Author: Rachel

We were meant to be in Antarctica for Christmas so when we realised that wasn’t going to happen it was a bit of concern about where to go. In the end we figured going to one of the biggest tourist towns in Argentina was probably the safest option, since surely things would be open!? We flew in to Puerto Iguazú on Christmas Eve, and despite our B&B host assuring us things would be open, we found somewhat sparse pickings for a late lunch (Christmas Eve is when many South Americans meet with family). We eventually ended up with some fairly average Mexican, but better than nothing!

Fortunately we’d just planned to have snacks and a bottle of wine we’d bought in Cafayate for Christmas Eve dinner, which turned out to be a good decision. Our driver picked us up bright and early (but not as early as we’d asked for…) on Christmas morning. We’d intended to get to Iguazú National Park when it opened at 7am, as it turned out the first train out to the Devil’s Throat didn’t run till 7:30am so despite arriving a bit later than planned, it didn’t really matter. We were the first park visitors out to the Devil’s Throat, which was great. The handful of other people from our train soon joined us, that meant there were about 10 of us, so plenty of room for everyone to get all the pictures they wanted. The volume of water was pretty intense, and we were fairly wet by the time the next trainload of people started trickling in (our cue to move on!).

First to Garganta del Diablo (“Devil’s Throat”) on Christmas morning

No fighting for views

A lot of water

We’d just missed a train, but there was a family of coatis, including a bunch of babies, looking for food in the forest around the station, so plenty of entertainment while we waited.

Coati destroying a tree

We basically planned our day to try and do what we thought would be the most popular things first, to avoid crowds as much as possible. It was a successful strategy. Our next stops were the Upper Circuit, and then the Lower Circuit.

A section of the falls from the Upper Circuit

Birds perched on a vertical wall next to a fall

Back at Central Station we tried to have lunch, but a coati got wind of it and come over to investigate so we moved abruptly! The photos around the grounds of the damage the coatis can inflict on humans were a bit sobering, and clearly why they had picnic ‘cages’ for you to eat in. After lunch we did the longest trail, the Macuco Track (8km return).

Butterfly & Salto Arrechea

By then we’d “done” the Argentinian side so Maxi, our driver, came back to get us and we spent the rest of the afternoon enjoying the pool at our accommodation. For Christmas dinner I’d booked us in the “Argentine Experience” which was a great night.

The empanada I “made” – well, wrapped

Christmas dinner at The Argentine Experience

Boxing Day we had a day off – sort of! We hadn’t booked in our driver for the anything so we didn’t have transport. Rather than try and get a taxi or a bus, we decided walking to the animal wildlife rescue centre was the best option… I mean it was only 4km. In the fricking’ humid, hot, Iguazú summer… We were drenched by the time we got there, but fortunately arrived just as a tour was starting. It was all in Spanish but since we were looking at animals  that wasn’t critical. It was good to see a bunch of animals that had eluded us in other parts of the trip, including tapir, puma, sloth, pudu, amongst other creatures. Unsurprisingly we decided to take a taxi back to the accommodation!

The next day we’d decided to head to Brazil for the day and see the falls from Iguaçu National Park. Maxi, maybe feeling guilty about his late arrival on Christmas day, arrived early and we didn’t take long to exit Argentina. We skipped arriving in Brazil altogether (which I think is quite normal on day trips, though it did look like they were building quite a big new border post so maybe this will change?). We were on the bus into the park before 9am, but so were lots of other people. We got off the bus one stop before the end (along with most others) and walked the 1.5km track for views of the falls. I preferred the Brazilian side as you were able to get a much better sense of scale.

Rainbow below the falls

Views towards Devil’s Throat on the Brazilian side

The hordes

It seemed pretty busy, but based on the size of the bus queues when we left, this may not have been too bad!? We easily got the bus back to the Macuco Safari stop (all the buses stop at all stops regardless of direction they are heading). We put our stuff in a locker (to stop it getting saturated) and then got in the queue for the funicular railway down to the river. It was pretty hot and the queue was in the sun. I started feeling unwell, but then we got to the front of the queue and so we got on the funicular. Part way down I fainted which caused a bit of alarm, when we got to the bottom a medic was summoned, but of course he only spoke Portuguese. One of the other tourists translated for a bit, but then we went back up, and we lost our translator. The medic managed to find a staff member who could speak a bit of English, after I’d downed a couple of bottles of water, he said I could give it another go I wanted.

