El Bolson

El Bolson 16.12.11 – 21.12.11

El Bolson is a lovely, friendly town through which the dusty Route 40 runs. It is flanked on both sides by mountains which hold beautiful countryside that reminds me of summertime in the countryside of my childhood. It holds the same flowers, same smells. From what we have seen of the town it is a liberal minded and creative place which is evident in the carved sculptures everywhere and the various buildings (from triangular shaped cabanas to a literal fairytale castle turret and all!!) 

There is a relaxed atmosphere hanging under the blue sky, almost soporific and everyone we passed seemed always to be engaged in a laughing conversation or just simply sat together watching the world go by.

Watching the world go by in our campsite would lead you to the three types of birds that roam around its corners. Each of these types of birds are crazy in their own way. We named them thusly; The Brown Skree; which is a brown hawk like looking bird, The Hook Billed Beaker was the bird we had most contact with; a strange mix between a cartoon bird and the personality of a dog

and the Honker Gull; that looks like a sea gull but sounds like a huge honking car horn. All were named in part for their crazed and extremely loud calls.

We trudged under all our weight (not much longer to go now!) to a cute little campsite on the edge of town. It is a really green place run by friendly people and some crazy birds, it has a little stream burbling through it and part of it is a tiny wood. We can see both sets of mountains and the blue sky from our little nook surrounded by a tree, next to the stream, and I fall asleep and wake to a constant cacophony of birdsong.

We did do some hikes as planed but only short day ones which limited us a bit but that was fine by us. El Bolson had made our bones heavy and our eyes dozy and we just wanted to loll about reading and writing, eating helado and drinking coffee. So, for the most part, we did!

We did make it across the river and up along the ridge line which looked down on the valley and the aptly named and astonishing so Rio Azul (Blue River). 

We followed the path through beautiful countryside, wild flowers everywhere; large daisies, pink, purple, orange flowers, to the dubious ‘Cabeza del Indio’ (Head of the Indian), an anthromorpholigised rock that needed some imagination. But then we walked to a waterfall and after we got over the usual paying for nothing that you have to endure in Argentina, the waterfall was actually really beautiful.

Another day trek we did, well I say trek but what I mean is a grandma’s amble, to Laguna Puelo. It is a big blue lake in a National Park. At the park’s entrance we met a very friendly and informative guide who took a deep breath and asked to practice his English. He of course spoke it perfectly but kept asking if he was doing OK and whether we could understand him, to which we replied ‘yes, yes, muy bien!’ Then we went and blew it by immediately taking two wrong turns in a row! His mate had to come and rescue us. We had visions of the man saying to his mate ‘my English was really good then! Those gringos understood every word!’ and then watching as we steadily but assuredly walked completely the wrong way!! We reckoned his mate said to him ‘err either your English is actually pretty bad or they are complete idiots!’ Wonder which one is correct there?!?! Hmm no improvement on our map reading skills then. Still we’ll blame it this time on hazy, dozy, sleepy El Bolson… We managed the rest of the route by ourselves and were practically the only humans there. We walked through magical forests, where the trees seemed as though they were from Fangbourne Forest, and a mini swamp, right up to a high mirador that looked out over the deep blue lake and the mountains around it. 

All the time we were followed by Brown Skrees ‘skreeee! Skreee!’

The rest of our time here consisted entirely of local pace. I read a book and a half in three days! We did some writing, we ambled around looking at the fantastic hand made wonderlings on the market and I bought the most amazingly expressive puppet! 

We lolled around in the sun on the grass filled central plaza, listening to local bands (who weren’t so bad, they were actually quite good) and watching the hippies dance. Splendid.

Now let’s hope we can get our bones warmed up enough to move ourselves to Bariloche, next stop!

Getting to Puerto Madryn and Peninsula Valdez for WHALES!!!

WELL!
We got into a bit of a pickle on our way to the east Atlantic coast. We were planning on trying to stay at an estancia and go on a ten hour hike through canyons and to the cave of hands and back. As we were travelling across the barren wastelands of the Andean Steppe we started to ask some questions to each other that perhaps we should have asked earlier!! Like 'after the estancia, how will we get back to Perito Moreno?' (which was the nearest town). So after we'd asked each other this and didn't seem to know the answer, we asked the driver. Through our broken understanding of Spanish we discovered that we would only be able to get back by hitching. As I have mentioned before, we are literally travelling with nearly all but the kitchen sink. We would NOT be attractive pick ups as hitchers.


So, we scrapped our plan of the estancia, which upon reading about more closely is really only accessible by car and decided to stay on the bus to Perito Moreno. We then spent the rest of the journey there trying to figure out how we could get from Perito Moreno eastwards and up the coast to Puerto Madryn, which is next to Peninsula Valdez. 


