Torres del Paine

Today I got up early to go on my tour of Torres del Paine!  As much as I generally hate tours, this was the easiest way to get there.  Unfortunately because there were so few people, they got to my place earlier than expected and so I had to eat breakfast in the car.  But, there were only 5 of us on the tour, which is a great tour group size.  Not nearly obnoxious enough.  :)

We left Puerto Natales and headed up the road toward the park.  Our first stop was at the Midolon Cave - named after the prehistoric giant sloth that used to live in this region, and whose remains were found in this cave.  It was a neat place - supposedly the biggest cave in South America - and it was great.  However, compared to caves I've been to in North America (like Carlsbad Caverns) it was not nearly as big as I expected.  But it was neat, and there was even a statue of a sloth!  Haha.

From there, we made our way into the park.  We made a stop at a little settlement along the way called Cerro Castillo for coffee and souvenirs.  It was basically a tourist trap, so I just had coffee and a cookie.  From there we drove into the park itself and made a stop at Lago Sarmiento de Gamboa, which is a beautiful blue lake in the park.  As you'll see with all the other lakes I stopped at, every one is a different shade of blue and all of their colors are absolutely stunning.  This one is extra special (and makes me feel super nerdy) because it has thrombolites along the coastline.  These are very similar to stromatolites, which are thought to be one of the earliest forms of symbiotic life on the planet.  They are comprised of algae and bacteria that work together, with mineral deposits, to live together and form this structure.  It's hard to see in this picture here in Torres del Paine, but you can see some stromatolites in Shark's Bay, Australia, here.  I learned about these last year in my classes, so it was really cool to go to a place that had them (or something similar).  The other interesting thing about this lake is that it's slightly alkaline (pH 8) and salty, but unlike other lakes of the sort, it has fish that survive there (rainbow trout artificially introduced some years ago).

From there, we followed the road to another interesting lake called Lago Amarga.  On the way, we ran into some of the guanaco that are native to the area.  They are basically llamas.  And they were everywhere in the park.  This led to me singing this song basically all day long.  Be careful...it's addicting.  But anyways, Lake Amarga was a very different color green and also had some of these stromatolites, except they were not as big as in Australia.  Beautiful though.  And we were supposed to have a great view of the "towers" of Torres del Paine, but they were covered in fog.  Boo on that.

Not five minutes down the road they cleared up.  So we stopped to take a photo.  :)  Apparently the weather changes like crazy here.  The guide says you can experience all four seasons in one day in the park.  I believe it.

After this stop, we got out to pay the park entrance fee of $15,000 pesos (or $30) and then continued along the way beneath the mountains.  The drive is gorgeous.  The roads are okay, a little bumpy, but the landscape is breathtaking.  There are snow-capped mountains everywhere, lakes, guanacos and birds, some rivers, and a lot of plants (few flowers this time of year).  But still a gorgeous place.  We stopped in front of the "Long Lake" to take some more pictures, and you can see Lago Nordenskjold in the background (REALLY blue) which is named after a Norwegian father and son who were explorers and geologists in this region.  At this stop we also saw some bushes of the Calafete berry, which I may have mentioned before, but it's native to Patagonia and legend has it that if you eat it, you will have to return to this area.  It's also the name of the town in Argentina where the glacier was that I want to visit.

From there we drove a bit more and got out of the van to hike to the Salto Grande waterfall and see the "cuernos" (horns) of the mountains in the park.  Lago Nordenskjold empties into this waterfall, so that's why it's such a nice color blue.  It was an easy walk, and completely gorgeous.  The sun really came out too, which gave us a great view of the mountains.  But it was very cold and very windy!  Sometimes we struggled to stand up straight because the gusts were so strong.  I think the guide said the winds could get up to 120 km/hr (which is roughly hurricane force).  Crazy!

We drove along some more and finally stopped at a resort on Lago Pehoe (pay-way) for lunch.  It was a gorgeous view out of the building, and I enjoyed my sandwich of chorizo and Chilean cheese very much!  After lunch, I walked up to the top of the island that the resort sits on and took some pictures.  The water was so clear and blue and gorgeous...at some points I had to remind myself I was looking a lake and that I wasn't on some island in the Caribbean!  It was a beautiful place though, with great views of the cuernos, even with clouds rolling in with a bit of rain.

Our next stop after driving a bit farther was at Lago Grey, which was formed by Glacier Grey.  It was a bit of a hike to the lake, including crossing a sweet hanging bridge, and a walk through a forest and then along a sandy / rocky beach.  It was a great walk and lots of nice scenery.  When we got to the lake I almost felt like I was in Antarctica again!  There were icebergs and bits of ice in the water, washing on shore.  It took a little bit to walk down far enough, but finally I could see the glacier (it's in the 3rd picture).  Beautiful.  And then add the mountains!  It started to rain and was overcast for most of the time, but we did have a full rainbow form over the beach while some of the guys were walking under it, so that was awesome.  Made me think of the double rainbow song though.  Haha!  Finally, the sun came out and gave us some gorgeous views of the mountains.  They really began to look like an artist had painted them - there were so many colors with all of the layers of rock that had been revealed as glaciers retreated to form them.  I don't think I mentioned that before - but that's how all this park was made.  Glaciers once covered this entire region, and as the climate warmed from the last ice age, they retreated and carved out the amazing shapes of the mountains and left all these lakes behind.  Pretty nifty.

That was the "official" end of our tour, but we made one more stop on the way back to take one last look at the mountains over Lago Toro, one of the biggest lakes in the park.  It was really a great way to say goodbye to a fantastic park.  As I've told some of my family members, it was like someone took bits and pieces of all the national parks out west in the US and put them in one place.  What an amazing area this is!

After I got back to Puerto Natales, I took a rest for a bit and finally made it out to La Mesita Grande again because I was craving some pasta!  Their special for the night was osso buco in a tomato sauce and I got it with gnocchi.  Amazing.  And a perfect way to end the day today. 

I'm heading back to Torres del Paine tomorrow for a hike to a waterfall that Alejandro says is fantastic, so looking forward to that.  But it means another early morning, which I should be used to by now...