January 11th, 2012
7am! Wakey wakey! Had breakfast with 5 Israeli girls who were just starting there trip-asking me a million questions about the different available treks and all. Its crazy how when we flew down here, we knew nothing, no plans, no nothing and then here I was telling her the best way to see everything/do all the treks in X amount of days, etc. Again, when did I become this trek/travel guide? Ahahaa! We were dying laughing. Who do we think we are? Kisses and hugs to the cuteee old man that ran the hostal because we were going to miss him! So gentle and sweet! 8am back on the road again- heading to Torres del Paine, Puerto Natales, Chile. Unfortunately, there was a forest fire that destroyed a big chunk of the National Park. REALLY SAD. There is the “W” trek which many people do anywhere between 3-6 days. Lots of trekking/climbing and camping. However, due to the forest fire, only one leg of the W was open which was really disappointing. After being bummed out for a few hours when we heard this, we decided Whatever! We are here; gotta suck all the joy out of that one leg! Guess that means we will just have to return at another time to finish the whole W! (Who wants to join!?) So, on the road-arriving in Puerto Natales just before 10:00am.
All the dogs in Patagonia are HUGE! Its so cool to travel and meet all the street dogs- each place has its “type” of street dog- so serious. Its so fun and so interesting and they are all sooooo cute!! My bus stop buddy…
We stayed with Melinda one night and then heading out to Torres del Paine the next day to camp and do the leg of the W trek. Melinda let us borrow her backpack, tent, sleeping bag, cocinera (I don’t know what it is called in English- the thing we cooked with), and a mini gas can to connect to this cooking device. Instead of renting from a store, we paid less money by using Melinda’s gear. Thanks Mel! Packed and ready to go! Now its time to rest before this trek/camping adventure.
January 12th, 2012
6am- Melinda’s gentle husband made us hot coffee and then we were off! Between the two of us, we carried a tent, a sleeping bag, layers of clothes, food, water, and our cocinera/mini gas can. Doesn’t sound like that much but damn it was HEAVY!!!! The entire trek was UPHILL. We left at 10am and arrived to the camping site at around 6pm! Damn, that was hard-really hard. Moments of laughter and silliness and moments of “I cant flippen climb anymore/cry faces.” Ha. Whats an adventure without the mix of emotions!
We were so hot from trekking! The weather was breezy but the sun was strong. Sidenote- bandana is one of the best things to have while backpacking- washcloth, hat-totally lessens the intensity of the heat-very multifunctional!
Sweeeet Tree! Connect me, Avatar style!
We passed some guys on horses carrying these gas tanks.
We finally made it. Time to set up camp. How the heck do we put this tent up? How the heck do we start this fire to make some food?
We also learned that our tent did not zip, had holes in it, and only had one steak post! Really? Oh boy did these little details add some spice to the adventure! Ha. I took the string out of my hood of my jacket to try to tie the flap shut to the tent so no creatures entered at night. Sidenote: I got bit by some big flies a few days ago on one of the treks. A few days later—aka in this moment after we set up camp, I look at my bites- and they were huge! SWOLLEN like the size of a lemon. After trekking up a mountain for 8 hours, I was exhausted and now in the middle of having an allergic reaction to these bites. Whats a girl to do? Its physically impossible to trek down at this point. So, I tent hopped asking people if they had anything I could take. I was about 3 minutes short of letting this pre-med student stick a needle in my butt. What was I to do? I was crawling out of my skin, hot and swollen. It was just getting worse and worse. But, just before the butt adventure I found a kid who has prescribed Benadryl. I decided to take that and if that didn’t work then try the needle in the butt. Took the Benadryl and I was out. Woke up the next morning and my bites were still huge but at least half the size now. So, we decided not to trek that day. Just hang out at the camp site. Our bodies were exhausted from trekking and well, I was at the mercy of these Benadryl pills that were making me sleep basically all day. Later that night we hung out with these 24 year old two park rangers who showed us pics of the forest fire which were CRAZY and sad! They showed us pre-fire pics of the other parts of the W trek that we wouldn’t be able to see due to the fire- beautiful! Cool- good people, good company- the good life.
January 14th, 2012
4am! Its dark out now. Our campsite was one hour away from Torres del Paine Glacier. We decided it would be awesome to trek at 4am and make it to the glacier by 5am-just in time for the sunset. We were all excited the night before, feeling rested and ready. But, 4am hit and damn, it was dark!! Ahh! The back and forthness- Should we do it? We want to do the sunset thing but its dark and kind of scary. What about the Pumas? The other backpackers we met in our travels did it; we can do it! Lets do it! So we are up and out in the dark. I had my handy dandy headlamp on which totally enabled us to do this dark trek. I saw a couple standing 50 ft from us outside their tent. They were heading out to do what we are doing- the sunset trek. Phew! We are not alone. And off we went. We only had one headlamp so I was using it to see the rocks I was climbing in front of me then putting it near my butt so Monetti could see where she was walking. Haha I wish someone could have videotaped what we looked like. I put the coffee, the cocinera, a bottle of stream water and the jar of peanut butter in the tent cover and carried it with us on this trek so we could make coffee during sunrise against the glacier! Damn this was uphill, rocks falling- literally boulder climbing. SO COOL! – making it just in time for the sunrise, 5:19am!! The wind was whipping right through us! We had to stay low on the rocks so we wouldn’t fall! So Awesome!
After the sunrise coffee and peanut butter, we headed back to our campsite, packed up and headed back down the mountain. Holyyy wind!! The down climb was insane. The wind literally was throwing us around like we were grains of sand. We fell a few times, ha. But really, at points of the trek, the walkway was narrow and we found ourselves squatting down or laying down at moments when the wind was super strong to avoid getting blown off the side of the cliff. Ha, but really. We even had our heavy heavy backpacks on, but that meant nothing. We literally were at the mercy of mother nature. I starting singing and trying to walk (or run if the wind blew threw from behind) with it. Work WITH it, instead of against it. The wind and I totally had our dance on-groovin! Its rhythmns determined my steps and speed-grooovin! A few hours later we made it to the mainland. We were going to do the last trek that was open which was called “Cuernos.” All the other parts of the W trek were closed do to the fire. However, when we made it to the mainland, one of the park workers said that Cuernos is temporarily closed because of the intense wind. One of the bridges fell into the river, knocked down by the wind. He said campers are staying put at their campsites. (And there we were trekking downhill in that wind- again, who do we think we are?)
So, being that we conquered the only part of the W trek that was open, we were off to our next adventure. Vale la pena!! = (Tough trek but) totally worth it! We took a bus back to Melinda’s house from the National Park. Swang on some swings by the water for a while then called it a night. Exhausted! Thank you Torres del Paine! You are insanely cool!
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