By the time we had figured out a route we had arrived at the town. One of our lovely bus drivers helped us to get a bed in his friends hotel for cheap and we started to cross our fingers that the buses wouldn't all be booked up! Our hotel was hilarious and definitely one for the memory banks! It was a like time warp, stuck in about 1975, from all the furniture, the scowling countenance of our host right down to the groups of middle age men playing cards for money whilst smoking and drinking at midday. Brilliant. We marched straight to the bus station to see if we could get on the next bus to Comodoro Rividavia in which we could swap to (still fingers crossed) a night bus to Puerto Madryn. As we walked through the small, literally one road town towards the bus station, I felt there was quite some charm about the place. The people were really friendly, I had to print, scan and email a document and the lovely man not only charged me about 40p to do so but also gave us a Route 40 keyring each, get in!! AND we found a cafe with the fastest wifi in all of Argentina so far in which we sat in all the next day as we waited for the bus, with Lyndsey and Sandro. So as you can guess from the previous sentence, we managed to get a ticket from a strange old lady at the bus station which left for the coast at 4pm the next day. Hoorah!


We arrived at Comodoro Rividavia at 9pm and scored two tickets to Puerto Madryn no problems from a lovely and incredibly well dressed man at the company Don Otto. He even let us keep our HUGE bags in their tiny office. Then we scarpered and found a very friendly cafe again with wifi, (result!) and sat there eating and drinking until our bus left at 1am that night. Up until they closed at middnight there were still young families coming in with spritely kids. It was very strange. It mist be the siesta they have from 1pm until 5pm every day in full effect!


We arrived in Puerto Madryn at 6am into a plush and very well equipped bus station. We had made it! With no preparation and by luck of the buses it seems. PHEW!!

Our hostel was lovely and really clean and even though we had to spend three nights in a six person dorm (I much prefer the tent to dorms) all with smelly boys who snored ALL night, we eventually got into our own room with our own bathroom, paradise! It cost us a pretty penny but it was so worth it. After all that camping we needed soft beds, lies in and our own space. 


From our hostel we arranged for the second day of us being here a tour of Peninsula Valdez. We had been told that their tours here were good, especially the guide. They weren't wrong. Our guide was brilliant and he knew so much about the wildlife we saw, in fact he was so enthusiastic about it! We loved asking him questions! Especially as his voice was so funny. He had a few mannerisms that made us really enjoy listening to him throughout our ten hour round trip. He was humm after every sentence that he said and his pronunciations and jokes made him sound like he was singing! 


So first stop on our little bus was at a cute museum which had a full sized Southern Right Whale skeleton on display. The very whale we had come to see! We were keeping our fingers firmly crossed that some were still around as it is the very last days of the season. The Whales come into the bay as the waters are warm and protected to calf and nurse their babies. If we had been here about a month ago we would have seen many many whales and their babies but at this time most had left as their calves were old enough to experience the open sea.

So after the museum we drove to the tiny village on the peninsula right on the shores of Golfo Nuevo. This was where we were going to get on our boat to seek out the whales! We were so excited but trying to hold it down as we didn't want to be disappointed. Everyone kept saying 'at this time of year there is no guarantee that you will see whales'. We were so excited but also so apprehensive. We put on our bright orange life jackets and all headed to the boat. As the boat was driven down to and we entered the sea we both focussed on the horizon, remembering our furrowed brows and focussing eyes from our Pacific Coast three day search for whales. After about ten minutes there was a big patch of sea up ahead that was being flown into by a large group of sea gulls. Ooo! What could this be. As we came closer and the boat's engine was cut we sat still and listened. Then a second later we saw a flurry of action right next to the boat. Small dorsal fins broke the surface and we realised we were right next to a small group of dolphins! 
NB - Please excuse the quality of wildlife photography from this point on. We really were too busy looking with our eyes!

They were small and black and white and we were told that they were rounding up the fish into a bait ball and then eating them. The sea gulls were gaining from their work too and diving into the top of the bait ball to eat the fish. Then a huge un-dolphin like shape leaped out of the water!! It took a while for my eyes to take in what the shape was and as I was looking another sea lion jumped clean out of the water, arcing her brown body into a sleek curve and re-entering the water with barely a splash. AmAzing! I had not seen a sea lion jump before and before I knew it I saw two more jumps. The sea lions were so funny! They came really close next to our boat and really looked at us. Their heads looked so funny popping out of the water like that!


After a short while we moved off, back in search of whales again. About five minutes later we spotted a still boat on the horizon. As we became closer to it, a HUGE shape moved up vertically right in front of the boat, dwarfing it as it did so. Incredible! I was the head of a massive Southern Right Whale!! Hooray! It made us suck in our breath and when we exhaled it was a 'wow' that came out of our lips. We watched on as her huge barnacled head bobbed up a few more times and then she started to float towards our boat. We were told that she was a very old whale, a grandma, and her calf was about three months old. He was a playful thing, mostly swirling around on his mother's tail. Her 'soplos' or the water and air she ejects when she breathes was really resonant and an incredible sound. We spent some time with her as she sank and rose above the surface, lifted her fins, lifted up her gargantuan head and as her calf rolled and played about her side. It was astounding. Then we headed off in search of any others we could find.