Hilariously while we were in the queue the second time (and I judiciously stayed in the shade the whole time) a lady said to us “this weather doesn’t suit English people”. To which we had to admit we were from Australia and should be able to handle it! Anyway, we made it down and piled into our 20-seater boat for the trip up to the base of the falls. This was exactly what I needed as we got absolutely drenched going under various falls.

With the delay at the boat ride we were running a little later than planned so headed straight to the bird park over the road. The park was great, and there was no queue to get in (there’d been a very long one in the morning when we’d driven past). The Scarlet Ibis was a highlight – we’re used to seeing Bin Chickens (Australian White Ibis) in Sydney all the time, but the colours on the Scarlet ones were pretty outstanding.

Scarlet Ibis

Bird Park in Brazil

Unfortunately the rest of the day didn’t go quite as well to plan. Despite messaging Maxi to say we were going to be ready to be picked up at 4pm, it didn’t seem like it picked up the message until close to 4pm, and so he didn’t get to us until 5:20pm. We then took 3 hours in gridlock to get back across the border. Maxi said it was the worst he’d ever seen it. By the time we got back to our accommodation I couldn’t be bothered with dinner and made do with the last of our Bolivian snack bag and a cup of tea.

The next morning Maxi picked us up for the last time and we were on our way to Buenos Aires without too much drama, and an unexpected final view of the falls from the plane.

View of the Falls from the plane

The traffic when we arrived in Buenos Aires was very light, and we were at our AirBnB in Recoleta in no time. We went to a Tango Show in Buenos Aires that night, and walked around many of the main attractions the next day. That was more than enough city time for us!

Our last stop was back in Chile. We flew back into Santiago (for the third time?) and picked up a hire car. It was a beast of an old-ish SUV, and of course I was stuck doing the driving due to Tom’s lack of physical license. It wasn’t the most enjoyable drive, especially when the engine malfunction light came on, but we did make it to Santa Cruz. The power in our house went out part way through the evening, which wasn’t great given it was hot, but it wasn’t off for long. The following day we were driven around a few wineries in the Colchagua Valley – our guide was great. The tastings were quite different to what we’d expect in Australia – very formal and drawn-out. We had a fabulous lunch before a couple of more tastings. A great day out – just unfortunate it was New Years Eve and everything was closed the next day. I don’t think we even bothered leaving our accommodation! We’d been told to ignore the malfunction light by the car hire company, so fortunately we made it back to Santiago airport in one piece. And with the final flight back to Sydney that was the end of a grand trip.

In the previous month we hadn’t spent more than 4 days at one place, it was nice to know we weren’t going to have to pack everything up for the next 11 nights. El Chalten was the longest block of time (by far) that we had anywhere on the trip. Initially I’d just heard so much about El Chalten, and how it was the capital of hiking in Argentina, and various outdoors documentaries had celebrated it so much, I just assumed there would be plenty to keep us busy here. The National Park brochure had 18 or so walks on it. Then closer to the time I started looking at the listed walks a bit more carefully – and realised that most of the 18 walks were just subsets of 3 longer walks. Were we actually going to be able to keep ourselves occupied for the time? If we got a weather window to do the Huemul Circuit then it was likely fine, but if not, we could find ourselves wondering why we were staying in one of the most expensive places in Argentina for so long!

The day we arrived the weather was stunning. In retrospect, given the long daylight hours, we should have got out and done a walk that afternoon. Instead we did laundry, scoped grocery stores and camping gear hire options.

Beautiful views from the bus

Parque Nacional Los Glaciares

The next day the forecast was rubbish so there was no impetus to get up and moving. After an early-ish lunch we decided to hike to Laguna Torre. The weather was still cloudy and a bit drizzly, but due to clear – which it did as we walked.

Forest walking

Some views

We were ‘marching’ on our way there, since we weren’t sure how long it was going to take. It took us 2h20 to cover the 9km to Laguna Torre. There was reasonable visibility of the lake by then but not up the valley. We hung out, photographing a white-throated caracara, for a while. But then the wind came up, and we concluded we weren’t really going to get much out of pushing on to Maestri viewpoint, so headed back.

Caracara flies over Laguna Torre

You can tell the direction of the prevailing wind!

