With our new friends Jamie and Sam, we started our five day long “W” trek through Torres Del Paine National Park. We were told to expect terrible winds and non-stop rain our entire trek, but we somehow managed to have awesome weather our entire five days, which we were very thankful for. Our first day was spent hiking to a massive glacier on a lake with icebergs scattered around in magnificent shapes and shades of blue. Yes, the nights were very cold. After a quick stove-cooked ramen dinner (surprisingly delicious if you add sausages!) we scrambled into our respective tents and huddled together until morning. Unfortunately a few years ago a tourist didn’t think the park wide fire ban applied to him, and proceeded to burn down a sizable portion of the park. While we missed out on what we were told used to be beautiful forests, we found a different kind of beauty in the recovering branches of trees that remained.

Day three was the worst day for weather but one of the best for scenery. We ditched our camping gear and hiked up the middle of the “W” into the French Valley. The higher we went, the better it was. We walked through a massive forests along waterfalls to come into clearings to see mountains with glaciers in the middle on one side, and a bright blue lake with rolling hills on the other. We went further up the valley through pampas that boasted views of snow-capped peaks in every direction. We went even further up after this through the now progressing wind and snow to the top of our hike to stand at the bottom of THE Torres del Paine, jagged, 500m high rock peaks pointing into the heavens. After returning down and getting to our waterfront campsite, Jamie decided because the water looked so spectacular, that he would challenge Brad to go for a dip in the glacially cold water with him. After enduring freezing temperatures the boys headed in for a nice hot shower and we able to enjoy a dinner in a warm refugio before heading to bed.

Day four was another day of spectacular views, paired with a seemingly never ending uphill climb. We started the day walking along the shoreline of a lake that seemed to change colours every hour to shine a new light on the landscape. We walked along the base of the mountains with rocky peaks looking down on us. We looked up at one point to spot a condor soaring above us. After watching for a second we wated two more appear... and then three circling around... as they began to fly away we looked back to the mountain again and saw another one, then two, then three appear, until there was a whole flocked of 11  condors soaring above us. There aren’t any word to describe how incredible it was to see these massive, 3m long birds that people pay thousands of dollars to see from 500m away, and we saw 11 of them in the sky at one time, right above us. 

Day 5; 3:30am wake up. Enough said... we make some tea and hot chocolate for our thermoses, pack a seeping bag, and head up the steep 300m climb in the dark with our headlamps to the base of the torres. This was the day we really felt that famous Patagonian wind. We made it to the top just as the sun was rising to see the most amazing colours over the valley. We hunkered down with tea and hot chocolate and waited for the sun to hit the Torres, and it was awesome. Everyone who all made the climb together were all happy and in great spirits; one of our new friends even brought rum to share with everyone! After a happy morning we all exhaustedly made it down the hill and out of the park to finish a tiring but amazing adventure. Back to Puerto Natalas for some well deserved pizza and a few beers!