slog, and, keeping in mind we would be hiking three more hours in the afternoon to our next campsite, we turned around before the end, more than content with the incredible views from the lookouts that we had reached on the way: to the left, mountains caked with glaciers; to the right, the Cuernos taking up the whole sky; up ahead, the ring of peaks around the bowl up in the top of the valley; and down away behind us, the whole sweep of the park's multi-hued lakes.

We lunched back at our campsite, and then hit the trail towards Refugio Los Cuernos, so named for its lakeside site right at the base of those peaks. This trail essentially came out of the valley and curved eastward around the base of the Cuernos, eventually reaching the lake and traveling along it at varying elevations up the steep rise from the shoreline. It was inevitable that we would eventually come right out beside the lake, which we did at a lovely black and grey pebble beach; equally inevitable was that I would feel compelled to take a plunge. In deference to some nice french ladies also taking a break on the beach, I kept my knickers on, and stepped gingerly into the still azure water.

It was cold. Really cold. Glacier cold. But this wasn't my first rodeo, and I'm a Canadian, after all, and these are the things we do to ourselves for fun. And so: step; stall; curse; stall; step; curse; stall; clench fists; step curse run curse run and curse and in. And out! Out! Out out out fast fast fast, and splaying out on the warm dry pebbles, breathing quickly and laughing gleefully. Oh, but it's an amazing feeling, that. My trekking partner, for the record, did not join me for a dip; but some Japanese dudes were disrobing as we got moving once again so I can say for sure I'm not the only lunatic out there.

We reached the refugio in the late afternoon and set our tent up in the field beside it. We bought their hot  dinner and ate it in their hugely-windowed dining room. We watched the sun set behind the mountains across the lake and saw the moon rise over the Cuernos. Then we went to bed, tired and happy.