Cerro Solo and cloud-obscuring Cerro Torre

View over El Chalten

We woke to rain and wind and no plan to do anything. We headed to the Parks Office to discuss the forecast. The Parks Officer wasn’t particularly encouraging about heading off on the Huemul as the cloud would mean no views. As discussed in my separate blog post in the end we decided to do the Huemul Circuit – and headed off the next day.

Views of Fitzroy from our bedroom – not visible very often!

Back in El Chalten 4 days later, after our Huemul Circuit effort, we decided we’d earned a rest day, and a meal out since we’d been cooking in our apartment the other nights. We had a really enjoyable meal at The Asadores (we went one meat/one vegetarian choice which worked pretty well between us).

Great meal at The Asadores

Unfortunately that day we’d received an email from advising us that our Antarctic trip, which was coming up in 8 days time, had been cancelled due to mechanical issues with the boat. This put a bit of a dampener on the rest of the trip as Antarctica was the final big thing. And we’d also been looking forward to getting on the boat and having someone else make all the decisions for 12 days.

Unsurprisingly this overshadowed our remaining time in El Chalten as we had to spend time trying to work out what to do instead. I guess on the positive (?) side the weather wasn’t great for our last 4 days in El Chalten, so spending hours searching for options on the laptop wasn’t as bad as if the weather had been good.

We did the short (7km return), flat walk to Chorrillo del Salto one morning. It almost ended in disaster when Tom’s shoelace managed to get caught on his other shoe and he took a tumble before we even left town. However, despite a sore foot we managed to get through the remainder of the walk.

Chorrillo del Salto

Given Tom’s foot, I thought I might be doing Laguna de Los Tres by myself. But the following day we both got up at 5am and headed through town to Laguna de Los Tres trailhead. We were somewhat surprised that a ranger was on duty checking park passes (we’d bought an annual pass so it wasn’t like we were up that early to try and skip the checks). The forecast wasn’t great, but it was the best of the remaining 3 days we had.

Early morning views up the Rio Blanco valley

After the other walking we’d done in the area, and reading so much about how hard Laguna de Los Tres, we were surprised at how easy the early stages of the track was. A gradual incline for the first 3km, then we went past Laguna Capri, after which there was a long flat section to Poincenot Camp.

Flat walking on approach to Fitz Roy

The final 400m over 1km I guess is the section which destroys many people. We found it fine – there had obviously been a fair bit of track work done & quite a few steps created from the rocks (maybe not evident to less experienced walkers). Sure it was steep, but not the nightmare that the inexperienced masses of the internet would have you believe. The masses who had camped at Poincenot and then gone up for (the non-existent) sunrise were all on their way down as we went up.

The false summit – almost at Laguna de Los Tres

We got to the end of the trail (Laguna de Los Tres) in 3 hours – where we boiled the billy and ate bakery goods for breakfast. It was relatively still while we were doing that, but once we walked down to the lake edge the wind picked up and was bitterly cold. We stayed up there for a fair while checking out the views over Laguna Sucia etc, hoping that the cloud would lift from Fitz Roy. But it wasn’t to be.

Laguna de Los Tres viewpoint

Tom above Laguna Sucia

Exploring around Laguna de Los Tres

The wind was brutal (as forecast) by the time we left. Our descent of the steep section took about the same time as the ascent (45 minutes). We retraced our route until the junction and then returned via Mirador Fitz Roy, where we had lunch.

On our way back down

At the Fitz Roy Viewpoint

About the best view we got of Fitz Roy that day

Overall we thought that Laguna de Los Tres was easier that Base Torres, as it was a lot less undulating. I don’t know that the rest of the world agrees with that position though.

The next day was devoted entirely to travel planning, while the weather was miserable all day. The following morning was more of the same, but by mid-afternoon I was going stir-crazy. The wind had died somewhat and it wasn’t raining, so I dragged Tom out to Mirador de Los Cóndores and Mirador de Las Aguilas. The weather came sweeping back in towards the end but at least we had got out for something!

Viewpoint Los Cóndores

And finally the next day, our long sojourn in El Chalten was up, and it was time to get the bus back to El Calafate and then fly to Ushuaia despite no Antarctic cruise awaiting us.

Next stop El Chalten where we’d hoped to do quite a lot of hiking but the weather is notoriously fickle so it was very weather dependent. After our first couple of days there it looked like a small weather window was opening for 3 days. The forecast for the first 3 days was ok, the 4th was for a fair bit of rain – but we’d be out of the mountains by then. Not being that confident in alpine conditions we consulted a few local sources and decided it was good enough to attempt the Huemul Circuit.