We came across another whale and her calf who weren't that happy to see us. She turned around and immersed herself and slowly swam away. Then almost right next to her there was another mother and calf who were much more pleased to see us and curious enough to venture right up to the boat. We spent time 'oo-ing' and 'ahh-ing' as she sank and rose and rolled onto her side to show her fins. Her calf was really playful and after spending many minutes with them we started to move off. As we did the calf rolled onto his side and waved us goodbye with his fin, it was incredible!! Such a moment. As we moved further away, the calf then launched himself out of the water and splashed back down again! Brilliant! We were so happy - smiling from ear to ear as we motored back to Puerto Pirimides. 


On we went with the tour and after a short drive we drove to a small penguin colony, the penguins of the Magallens variety (the only one in the world with a black stripe on its tummy). They had nested on the cliff top above the beach and we could get really close to them here. We had to be very quiet and look very carefully for chicks. It wasn't long until we saw a big fluffy one stood in front of it's mum/dad in their rock nest. Cool!

There were penguins, chilling and flapping around and all the way at the bottom of the cliff we saw then waddle into the sea and speed off. They are so cute!


Next we went to a place on top of the cliff where we could look down upon an Elephant Seal colony which had gathered on a sandy bar. They were SO fat! It was only the females and the pups left at this time of year. The massive blubber nosed males that give the seals their names are long gone filling up their blubber carcasses out in the open sea. They were a very still but loud bunch. The grating pulsating sound that they emanate is a very strange sound, a bit like when your ears are muffled with too much water and then they gurgle back to clear hearing. They hardly moved but when they did it was hilarious. A group of adults were around some sea water and a couple of them were lying there with their heads dipped in the water to keep them cool. Others would snort and move their flippers to flick sand and cool stones onto their backs. 

We drove to another place where we could see elephant seals and sea lions. There was a lot more action here. We watched as a couple of seals frolicked in the water doing a sort of open mouthed slow fight dance (Check out our Flickr video of this interaction when I can finally upload it). 

A lot of the seals were all different colours. When I asked our guide Daniel why this was he told me it was because they were moulting. I looked at one close up and it was gross! The new fresh black skin was visible but around it hung on gobbules of palid dead skin, yuck. We spent about half an hour watching these funny creatures through our binoculars and our camera lenses and then we were off driving back to Puerto Madryn which would take about two hours. Time for a snooze!


Since that fantastic day we haven't really done much really. We really have just chilled out and relaxed. We've been on picnics on the beach. Each day has been a sunny, warm and totally blue sky day. We've been revelling in the novelty of this throughout our walks on the beach and whilst drinking delicious red wine. I;ve read a book in two days, Sam's done lots of writing. I've been reading and starting to plan our Bolivia trip (very excited) and I've caught up on this blog and trying to upload photos (which take about two hours to do twenty!!). We've really needed this still time. I've been poorly as well, a head cold and a nasty cough but I'm getting better. I really like Puerto Madryn. It's  a really chilled out, friendly place with a slow pace and a fantastic atmosphere. We're off to El Bolson on the other side of the country tomorrow night so we will be leaving Patagonia and entering The Lake District. Then on to Bariloche, the chocolate capital of Argentina, just in time for Christmas! Hooray!

Trekking in El Chalten

El Chalten 3.12.11 – 7.12.11

We had a fantastic journey to El Chalten along route 40. Our driver was brilliant, playing some good music as we peered out the window at increasingly spectacular views. Then the Fitz-Roy mountain range came into view and it was incredible to look at. 

The day was a perfect blue sky spring day and although it was a bit nippy outside the scenery almost looked like a painted on backdrop. Elis actually took some jump shot photos of us which looked like we had been superimposed. It was glorious. 

The driver stopped at various points along the way for us to take the view in and some photos. He also took us to the information centre where a very helpful guide told us in a lot of detail about the area and asked us to leave no trace and protect the area to keep the national park free. (Wow! Something for free in Argentina! Unprecedented!!) We also got a detailed map of the walks we can do and all decided to do a six hour walk the next day to see Cerro Torre. Samly and I decided that this was definitely our favourite bus trip so far, brilliant. He even took us to our camp site and after meeting the windswept and hairy Humberto, we pitched our tent in a spot with a chocolate box view of a stream leading up to the snow capped peaks in the distance. Absolutely wonderful. Here is the view out of our tent door!

We wandered around the town which at first seemed a little like a ghost town, wind swept and elemental and we frequented a cafe, the supermercados and a restaurant before heading to our respective beds.

The next morning we met at eleven AM after deciding upon a much needed lie in and began walking our way to the laguna from which you could see the peak of Cerro Torre and the glacier. It took us three hours there, mostly in the up direction (my screaming muscles!) and we walked through beautiful countryside, glacier streams and an extraordinary forest of dead trees, the bark of which had turned silver white, very ghostly! 

We arrived at the glacier lake and had a very chilly and windswept lunch picnic and began our walk back. (If you look closely there are huge chunks of ice in that there glacier lake - and the strong, gusty wind had a minus degrees chill factor! We're doing very well to attempt to move our mouth muscles into a smile in this photo!!)

We were still able to drink the water straight from the streams as they came directly from the glacier melt. By this time we had enjoyed glacier water so much we had created a little celebration ritual of our own! Here is Sam demonstrating said ritual!!

