Good bye showers, so long cold beer….we’ll see you again in four days…..

What?!? They have hot showers in the camps and pubs in the Refugios? This trekking thing isn’t going to be as tough as we thought!

We started the W-Trek on the longest and busiest section of the trek with a hike to the Torres del Paine. These are the three iconic granite peaks from which the name of the national park is derived. A lot of people do this as a separate day hike so it was a bit crowded for our liking but the view from the top was rewarding. The peaks soar up from a beautiful glacial lake and we were lucky that they were mostly clear and not covered by cloud.

We spent our first night in a small camp by a beautiful lake with views of the mountains. Unfortunately we weren’t able to spend much time there as we had to get a move on to catch a boat in the morning. The boat is the usual way to access the start of the W and it often lined up early as it is first come first served. We made our targeted departure across the lake, grabbed a coffee at the Refugio and started our hike to Grey Glacier. We encountered few people on this part of the trek and it was lovely! We passed Grey Lake and continued on to Grey Glacier. The view of the glacier was just amazing but it was so windy at the viewpoint that we had to be careful not to get blown over the cliff. When we returned to camp, we had drinks and a little celebration for one of our delightful trekking companions from London who was celebrating her 30th birthday on the trail. It was a great way to wrap up the day.

Day three saw us heading up the French Valley to a viewpoint of the mountains and several glaciers. The park had a major fire in 2011 that burned for months and destroyed a huge swath of forest (apparently started by a tourist who decided to burn his dirty toilet paper in the forest but didn’t anticipate the power of the Patagonian winds….) Regrowth of the forest has been very slow. Today we left the part of the park that had been mostly burned out and headed back into green forest. We made the viewpoint just in time for lunch. The day was mostly sunny and there was no wind so we took our time lunching, relaxing and watching the glaciers. It was just magical!

Our last night on the trail was in Cuerro camp near a beautiful lake. It was a busy campsite but our tent was in a quiet corner under some trees so it was quite peaceful. We were surprised by a fat little fox on the trail to the bathroom in the morning! I suspect he was scouting out breakfast and was not deterred at all when we tried to shoo him off the path to pass.

The last day of hiking was great – lots of undulating trail that we came to know as Patagonian Flat, green forests, views of the Oreo coloured mountains and amazing viewpoints. Again we were blessed with good weather – we started in the rain but by lunchtime it was sunny and calm so we enjoyed another leisurely lunch, resting and looking over the lake. After several more hours of walking, we hit our final destination at the end of our W!

I have to give a shout out to our companions on this trek. We had the pleasure of hiking with some amazing folks from many parts of the world. We shared challenges, encouragement, great conversations and many, many laughs. Thank you for being part of our adventure! We are richer for having shared this with each and every one of you!