The Huemul Circuit is typically a 4-day circuit of Cerro Huemul, a 2700m peak on the disputed border between Argentina and Chile.

The Huemul Circuit

One of the great things about El Chalten is most of the trailheads leave from town so no driving needed. This meant we just walked out the door (after registering with Parks via their google doc survey) at 9am and into the mountains. We were delighted to find we got some views of Fitzroy early on, and the vistas just kept opening up. The precipitation of the previous days meant there was recent snow on the ground, and plenty of boggy sections to negotiate. Only one shoes-off river crossing fortunately!

Tom with views of Fitz Roy

Crossing recent snow as we near our highpoint for the day, with spectacular views

Over the highpoint with views of Cerro Huemul (mountain on the left which the walk circumnavigates)

The only shoes-off crossing we had of the trip. A little chilly!

We made it to the day 1 campsite (Laguna Toro) and got one of the last ‘good’ sites. The problem with the weather windows is everyone jumping on the track when one arrives – there were probably >40 people at the campsite that night. Supposedly there used to be a long drop here, but not in evidence any more (only a large shovel). I felt quite uncomfortable with the volume of people and the lack of toilet facilities. Even if everyone is well-versed in LNT (which I doubt they all are) there’s only so many places you can dig a hole.

Andean Fox prowls around camp on night 1

We had hired a tent & sleeping mats for the trip. The tent was small, with negligible vestibule space. The mats were very thin. With no desire to spend 3 nights on the mats, combined with concern about how we’d go with the tent in the rain on day 4 and, concern about the mass of people at camp 2 (which was a lot smaller than day 1) led us to attempt to combine day 2 & 3, shortening the trip by 1 night. The Parks powerpoint presentation which everyone has to watch before starting, had 6 hours & 7 hours as the respective times for most parties, which meant we were looking at a 13 hour day. There’s plenty of daylight – sunrise around 5:30am, sunset at 9:45pm.

Our small hired tent. You can see the packs bulging in the front vestibule. Also note the wind barriers which were constructed all around the campsite

The very sheltered camp 1 is in the trees which are tucked behind a rocky finger to my left

So day 2 had us up at 5:30am and out of camp by 6:45am. Unfortunately we’d already seen a large string of people head off ahead of us. Unfortunately, because, very early on there is a Tyrolean traverse over Río Túnel. If you budget 5 minutes per person getting across it doesn’t take many people before you can be waiting for an hour. So despite all these people ahead of us we were amazed to get to it, and find we were the second couple there.

I think many people missed the route climbing up a waterfall and so had to backtrack. The first couple were a bit nervous so I was the first person across. It was a bit awkward to manage your pack as the landing spot is on slopey rock. It was much easier when someone else was there to help.

We had also hired the harness & gear needed for the Tyrolean – just one harness for the two of us. Ideally you alternate people sharing harnesses to maximise efficiency for everyone else. Let’s just say there wasn’t a lot of efficiency early on, but then a guy from the third party came across. He clearly had a lot of experience with Tyroleans and we got ourselves sorted. Tom was 4th across, and so we were then able to keep going.

Tom on the Tyrolean traverse over Río Túnel. The queue of people look on – top left you can see one person who’s not waiting and is braving fording the river instead.

The lone person fording the river rather than taking the Tyrolean. It gets a bit deeper before he gets out!

Views of the Tyrolean from upstream

Not long after the excitement of the Tyrolean the next challenge is passing the Río Túnel Inferior Glacier. But the ‘track’ leading up to that section is pretty faint, and I was employing all my route finding experience to pick our way efficiently along the slope of the mountain. I imagine you could take a lot longer through this section if you weren’t confident about picking a route. Given how loose the slope was I was very glad no one had caught up with us and so there was no danger of having anything knocked on to you.

On approach to the terminus of Río Túnel Inferior Glacier (on the left covered in dirt)

Passing the Río Túnel Inferior Glacier involves walking on the glacier for a ‘short’ period of time. The route changes each season so you’ve got to make your own way and decide when to get off. Early on the walking was easy as there were a lot of rocks on the glacier so plenty of grip, then it turned to straight ice and things started getting a bit sketchy. We bailed off onto the moraine – which was also a bit sketch, until we got high enough on it. Then it was a 500m slog to get to Paso del Viento (Windy Pass).