Although mostly down hill, I’m afraid I had hit my trekking limit about an hour before the end and my face soured a little, but the promise of homemade, organic ice cream at the end spurred me on and when we arrived back into town we all collapsed into chairs and had cups of coffee and buckets of mixed flavoured ice cream. We tried the dulce de leche granizado, lemon pie and calafate flavours. The calafate berry is a local berry and it tastes a little like blackcurrant in the ice cream we had, yummy. Argentinians LOVE dulce de leche which is a delicious caramel (I guess their version of the Colombian arequipe) and you can get it on and with everything here! It is yummy. I have taken to eating it with crackers out of a pot! Later on we cooked a meal for ourselves on our stove and went to bed just as the sun did.

The next day Sam and I had yet another lie in and then as it was another blue sky day, we decided to walk to the laguna Capri and the mirador of the Fitz-Roy mountain range. It was the most astoundingly beautiful walk we have done yet! And much faster than the predicted time of one hour forty five minutes. Mercifully short and through woods of crazy looking old trees, the kind you imagine in story books with hairy lichen growing all over them and alongside the incredible valley (the view which we can see from our tent).
The path along the valley is very high up and you can see for miles! The mirador is spectacular and we spent a good while there taking photos and staring into the sun and the unbelievable beauty of the range. 

Then we walked round further to reach the lake. This too was so, so beautiful. The colours and reflections and the golden glimmers that the sun made on the surface of the lake rendered us quiet and still for a spell. 

That evening we all met up and had a meal together and again Samly and I drank a bottle of amazing wine, this time a woody tasting Malbec. We chatted the night away and even got to see some stars before we went to sleep. In fact we had a little excitement just before bedtime! As I was brushing my teeth in the bathroom, Sam urgently whispered ‘Clarence, Clarence!’ I rushed out just in time to see a skunk skulking passed, tail raised! I couldn’t believe my eyes! I scrambled for my camera and followed him down through some bushes but his black camouflage worked well and he disappeared into the dark of the night. Sam told me later that he had seen the skunk and thought it was a badger, upon thinking it was strange that there was a badger in Argentina he moved closer to get a better look. The animal then raised its tail and began making a throaty growling sound. Then Sam called me and the skunk started moving off! How crazy is that! A real wild and angry skunk!

The next day we awoke to rain and wind hammering at sides of the tent. We had planned to walk to the mirador to see some condors but it was not going to be nice battling hefty wind strength and rain lashes. Instead we readied ourselves for our next trip and sought refuge in a café. Before meeting up with the others we returned to our tent to find it blown onto its side! Hilarious removal attempt ensues which involved us trying to pull the tent to relocate it practically inside a tree bush thing and me falling backwards, trapped on my back by the wind and the muscle weakening giggles. It was hilarious. We managed to peg it in and the tree did work very well as a wind shield. After some reorganisation and a bit of a snooze we met up with the others to say our farewells. It had been lovely having a group to hang out with and they were all really lovely and interesting people. When you’re travelling two weeks is a long time to spend with people and it had been great! The time had come for us to go our separate ways however. Although they would be staying together a little while longer, travelling to Bariloche, as we were headed further inland Patagonia to stay on an estancia about eighteen kilometres from la cueva de los manos (the cave of hands) which holds cave art from around seven thousand years BC. So we ate some tasty food together for one last time and said our goodbyes. Their bus was leaving at midnight that night whilst ours wasn’t leaving until nine AM the next morning. By this time the wind had died down, the rain had stopped and blue sky had appeared. Although the temperature had dropped by quite a few degrees. They weren’t joking when they said that anything can happen with the weather in Patagonia!

However we slept through an incredibly cold night in the tent and got dressed in the freezing cold morning. We packed up all our things and waved goodbye to lovely, bumbly Humberto and our beautiful campsite and set off for the café to load up on empanadas, pastries and bread for the journey.

Here I am writing this on our journey. We are travelling on a bus along the (in)famous route 40, part tarmacked (when I say 'part' I actually mean 'tiny bit'), part rubble bump road with an hilarious team of drivers. Some of which know where we need to be dropped on the side of the road for our estancia. Route 40 is a very, VERY straight road that leads through the amazingly barren and mostly flat land of Patagonia. Here is a view from Route 40 when we stopped at a gas stop...

One of the drivers has just legged it out of the bus as it stopped and caught an armadillo!! He brought it back on board for us all to see and then let it go again. SO cute! I’ve never seen an armadillo before. Fancy that! A skunk one day and an armadillo the next!! Armadillos are hairy little guys!

Fingers crossed where we’re going will be nice. We’ve planned to stay at this estancia so that we can trek a round trek of ten hours through a canyon to the cave of hands and back but who knows what we’ll find when they drop us off at the side of the road! We weigh a tonne with all our stuff as well so we’re hoping that the driver’s estimation of about ten minutes walk is as close as close can be! I’ll let you know what happens in the next instalment!

El Calafate for Glacier Perito Moreno

El Calafate 1.12.11 – 3.12.11

Glacier Perito Moreno

We all took different buses from Puerto Natales to El Calafate. Bron, Elis, Lene and Jakob caught an earlier bus at seven AM and we got a lie in and caught the eight thirty one. The Chile to Argentina border crossing was a lot less stressful than our crossing the other way around. No xray machines and threats of fining your bags of cattle semen, just a stamp and the confirmation that I was a professura (teacher).

