Torres del Paine O-Trek

Chile

Dec 4

Hello friends and family,

Thanks for your patience while it took me longer than I had wanted to send out my next post. Fletch and I got sick after finishing our 8-day trek. We then went to the small town of El Chaltén where Wi-Fi was lacking, and we got food poisoning that took us out for a few days. Luckily, we’re all healed up and back at it. What have we been up to the last few weeks?

As you know from my last post, our first few days in Patagonia were in Punta Arenas with the penguins. Our next stop was a few hours north in a town called Puerto Natales which serves as the launching pad for all Torres del Paine National Park adventures.

We spent a few nights in Puerto Natales gearing up for our O-trek. You likely only need to spend one or two nights in Puerto Natales since it’s a small town and doesn’t have too much going on.

On November 8th we left Puerto Natales and started the 7-night/8-day O-trek in the Torres del Paine National Park.

You have a few options when doing this trek of how to plan it. You can plan it all yourself which is quite involved since you must reserve campsites and/or beds at the refugios. The refugios are backcountry campsites and/or buildings with a bar, dorm rooms, bathrooms, and the occasional fireplace. The only way to access most of the refugios is by trekking. Throughout the O-trek there nine refugios to pick from run by three different companies which means three different booking companies. You also need to book the correct refugio in the right order otherwise you could end up hiking more miles than you wanted to get to a different refugio. Fletch and I decided we didn’t want to spend our time booking refugios and planning meals and carrying gear so we opted to book the trek with the company Hello Patagonia who did all that for us. It was 100% worth it. They booked all our lodging and meals so all we had to do was hike with our clothes and snacks in small packs instead of a 60+L bag with your sleeping bag, pad, tent, etc. We stayed in tents for five of the nights and inside the refugio in a 4-person and 6-person dorm room two of the nights. Hot breakfast and dinner were served every night at the refugios, and box lunches were provided. It was pure luxury carrying a small 30L pack and arriving to camp with our tent already set up and our dinner being prepared. Fletch and I would look at each other and say “so worth it” every day. It was expensive to use the booking company, but it was so valuable to us, and we would do it again that way.

The scenery throughout the hike was stunning.

We saw rivers, streams, valleys, glaciers, lakes, icebergs, wildflowers, rainbows, snow, ice, sunshine, and felt so much wind.

I like to consider myself fairly fit and therefore didn’t pay too much attention to the details of the hike when we were booking it. The tour company rated this as medium to hard fitness level. In my experience when a hike or some outdoor activity is rated as medium or hard, I usually find it much easier than what was listed. Perhaps it is my mindset since I prepared for something hard and then it was easier than I had mentally prepared for. Or the general fitness level of Americans is assumed lower and therefore the rating scales over-adjust. Anyway, this hike was definitely medium to hard. We hiked 77 miles in total and ascended 18,500 feet in total which is about 2,300 ft a day and almost 10 miles a day. The hardest part for me was trekking through two to three feet of snow on day four which I will describe later. I was not prepared for that much snow. The beautiful part about this hike is that you’re not at elevation so trekking is much easier. The pass we went up and over called John Garner’s pass is about 4,000 ft and I believe that’s the highest point we were during the eight days.

Most people typically hike the W-trek which is the shorter version of what we did. Fewer people do the O-trek because it takes more time.

*O-trek in white. The W portion began at day 4 “Grey” and finishes at day 7 to form a “W” on the map*

The first three days of the hike were amazing because the sun was shining, clouds were minimal clouds, and the wind was still new to us. We also started to mesh with our fellow hiking comrades. Since there are fewer people on the O-trek you start to get to know folks after seeing them on the trail day after day. Dining is communal so you share breakfast and dinner together every morning and evening. We met a rad group of people and very much enjoyed each other’s company. There were about 20 of us that formed a nice bond and would get drinks at the refugio together after the hike. It was a mix of Americans, Dutch, Australians, South Africans, Welsh and Germans. The intensity of day four brought us all closer.

*Part of the O-trek group celebrating completion of day six with pisco sours and vino*

I don’t think anything could have prepared us for day four. A couple from Seattle who took a mountaineering course for six months told us it was harder than anything they did in the course. It was a grueling 8-hour day that started with 5 am breakfast and 6:30 am departure. None of us slept because it was so cold and the refugio was very rustic meaning no heaters and the electricity turns off after 10 pm. It was snowing as we began the hike up and the trail was MUDDY. I gave Fletch one of my hiking poles so he could jump from rock to stick more easily without falling into the mud. The first few hours were muddy through the trees and once we got above the tree line it was snow and no more mud. I thought it was going to be a light dusting of snow on this mountain. It was much more than a dusting - four feet deep at some points. The wind was whipping. I would put on my sunglasses to prevent snow from darting straight into my eyeballs but then my glasses would quickly fog up and I couldn’t see. It was a fun game of glasses on and off and vision not very great. I only brought one pair of running gloves with me that weren’t very warm. Because Fletch and I are traveling for the year we decided not to bring chunky hiking boots with us and did this entire hike in trail runners. They did not withstand against the snow. After a few long hours we made it to the top although we couldn’t see anything because it was storming, and we didn’t want to stop because it was really cold.

*Cold and snowy at the summit of John Garner Pass*

Getting down the mountain was harder than climbing up because it was steep and slippery. We had no traction with our trail runners, and it was an open bowl so at one point we slid down the trail on our bottoms because there was no other way to get down. While we were descending it finally stopped snowing and we had the most incredible view of Grey Glacier as we dropped down next to it. That view made the entire morning worth it. The glacier was massive, and I don’t think there are many other places in the world where you can hike up and over a mountain and land right next to a glacier. We passed over three sketchy suspension bridges and safely arrived in camp. When all of our group made it safety down, we celebrated with pisco sours and wine.

The next few days were tough because my legs were aching after four days on the trail. The weather wasn’t great either with wind gusting at what felt like 40 mph and rain pelting the side of your face. I hiked in silence for most of those days. Additionally, we joined the W-portion of the trail so it was much more crowded, and hikers could go in both directions on the trail. That night at the refugio all of us O-trekkers could not stop remarking how annoying it was with too many people on the trail and hiking in both directions. The horror! We felt like the trail originals.

On the last night it began snowing AGAIN. We thought after day four we were done with the snow. I was very much looking forward to sleeping indoors in the warmth the following night. The last day we hiked to the famous towers which are the three vertical granite towers overlooking a turquoise lagoon. It’s the classic photo from Torres del Paine and lots of people come for the day just to see them. The hike up was more rigorous than we thought since it had snowed the night before and turned to ice at the very top. Fletch and I left a bit later to let it thaw. I’m glad we did since we chatted with folks on the trail who turned back because it was too dangerous and difficult to hike with the slippery ice. By the time we got near the top the sun was out and thawing the ice. We scrambled to the top and snapped some quick photos with the towers for about 10 minutes before the clouds rolled in and we were completed socked in. We learned that the towers are notoriously hard to see due to the cloud coverage, so we felt immensely happy that we saw them in all their glory. I sat long enough to eat my tiny Toblerone chocolate bar before my ears were frozen. We began the last hike back all the way to the visitor’s center. Fletch and I both agreed the towers were stunning and beautiful in their own way, however, despite how intense and scary day four was, it was our favorite because of the glacier views.

The O-trek scenery was truly like nothing I had scene before and if you’re considering a trip or thinking about the trek, I would highly recommend the O-trek. If my words don’t convince you to visit, I hope the photos do.

Salud!

Dana