Tom walking on the Río Túnel Inferior Glacier – this section was easy as there were so many rocks there was plenty of grip

Tom walking on the Río Túnel Inferior Glacier – this section was getting a bit tricky and we bailed off not long after this photo

One of the key things for this trip is to know the wind forecasts for the two high passes, as they can be impossible at high winds. The wind was supposed to be gusting to no more than 28km/h so we were a bit surprised at the amount of wind we were getting hit with on the way up. Turns out most of it was coming off Río Túnel Superior Glacier and once we’d passed that it was far more pleasant!

Slogging out way up above the glacier

The top of the pass opens up to the really unique thing about this hike – views over the Southern Patagonian Ice Field. The views for the rest of the day were just outstanding. After a short morning tea break we descended to what is normally camp on night 2 (Refugio Paso del Viento).

Views over Southern Patagonia Ice Field – hard to capture the size! From near the top of Paso del Viento (Windy Pass)

Don’t be deceived by Refugio being in the name – it’s just an emergency shelter. We’d caught up to an American couple at the pass and they were doing the same as us, attempting to combine the two days. We both made it to camp 2 around 12:30pm, had lunch & assessed how we were going, and then were off again by 1pm. We’d caught one other couple but they were staying the night so they got best choice of the sites. There wasn’t a lot of space at camp 2 so I was glad I wasn’t going to be there if everyone from the night before made it through.

Approaching what is normally Camp 2, but in our case lunch

We were hoping to shave some time off the Parks estimates, but the next 4 hours were pretty much spot on. This wasn’t particularly surprising as there was little technical challenge in this section, and we aren’t breaking any speed records when it’s just straight-forward track walking. This four hour section was undulating walking alongside/above Viedma Glacier and was spectacular. It was also great because it felt like we were out there on our own (the Americans were a bit ahead of us most of the time). A late afternoon tea (5pm!) on Paso Huemul gave us the energy boost for the final section.

The views for the rest of the afternoon were just spectacular

Having a break and filling up water from one of the many glacial streams (needed to let it warm up a bit before you drank it!)

Looking toward Paso Huemul. A few walkers can be seen in the middle distance.

On our way to Paso Huemul. Viedma Glacier behind Tom.

Slogging our way to Paso Huemul. Viedma Glacier behind

Made it to Paso Huemul. Goodbye Southern Patagonian Ice Field/Viedma Glacier.

Down the other side of Paso Huemul

It is a notoriously steep descent (700m over <2km) down to camp 3. It started off pretty pleasant, but the lower sections were highly eroded. Some sections had ropes in place as you were just going down dirt banks with few hand or foot holds. It’s hard to see how this track can be sustainable in the long term given it’s popularity. This section was supposed to take 3 hours but given we’re pretty used to dealing with terrain like this we did it in less than 2 – making it into camp 3 (Bahía de los Témpanos) at 7pm. The most spectacular 12 hours of hiking I’ve done!

Negotiating the vegetation in one of the rare horizontal sections of the descent

One of the eroded sections of the descent. Hard to capture – this was one of the less steep sections.

Camp was packed so finding a site was a little tricky, but in the end we had a great spot. The photos make it look like we’re on our own, but there were probably 20 tents all pitched right next to each other in the trees behind me.

It’s not often you get to camp next to icebergs – they are noisy! We saw one crack in half while we were eating breakfast.

Breakfast watching the icebergs

The final day is the longest (if you do the 4 day version!), and potentially even longer if you can’t get transport at the end point. We both had very sore feet by this stage and really didn’t want to do the extra 8km slog into town if we couldn’t get a lift/taxi.

Compared to the prior days the final day doesn’t have the same wow factor.

On our way out – the weather looking somewhat ominous over the mountains.

Terminus of Viedma Glacier & Paso Huemul in the far distance

There are good views of the Viedma Glacier terminus, and the track is quite pleasant, but otherwise the highlight is another Tyrolean traverse – back over the Río Túnel. Given this comes close to the end of the track we thought queues might not be such an issue but we arrived to about 8 people in front of us. Four were with a guide and she was very efficiently getting them through.