We arrived in El Calafate, which was an expensive place and almost exclusively set up around tourism. After finding the map hard to follow (I really hope our map reading skills improve at some point!) we asked a friendly looking man where our camp site was. He walked us nearly all the way there, lovely man, and we found a beautiful pitch under a willow tree, along to a burbling stream lined with bright green grass and more importantly next door to our lovely neighbours Bron and Elis! 

The showers and toilets were really clean and nice (always a worry at a camp ground) and there was the potential of WiFi. There was an asado grill and a bench for us to sit at so it was a no brainer that a massive BBQ complete with copious wine would ensue. So we booked our mini trekking tour around and on the glacier and set off to the supermercado all together. We almost bought the whole place out and for once I was really looking forwards to a BBQ!

Elis prepared the asado by building and lighting a fire and when the embers occurred, he placed them under the grill. Samly and Bron prepared the food and I fannied about as usual until someone realised that I could have the job of getting more wine. I think we were being a little bit too conservative buying two bottle when in reality we really wanted four!! Two each of a Malbec and a Cabernet Sauvignon, both wines were delicious, so fruity! We filled our tummies and giggled all night.

The next day was an early start as we boarded the bus to drive the three hours to the glacier Perito Morneo. Our first glimpse of the glacier was as we rounded the corner whilst on the mountain road and caught sight of it spilling down from between the mountains and ended with its façade in a lake. As we neared it became possible to ascertain he enormity of the face of this glacier. It was HUGE! Also as we got closer you could see the sculptured top, all spikes and sharp undulations and the blue was indescribable. We had about two hours to walk around the walkways and watch the glacier whilst we had lunch. We got very excited when we heard the thunderous rumble and crack as a large piece of ice fell off the glacier and landed with a huge PLUOOOMP! And BANG! Into the water. As we watched more and more, some were so big they created waves! It was amazing.

Next came the boat trip which took us very close to the glacier face. It was hard to tell at some points whether we were looking at a real thing! 

The blue appeared most vivid inside the cracks which we saw a lot more clearly after we had fitted on crampons and went for a walk on the glacier itself. It was a strange experience walking on this landscape we knew was completely made from  ice. 

Our guide explained that the blue came from the ice absorbing all the colours of the spectrum and our eyes picked up the blue. It reminded me of glacier mints at points (and my grandma who used to eat them all the time). 

We walked up and down ice paths and saw drop holes and water pools and different features on the surface of the glacier. At one point we could also hear water rushing under the ice, making such a loud noise. It was incredible. The our crazy guide just decided to leap onto a bit of the glacier and use two axes to climb all the way up, nutter! 

We finished the whole walk off with a whisky, complete with fresh glacier ice! Then we took the boat back to catch our bus back to El Calafate.

That night we had our second delicious BBQ. BBQ-ed mushroom, butternut squash, beetroot, peppers, cobs, bread and a little bit more wine, yum. We also played with 'Pig', a cute, fat little scamp of a dog who befriended us and went mad for the moving tyres on cars. She had a HUGE pot belly (which she had grown almost exclusively from the proceeds of campers left over asado meat!) 

Then to sleep as early to rise for our bus trip (still with our lovely travelling buddies) to El Chalten for some trekking in the countryside and mountains there. 

Puerto Natales, Chile for the 'W' Trek

From the most southernly city in the world, the only way is north, which is the direction we headed after leaving Ushuaia. We hopped on our first Argentinian bus (which was pretty average after all the platitudes Argentinian buses were getting from most people we met in Colombia), its destination Puerto Natales in Chile for us to do the ‘W’ trek. Our bus journey involved a border crossing, a mild panic about tomatoes (no fruit or veg, or cattle semen for that matter, allowed into Chile) and most importantly our first meeting with Lene and Jakob from Denmark. We discovered that we were staying at the same hostel and so when we arrived in Puerto Natales and it was getting dark we headed there together. Sam and I had planned to give ourselves a day to rest and get stuff sorted and figured out for our five day hike through the National Park Torres del Paine. Lene and Jakob set off the next afternoon and we waved them goodbye. We planned to get the 7am bus the day after and spent nearly all of the rest of that day packing our bags (which weighed the same as a small human), complete with sleeping bags, gas stove, cooking implements, all our food, the tent and our waterproofs. No shower equipment or change of clothes were packed, we were going ferrel/going to immerse ourselves in nature.

