POSITIVELY glacial
Hiking the remote and icy terrain of southern Patagonia makes Jim Tully a very happy eco-camper.
GOOGLE TORRES del Paine and you instantly see why a trip to Chile’s acclaimed national park makes it on to many a bucket list and draws about 160,000 visitors a year.
Yes, we have our own majestic mountains and glaciers much snapped by tourists but there is something very special about the park’s main attraction, the 3050-metre Paine massif, with its unique spires and ‘‘horns’’. The park also has the world’s thirdlargest ice field spawning imposing glaciers.
It is reported to be Chile’s thirdmost visited national park, which may well point to its relative remoteness and the cost of getting to southern Patagonia. But it’s certainly worth making the effort to see an area designated a Unesco World Biosphere Reserve.
On a previous trip to Chile we lake-hopped across the Andes from Puerto Varas to Bariloche in Argentina and rated it an outstanding experience. Would Torres del Paine meet our high expectations? Would we be as lucky with the weather? It did, we were.
The gateway to Torres del Paine is Chile’s southernmost city, Punta Arenas, which sits on the Strait of Magellan about five hours by road from the park. You can fly there daily from Santiago.
We had a night at the Holiday Inn just 50 metres from the Santiago airport terminal so we could be ready with minimal effort for the early flight to Punta Arenas the next day. LAN Chile’s Auckland flight arrives late morning so there was plenty of time to bus into downtown Santiago for the afternoon.
Punta Arenas was a thriving commercial centre at the turn of the 19th century. Together with the more dangerous Cape Horn sea route, it was the main passage between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans and its booming economy attracted settlers from Europe including Croats who played a major part in the development of the city.
After the opening of the Panama Canal in 1914, Punta Arenas declined but evidence of its glory days remain, particularly the neo-classical once-grandhomes surrounding the main square. One of them, the Mauricio Braun H Palace, now the regional museum, opens a window on the luxury of those who made their fortunes at the turn the 19th century and imported their furnishings – and architects – mainly from France.
After a night in Punta Arenas at the cosy Hotel Rey Don Felipe we were heading for rather more spartan surroundings as our minibus set out on the 350km trip to Torres del Paine along the wonderfully named Ruta 9 del Fin del Mundo – Route 9 at the end of the world.
For those who want to travel independently, buses and rental cars are an option but transport to and from the park was part of our five-day package with Cascada Expediciones, which operates EcoCamp Patagonia, an awardwinning, eco-friendly camp at Torres del Paine.
After three hours on smooth concrete, with frequent sightings of the ubiquitous Darwin’s rhea, a flightless bird similar to an emu, we reached Puerto Natales, a small port popular – particularly with backpackers – as a transit post for Torres del Paine. Across the flat open grasslands we could see the southern Andes.
The pit-stop was an opportunity to get to know our guides Natalie and Nico, Chileans in their early twenties who had studied outdoor recreation at universities in Santiago. As we learned over the next five days, guiding facilitates Nico’s passion for climbing whereas Natalie is a naturalist at heart, her camera always in hand.
The 115 kms from Puerto Natales to the national park would normally take about two hours with the concrete highway giving way to asphalt then gravel as the terrain becomes more rugged.
However, we stopped to see the Mylodon Cave about 25km to the north in the Benetiz Mountains. The main cave, used by prehistoric tribes, features a lifesized statue of the mylodon, a giant sloth that lived in the region together with sabre-toothed tigers and a 3m-tall long-necked mammal, the macrauchenia, who all disappeared about 10,000 years ago. Darwin is credited with discovering fossils of the macrauchenia during his Beagle voyage in 1834.
Back on the road, we soon saw pink clusters of Chilean flamingo at the edge of small lakes and had our first of many encounters with guanacos, the wild relative of the llama that roam in their thousands throughout Patagonia, vulnerable to their natural predator, the puma.
Then, beyond a lake against a backdrop of blue sky with clouds hovering at its edges, was the massif, its granite spires bathed in sunshine. Dusk was closing in when we arrived at EcoCamp nestled under the massif, its spires now shrouded in swirling cloud. The autumn air was decidedly chill.
The camp comprises domes inspired by the semi-circular dwellings of the Kaweskars, a nomadic people in Patagonia who made no demands on natural resources. We opted for a standard dome and shared facilities but suites with heating and their own bathrooms are available.
The camp’s electricity comes from a micro-hydro turbine at a nearby stream and photovoltaic