The other three were very relieved when we said we had a pull cord with us as none of them did! You need a pull cord to retrieve the pulley that you go across the traverse with. This meant Tom ended up managing the pull cord for them (& me) and so no photos of me doing either of the Tyroleans. Fortunately I’d learnt my lessons from the previous day and was very efficient this time round.

Arriving at the second Tyrolean Traverse of the trip

Tom on the Tyrolean

The awkward dismount from the Tyrolean (though easier than the one from the day before)

The final 3km to Bahía Tunel Ferry Dock was a slog – hot and no wind (!). Fortunately for us the 3 we’d shared the pull cord with had arranged a taxi (not sure how as I had no phone reception) and it had just arrived when we got there. Tom ran (well, hobbled) over and asked the driver to come back and get us. One of the others spoke Spanish so was able to interpret. What a relief! 40 minutes later he was back and we were being driven to El Chalten.

For reference in Dec 2025 that taxi cost us ARS60,000 using credit card / 50,000 for cash (roughly A$60). I imagine many shoestring backpackers would rather walk the extra 8km than pay that… but from our perspective it was a cost we’d take every time.

Very glad to be waiting for a taxi and not slogging another 8km to town

A great trip, though like many popular walks, I think its probably being loved to death.

—-

Our statistics (from GPS so including every up/down)

*includes the walk from our accommodation, and also wandering around/collecting water once we got to camp. Normally day 1 is quoted at ~15km.

The day finally arrived for us to start the W. To make us feel better about our early pivot the O Circuit was still closed [and as it turned out was closed for several more weeks]. It was a long day – starting with a 5:15am alarm. I’d had to change our bus bookings and had been a bit annoyed I couldn’t get us on the earliest bus (6:45am). With hindsight I should have put us on the latest bus (7:15am). The earliest bus is helpful if you’re just trying to go to Central/Hotel Las Torres, but as we were now heading to Hotel Grey it was of no benefit. This was because less than a busload of people continue on to Lago Grey and so everyone from all of the morning buses gets consolidated into one bus – so we had to wait for the last bus to arrive before we could get going. The road (which we’d driven a couple of days earlier) is windy, corrugated, narrow and dirt – all leading to a very slow trip.

I was hoping since all the passengers were going to Lago Grey that we wouldn’t stop at all the intermediate stops but that wasn’t the case. We even had a longer stop at the Pehoé campground so the bus driver could get his maté. But don’t worry he assured us – it’s South America, you just need to go with the flow… We eventually got to Hotel Grey just on midday (scheduled to arrive 11:30am). We quickly checked in for the ferry and started walking. It’s about 3km from Hotel Grey to the boarding point of the ferry. Unfortunately the rain started about half way there.

The walk to the Lago Grey Ferry

The forecast had said rain for the afternoon but it arrived a couple of hours earlier. By the time we got on board we were quite wet. Then once we had the welcome blurb from staff, been given our ‘free’ calafate sour complete with glacier ice, gone on the deck in the rain for photos, retreated back inside… we were already at the Refugio Grey dock. We were slightly less disappointed about missing the sailing next to the glacier given how poor the weather was!

Delightful weather on our ferry on Lago Grey

If we’d known how slow check-in was going to be at Grey Campsite we might have hustled off the ferry a little faster. As it was we were probably the last ones to leave the beach (about 10 min walk to camp), and therefore a long way back in the check-in queue. There were plenty of people arriving on foot from Paine Grande so we weren’t at the back of the queue for long. However, it was a pretty inefficient system and we were in the queue for at least 45 minutes.

Arriving near the Grey campsite

By 2:30pm we’d made it to the front of the queue, and then been shown to our designated tent. Given the field of tents, and some of the angles they were pitched on we got a pretty good spot. You might be wondering why we opted to go for the pre-erected tents? The demand for overnight spots (whether it’s in the refugios, pre-erected tents, or own tent sites) is incredibly high. In order to get the dates and sites you want you need to book several months in advance. It seems the operators of the campsites release the pre-erected tent offerings first, and only offer the pitch-your-own sites later. So to get the dates you want it’s a gamble to wait for the pitch-your-own sites. Also, as you’ll see from some of the later sites we stayed at – there are no pitch-your-own sites, as the sites are on the side of a hill! Plus, in our case, we had to decide whether we wanted to schlep a tent around South America for 4 months when we’d only be using it for at most about two weeks – and ultimately decided it wasn’t worth the effort.