The W Trek – 25^th – 29^th November

Day 1

We boarded the bus feeling doubtful at 7am due to the threatening grey clouds and fairly strong wind in Puerto Natales. We arrived at the lake to board the catamaran and I realised the full extent of the task ahead of me. I was fully dressed from head to toe in warm and wet weather clothing but the wind kept knocking me sideways, whipping my wet weather clothes in fits and starts around my body. We made it onto the catamaran and waited for it to begin its journey across to the other side of the lake in order for us to start the ‘W’ trek from West to East. As we sat inside in the relative warmth, we felt the wind shaking the boat as it shivered passed it, blowing up lake water so high that it splashed on the windows that I was looking out of. This lake water was the fantastic colour of turquoise, and an unbelievably Disney version of the colour as well. Then we set off. The wind lifted the catamaran clean out of the water as we travelled over the lake at speed. I loved the feeling in my tummy but felt sure that even though the water looked like a friendly Disney style version of turquoise, if the catamaran flipped and we began to sink I certainly wouldn’t particularly feel Disney style as I was dying an icy death!! We finally got there and left the boat only to be greeted with the strongest wind I think I can remember experiencing. We battled our way through it to get to the communal kitchen at the first Refugio. Despite being only a few metres from where the catamaran docked, it took us a fair while to battle there at a 45 degree angle. As we squeezed ourselves inside the Refugio we bumped into Lene and Jakob who had been stuck there from the previous night due to the wind and the rain. We pulled our socks up and decided that whatever the weather we were going to make the camp at Refugio Grey at the top of the first vertical line of the W by close to the allotted time of three hours marked on the map. Off we set. Blown this way and that, the strength of the wind was magnified by the sheer weight of my backpack and it took all the ounces of energy I had to climb up and up and up. The ascent did not seem to want to stop! I had to resign myself to the fact that this was going to be the complete personality of the road ahead. On we battled. After about two hours the wind seemed to die down and the rain ceased lashing my face and as my eyes focussed at the first mirador and I caught sight of my first ICEBERG!! I was so shocked and excited! I knew we were heading towards the Grey glacier but it hadn’t sunk in that I might be actually experiencing icebergs. I could not believe how blue they were, it was as if part of a crisp winter’s blue sky had been caught inside a crystal, totally mystifying and utterly beguiling. I could not stop searching for them from then on as we followed the coast of the lake up to the glacier itself. As we rounded the peninsula I had seen icebergs of all different shapes and sizes and taken so many photos. Then came the glacier itself. It was a phenomenal sight. This glacier was part of the most southernly edge of the third largest ice field in the world (after Antarctica and Greenland). It was incredible to follow its shape as it undulated over the mountains and finally emptied its form into the huge turquoise lake before our eyes. We trekked for a while all the time in sight of the glacier and getting closer to it. Finally we arrived at our first campsite and set up our tent. It was a glorious site, on the edge of the glacier’s lake, in which icebergs would float past. I got so excited that I would be sleeping next to icebergs!! We cooked up to tasty dinner on our stove and then walked a few minutes more to the mirador to look at the glacier more closely. It was at this place that we saw the most incredible and huge iceberg. It was as if we were looking at an alien spaceship. I spent a long time staring at the curves and marvelling at the blue emanating from it. 

After a while we returned to our camp and I was asked by a couple to photo them taking a dip in the icy lake. I was stunned and asked them why on god’s green earth they would want to do such a thing. It turns out that Elis and Bron had made a list of things they have to do on their long trip before they came away and taking a dip in icy water was one of them. I laughed and took photos whilst they did a wobbly ice dance and then ran to a hot shower. Then Lene and Jakob turned up as the sun had come out they walked as fast as they could, making the camp before sun down. As the sun went down on our first day, we watched as the colours changed on the icebergs as it did in the sky. We all talked together for a while longer and then, exhausted, we all parted to curl up in our sleeping bags and hope that our supermarket purchased sleeping bags were in some way effective enough to keep us warm throughout the night.

Day 2

We awoke very early at about seven AM, packed up our things and got dressed. We ate a small breakfast, actually realising that we hadn’t planned well for breakfast at all as we watched the others eating strength inducing bowls of oatmeal. We all set off heading for the free Camp Italiano. Sam and I quickly fell behind as my hips were hurting under the weight of my bag which made climbing and descending the steep inclines and steps that lay on our path a challenge. He found us both a walking stick each which I relied heavily upon for the rest of the trip. My stick had obviously walked the ‘W’ a couple of times already as its handle part was worn smooth, I thought about its previous owners success at completing the trek and got strength from that knowledge a few times along the way. The wind had died down so much on this second day and we were able to look around at the environment so much more. It struck me that the countryside looked a lot like the countryside I had seen in the Lake District, very rocky and arid with sparse green shrubs. Apart from the intensely red succulent flowers that covered bushes and the, you know, icebergs I would have said it was a dead ringer. At one of the streams on the way down I had the experience I had been waiting for. I drank directly from one of the glacier streams. I have been wanting to have this experience for all of my life and finally being able to do this was such a joy. I feel it is such a privilege to be able to drink directly from a water source, and such a primal thing. It’s an almost lost human experience really, so I feel very lucky to have been able to do this and we continued to be able to drink from the glacier streams and rivers for the next two weeks. 

Once we reached the first Refugio, had lunch and set off again the landscape completely changed and we had to stop several times to marvel at the blend of colours. We began walking along one of the huge lakes in the area. The water appeared so different to the previous day as the wind had disappeared and left the surface of the lake utterly still and reflective. The blue sky and sunshine created a smudging of a variety of colours from the lake, the sky, the landscape and the various springtime flowers in colours of red, yellow, purple and blue. It was astounding and we had to make sure that we kept our pace up at times otherwise we would have been staring at the colours for so long that we would never have made it to the camp. We did however, over a rickety wooden bridge hung over a fast flowing river, another from which we drank several times as we marvelled at the mountains on the horizon and our ears were filled with the booming of some of the most fast flowing and freshest water on the planet. We all made our camp under the thin tall trees at the side of the river and after walking a long way we ate, chatted and fell soundly asleep.