Music festival or Grey Campsite?

After a very late lunch we walked out to the Grey Glacier viewpoint. We had hoped to walk further up the track over the various suspension bridges. However, a couple of days before we started the police investigation had decided that section of track needed to be closed – even though the deaths didn’t occur anywhere near this section. So that wasn’t to be. Fortunately the viewpoint we could go to was pretty good (and it had stopped raining).

Weather clears slightly (but not the rain splotches on my camera) – Grey Glacier lookout

The facilities at Grey seemed completely disproportionate to the number of people staying there. The cooking room for campers seated 30-40 (depending on the squeeze), asides from that room there were 3 picnic tables under cover and maybe another 5 that weren’t undercover. Given the number of campers that it was capable of taking that meant a lot of people who weren’t able to fit – especially on a night where it was still drizzling on and off. Plus, you’re not meant to cook anywhere other than at the designated areas. We fortunately managed to get an undercover picnic table for our dinner that night!

It poured with rain much of the night and there was a bit of wind. The tent handled it all with ease and our mattresses were  comfortable. It was a relatively short day ahead to Paine Grande so there was no need to get going early. By 9:30am, when we started walking, the rain seemed to have cleared but it was still cloudy and windy.

Waterfall on our way to Paine Grande

We got great views of the glacier throughout the morning – though we kept having to turn around to see them.

Tom with Chilean Firebushes and Grey Glacier

Last good view of Grey Glacier – funny leg positions as we were trying to stay upright in the wind!

Somewhat ironically we had lunch off the track next to this sign which seemed to be prohibiting everything! Not that I disagree with most of it.

No doing anything!

Shortly after lunch we spotted a family of Caiquen – mum, dad & 5 goslings which were incredibly cute. So many walkers had just marched straight past them without seeing them.

Caiquen family

Weather clearing as we approach Paine Grande

We got to Paine Grande at 2pm, and had a very straight-forward check-in compared to the day before. The facilities were much better than Grey – a much larger dining/cooking hall. The tents were on platforms so less chance of a slope – though Tom complained this made the sleeping overnight harder – can’t please some people!

Paine Grande views on morning of day 3

We got away slightly later than planned (7:55am rather than 7:30am). It took us 2 hours to get to Italiano “Camp” (it’s no longer a camp), where we, and hundreds (?) of others could leave our full packs and proceed with day packs.

Fine views

It was so nice to have the light weight pack as we took 2h10 to get up to Mirador Britanico (approx. 500m ascent). We pushed fairly hard on the way up, not stopping or taking too many photos. The views from Mirador Francés did make it a worthwhile destination in its own right, and the views throughout the walk were outstanding.

Climbing towards Mirador Francés

We had lunch at the top at 12:30pm and after an hour started heading back down. We had a more relaxed approach to the descent – having a lot more stops and photos. Looking back over the whole trip, from our perspective, the side-trip to Britanico was the highlight (but only worthwhile in good weather!).

At the high point of Mirador Britanico

Lovely views

More views

On our way back down

We were back down at the packs just before 4pm. We were clearly some of the last as the pile of bags was decimated compared to when we’d left in the morning and we’d struggled to find somewhere to squeeze our packs!

Hardly any bags left at the Italian “camp”. In the morning these shelves were completely full.

Loaded back up with our full weight we just had 2km to get to Francés Campsite. When we’d booked the sites we’d been tossing up between Francés or Cuernos for this night. We thought we’d be pretty tired after the long side trip to Brittanico but we were feeling pretty good when we got to Francés and could have kept going. Francés was our first experience of the safari-style tents built onto the hillsides. The first two campsites were run by a different operator and the mattresses were way more comfortable. The ones in the safari-tents were hard and uncomfortable. We’re used to far more primitive conditions, but given we were paying an extortionate amount to camp here, we definitely enjoyed the hot showers.

Safari style tents on the slopes

The landscape was somewhat prohibitive to installing a large dining hall, instead there were small cooking rooms dotted through the campsite. In addition, the cafeteria sold drinks, pizzas and provided the pre-booked meals for those who didn’t want to self-cater. Given the prices of everything else the wine was somewhat reasonably priced so we treated ourselves before retreating to a cooking shelter for our dehy meal.

Refugio Francés

One definite downside of the campsites nestled on the hill is the bathrooms being a bit of a slog to get back from in the middle of the night!

The safari tents were very dark, which was a plus for actually sleeping in. Given how far south we were the sun was getting up pretty early. After the first couple of days the weather was now settled and, leaving at 8:30am, our first hour to Cuernos was spectacular – completely still lake and lots of surrounding mountains. It was too early to have a break at Cuernos so we pushed on and had morning tea at 10:15am at the last lookout before the track swung away from the mountain views.

More views!

Views!

We ended up having an early lunch at Rio del Arriero. The bridge was one-way and as you had walkers coming in both directions there were some short queues. The walkers behind Tom were quite impatient and rushing to get across. They ended up jolting the bridge and Tom’s hand rather than grabbing the handhold, had his finger jammed into the wire instead. So, we decided to have lunch by the river so Tom could ice his finger in the glacial water.

Suspension bridge

The scenery after lunch was mainly rolling hills with a heap of Firebushes. We stopped at a few more creeks for finger-icing and drinks. I didn’t carry any water for the day, just drank at creeks every couple of hours. It was a very sunny and still day – even at Windy Pass.

Almost at Chileno

We got to Chileno campsite about 3:40pm. If we’d thought Francés was vertical then this campsite was even more so. I groaned as we were allocated a tent that was about half way up the hill. It was a bit of an effort to get to it after an 16.5km day (all with full packs). While my brand new boots were keeping my feet lovely and dry, I was suffering in all the ways you’d expect from having non-broken in boots.

Chileno campsites – a long way up the hill

No stoves are allowed at Chileno, so you either need to buy dinner from the Refugio or else just use the boiling water which was on tap in the camp kitchen. All the day walkers for Base Torres go through Chileno so it’s not the most relaxing spot. On a nice day, like we had, it was pleasant to sit outside on the picnic tables, but if the weather was poor there was very limited covered space.

Really you’re paying for the location, as it puts you in a good position for hiking up to the Base of the Towers for sunrise. As the sun was rising at 5:30am, and we wanted to be there 45 minutes before that, we concluded we needed to start walking by 2:45am. Given how awful the mattresses were we weren’t too unhappy to not spend the entire night on them. The alarm went off at 2:30am, and we were walking by 2:42am. We quickly overtook lots of people – it was an easy track compared to much of the rest – compacted with no rocks. I guess I’m also somewhat used to walking at night with my rogaining experience. We made very good time – 3:35am at the ranger station (3 of 4km done).

The final 1km is steep and in the dark we inadvertently left the track and ended up in a boulder field. I quite enjoyed the scramble up through the boulders (though I assume it was slower), and we eventually rejoined the track. Not long after that we were at the base of Los Torres at 4:15am. It was already first light and was amazing to be there by ourselves. Twenty minutes later there was a constant trickle of other hikers arriving – probably around 100 people there for sunrise. Fortunately there was a lot of room and it didn’t feel too packed.

Early morning at the base of the towers

Sun starts hitting the towers

We hung around till 6am and then headed back down to Chileno. It was clear why we’d lost the track on our way up – it was largely going up a creek at that point, and not at all obvious.

The scree slope we clambered up (incorrectly) in the dark

We were back at Chileno at 7:30am, where we packed up, and then had breakfast. We left a bit after 9am, there were already so many people on the trail who’d walked up from Central/Hotel Los Torres. Little did we know how many more we were going to see! As we started hitting the day trippers who had arrived by bus from Puerto Natales, we counted 600 people in a short space of track.

We were at the Welcome Centre by 10:30am and could have just made the shuttle bus to go to Laguna Amarga. But, given our bus to Puerto Natales was booked at 3pm, we didn’t want to run the risk of not being able to get on an earlier bus. Laguna Amarga was a dust bowl and so we didn’t want to be stuck hanging out there for several hours. The Welcome Centre by contrast had a cafe, gift shop, and some picnic tables in a grassy meadow with nice views. At 2pm we got the shuttle to Laguna Amarga, and then unfortunately the buses to Puerto Natales were running late so we didn’t get on those till 3:30pm, but we were back in Puerto Natales at 5:10pm, only 5 minutes after schedule.

The towers now tucked away

I was pretty happy with the decision to book accommodation only 3 minutes walk from the bus station – both for when we arrived that afternoon, and for the departure the next morning. We had a lovely meal in Puerto Natales and slept incredibly well on a comfortable mattress 🙂

Our W – we went West to East