Day 3

We left our large backpacks in the tent at the camp as we climbed up to the French Glacier in Valle de Frances, the middle vertical line of the ‘W’ shape. We had been told that we will be able to hear the thunderous cracking of the ice in the glacier and see small avalanches, which was a very exciting prospect. I was finding that my food hallucinations were getting stronger and in more detail as the days went on. I was dreaming about the food I’d like to eat and even the food we had was becoming a delicious incentive. I think the others were feeling the same as nearly all our conversations were turning to food! As we climbed up to the glacier over boulders and streams and along tiny paths we began to hear rumbles in the mountains around us. Then came a large rolling thunderous roar followed by a cracking sound and we knew an avalanche would be possible so we all scrambled to the edge of the path and craned to see the falling snow. Sure enough a long stream of snow streaming down the mountainside. It was one of those moments that you feel the enormity of nature and it makes you feel very small and covered in shivers. Then it makes me breathe fast and squeal with excitement at having witnessed such an awesome thing. We reached the mirador, quickly replacing all of our layers as the cold started to set into our bodies through our stillness. Hearing and watching a few more thunderous cracks and avalanches, we ate our strength inducing chocolate bars and prepared ourselves for the descent back to the camp. We made it back quickly, packed up the tent and gathered what strength we could from our lunchtime soup. We were fast realising that there is a lot of truth in the saying ‘breakfast is the most important meal of the day’ as we were really missing ours. Our muscles screamed as we pulled on our getting lighter but still as heavy as a small elephant backpacks and set off along the second horizontal bottom line of the ‘W’. We aimed to reach a Refugio along the line and set up camp there so our long day’s walking tomorrow would be about 5.5 kms shorter. Again, the terrain and landscape completely changed becoming of a more springtime ilk with hazy, blurred colours, green bushes, grass and a tiny path leading through. Due to our tiredness however, this part of the journey seemed to take forever! I could see the headland round which I knew the Refugio was but it didn’t seem to want to get any closer! Suddenly the path led onto a beach so we laid down our loads and skimmed stones on the turquoise surface of the glacier lake for some time. After this break, it was on with the bags again and the final push to camp. We made it and found a spot to camp at the bottom of a little wood near the lake. It was a windy spot however making the trees whistle and moan as wind flew through them. But someone had helpfully made a woven wood wind fence and fashioned a low wood table and some stools out of logs. So we cooked our dinner in the most efficient time yet (we had had practice cooking the exact same meal for the last two nights and were fuelled by the worry that we were running out of gas!) then we went in search of the others. We found them and sat in their camp next to the snow capped sheer mountain faces and drank tea as we watched the condors circling the tops of the mountains peaks. Exhausted but happy we fell asleep as my mind’s eye traced the shapes the wind made in the tops of the trees as it whistled through them.

Day 4

Today was going to be a long old slog. Not only were my limbs aching with overuse but it was taking me a while to rid the cold in my bones. After failing from lack of breakfast for the last two mornings, Samly and I decided to make a breakfast of spaghetti cooked in onion, garlic, salt, pepper and olive oil. So we packed up our things and walked up to the others’ camp to begin cooking. When everyone was ready we all set off to walk the rest of the horizontal bottom line and to walk almost all of the way up the last vertical line of the ‘W’ to Camp Torres. Our breakfast was delicious and it did the trick as we zoomed off, quickly warming up under our layers of clothes. For the whole of the morning we walked along a tiny path, coming across many streams which we all drank from, and through vast open hillsides on which grew thorny green bushes and cracked and curly half dead trees. Check out my pack. Freakin HUGE! I have grown muscles on my muscles.

It was so windy (the predominant weather feature of Patagonia so far) and we sought shelter behind a tree and some bushes to eat lunch. We spotted a Guanaco (a Llama like creature) curiously approaching us and watched as it gracefully galloped away. Then we set off again this time in search of the shortcut that would begin to take us up the valley again towards the famous Torres del Paine (or towers of pain). At this point, as the path began to ascend steadily but assuredly, I hit my own towers of pain called ‘The Wall’. Many people have been there too and I have heard about this place but here I was there myself. I received much encouragement, especially from Elis to ‘smash the wall’ and after a little time spent with a grimaced face, screaming and heavy muscles I found that ‘The Wall’ had disappeared and I was lighter and stepping more easily again. TAKE THAT WALL!! We rounded the corner onto the last vertical part of the ‘W’ and into the most beautiful valley. At the bottom a torrid turquoise river gushed and tumbled passed the rocks and boulders in its path and we felt the air temperature drop quite dramatically. (Is that a smile or a grimace?! I think it's a smilace or a grimile).

As I hunkered all my limbs (including my extra walking stick limb) up and up over paths through shale landslides and rocky outcrops the valley was becoming more and more dramatic and beautiful as we ascended higher and higher. 

Then we realised that it was actually snowing! Incredible. We reached the final Refugio and stopped for a break. Sam and I had found that we had more money than we thought (having got out of not paying at the unfriendly and extortionate last Refugio campsite) so we treated ourselves to a huge bar of chocolate. I think this was the most delicious chocolate I have ever tasted and the best reward. I felt like Charlie in the Chocolate Factory. Not only that but my old friends chocolate and sugar gave me super zoom powers much to the amusement of the others and just after we started walking the last little bit to our free camp, I was off! Zoom zoom!! I wasn’t as zoomy as Elis however who had already zoomed off as Sam, Bron, Lene, Jakob and I stood around in the warmth of the Refugio comparing places on the world map on the wall. His natural pace was probably three times as fast as mine! The last part of our longest day’s walk was mostly uphill through small woods and over bridges, under the tall thin trees that seem to make up most of the small woods in these parts. We saw some Woody the Woodpeckers after first hearing them and then made our camp on a sloping campsite, our coldest one yet. We decided to eat our dinner before the final and very, very steep climb to the mirador to see the Torres del Paine. We had to keep our fingers crossed that the clouds would stay away so we could actually see them and it was a risk as we set out after our fourth (and most tastiest) meal of tomato spaghetti with garlic, onions and herbs. Sam sprang up the mountains like a mountain goat but I chuffed away as a steady steam train would, sweating under my waterproofs (mainly put on as it was SO cold). I ascended to the mirador by myself and had a proper ‘wow’ moment as the path led out onto the exposed mountainside and snowflakes were moving towards my face from all directions. It took my breath away, in all ways! Another time in which, as I looked about me at the snow capped mountains above me and the tiny trees and streams below me, I felt so small in the enormity of nature. We made it to the mirador and to our fortune there were hardly any clouds affording an almost unhampered view of the Torres del Paine. We had made it! 

I felt very happy with my achievement as I realised again that this was probably the hardest thing I have had to do in a very long time.

Day 5

By the last day we had all cemented as a group, having discovered an average pace, talked about so many things, cooked together, numbed our hands washing up in 0 degrees, held joint food hallucinations, used nature’s toilet (although not exactly together in this instance), gave each other support when we were feeling tired or achy, dealt with not washing and above all seen the most extraordinary things together; icebergs and glaciers, valleys and snow capped mountains, condors and the insides of Refugios (the first one very friendly, the second one not so, the third one had magic chocolate which cost the earth – or £6.50, but was worth every penny), snow and wind, glorious blue skies, purple, red, yellow and green hazy blurring over turquoise lakes, and finally the snow capped peaks of the Torres del Paine up close. It had been monumental. But wait! Our trek had not ended yet. After warming ourselves on cups of tea and shivering into our sleeping bags we knew we had to wake up, pack up camp and walk several more kilometres to the Refugio at the bottom of the mountain to catch to shuttle bus back to the bus which would take us all back to Puerto Natales. Elis and Bron were the most committed amongst us as they got up at four AM to climb the mountain again and see the towers in the sunrise as they are lit up orange. For Sam, Lene, Jakob and I, our bodies were saying a firm NO WAY to that as we had no intention f getting up before the sun. That last night’s sleep was the coldest yet, with our sleeping bags barely keeping us warm enough to keep sleeping, so we were up early but slow to breakfast, the cold and sleep still clinging to our bodies. We gathered our sticks, lugged on our backpacks (with were a lot lighter now) for the last time and left our camp at the top of the hill, immediately talking about which restaurant, what food and drink we will have to celebrate that evening. The way back was mostly downhill with spectacular views continuing throughout the descent until we crossed another suspended wooden bridge to come to a stop on a grassy verge to wait for the shuttle bus. Now we really had made it! So we celebrated by each buying some chocolate biscuits from the little kiosk there. The shuttle bus came and took us, affording us five star views of the Torres del Paine all the way until we stopped for the big bus to take us back to town. What a crazy few days. Some I will never forget.

Back in Puerto Natales

We came back a day earlier than we reserved a room for so our hostel found us another room for half price in their sister hostel. I took a shower for about an hour, completely washing myself about three times and so ended up feeling like new human being, then we headed out for a monster meal all together to celebrate. They all had huge lumps of (what they termed) as tasty meat and I had a monster palta, cheese and salad sandwich, choclo soup, patas fritas and another salad and some tasty Chilean red wine Cabernet Sauvignon, yum. The red wine in Argetina and Chile have been amazing, so delicious, I don’t think I have ever tasted such tasty wine. We chatted, were merry and then all fell into our beds. 

I don’t think I even dreamed that night! But we were up the next day to move into our hostel and to gather things we needed for our bus trip back across the Chile/Argentinian border to El Calafate, where we planned to see the huge glacier, Perito Moreno, which was at the other end of the ice field we had seen on the ‘W’ trek. The others were also heading there so we would be together a while longer! So we visited the supermarket, the dried fruit guy (delicious dried fruit!), had a long café visit and lounged around in our hostel room, watching football and films and repacking our monsters of back packs. Off we head on our next adventure!