Torres del Paine: The Final Ascent

BEEP, BEEP, BEEP. The alarm rang at 4AM. Cam had slept soundly for the whole night, 7 full hours of sleep. I had tossed and turned with maybe had two hours total, in short bursts. We had a long, likely doable journey ahead of us, but so much could go wrong.

To catch you up, were 7 days into our 8 day O-Trek in the Torres del Paine National Park in the Patagonia region of Southern Chile. The highlight of the region are the Torres del Paine, three granite towers that shoot above the skyline, in the middle on an unnamed mountain massif. We’re at the Los Cuernos campground, which is not the place you want to be for the last day. Scheduling problems put us here. We’ve hiked about 110km in the last week, and for the most part are healthy, barring my right knee, which has been giving me troubles on downhills for most of the trek. No worries, just about 1500m of elevation is planned for today.

We went into the day with multiple plans. Plan A, if we were feeling good, was to take the ~25km direct route to the Torres del Paine viewpoint, ditching our bags somewhere along the Chileno shortcut at the 13km mark, running in and out to the viewpoint, and then picking our bags up for the final 6km to the Central campground, where we had a final night in the tent booked. We had a little foresight at least, leaving the bus ride back to civilization for the next day.

I realize those campground names don’t mean anything to you if your don’t know the area, so let me give you a quick rundown. Chileno is the best camp to stay at for the final night. It’s 5km from the Torres del Paine viewpoint, and 5 from Central campground the other way. Central is pretty self explanatory, its the start and finish of the 20km in and out day hike up to the viewpoint, and where the shuttle busses pick you up. Los Cuernos, where we started, is 12km from either of those campgrounds to the west, 17km from the viewpoint.

Plan B was if we were not feeling as great. We would walk an extra 2km total, and ditch our bags in the woods much closer to the Central campground, and most importantly at the bottom of the mountain, so we would be without our bags for any major elevation. The day would be longer, but easier.

Plan C was the bailout. If we got injured, or it started pouring, we would just walk strait to Central and call it a hike. No iconic viewpoint. Neither of us wanted this option.

Day 8: Torres del Paine viewpoint. Los Cuernos to Central
Distance: 28.97km
Elevation: 1,293m
Time: 11:44

It took an hour to pack up camp and have breakfast. We were both sick of oatmeal and dulce de leche at this point. We had run out of trail mix, adding to the misery of the meal. But that’s ok. It’s not raining, and there’s nary a scary cloud in the sky. We checked in with Martin and Maude, the other nutters with the same general plan as us, and then headed out on the trail.

There’s something about hiking at 5:30AM in a calm morning that’s hard to put into words. In the distance you can see the soft oranges of a promising sunrise shrouded by light misty clouds. The only sounds around are that of the birds and the footsteps. To our right was the massive Lago Nordenskjold, whose shore we had walked the day before. We were high above the lake now. And to our right were the personally unconquered remaining mountains of Torres del Paine, their bizarre peaks towering above the landscape.

It was a serene first two hours. Hardly a word was spoken, and only one other hiker was seen, resting at a viewpoint, the world at their fingers.

As the sun awoke and peaked over the mountains and clouds, we began to get more lively, as did the trail. More eager hikers were coming the other way, starting their W-Trek adventures themselves, discovering the secrets of the park. Big smiles, full of life and excitement. And we were excited too. We were making great time, coming to the fork in the road., and our major decision point. Are we going to Chileno, or Central?

“Feeling good?”

“Feeling good.”

And with that, we headed up the mountain, backpacks on to Chileno. Plan A full steam ahead.

This shortcut path is a much quieter path on the W than the rest of the park. The Cuernos-Chileno linkup isn’t used much, as most itineraries will go through Central instead. The only hikers we saw here were Martin and Maude, who as promised, appeared to be much quicker than us. The trail here is much narrower. One point even had us lost, as the path had flooded out, and we had to scramble through some trees to find our way back. The terrain was mostly open field, with long distance view of Central campground in the distance. Small shrubs that we had gotten to know well crowded the trail.

The trail grew steeper towards Chileno, and that meant our steps were getting shorter. It was about 300m up with the bags on for us. That didn’t sound like a lot a week before, but for now it was crippling. Cam’s legs were feeling every placement, her steps getting smaller and smaller. My knee was getting more and more sheltered, taking as much weight on my poles as possible. But we inched closer and closer to the meet up point with the day hike trail from Central.

About 100m from the tripoint, we ditched our bags behind some bushes. Instantly the relief on our legs was apparent. Our bags were somewhere between 15-20lb of gear each at this point, and each pound counts. We brought our waterbottle, some snacks, and our rain jackets, and continued onwards to Chileno, where we hoped they had something good for lunch we could buy.

The walk to Chileno was level in elevation, but bounced between serious ascents and descents. Hundreds of day hikers, and trekkers on their final days joined us now on this path, which had become much wider and more pronounced. We followed a massive stream valley, hugging the side of the loose dirt slope that appears to landslide frequently.

This walk to Chileno was very enjoyable, as we saw all of our friends one last time. Most had stayed in the campsite the night before, and were now headed down to catch their bus. We saw the USA gang, who had definitely looked better. Most in their group didn’t make it up to the viewpoint in the morning, which was sad to hear. They were just too burnt out. We passed John and Sarah, where we learned that Sarah’s feet had infected blisters, and only John had gone up to the viewpoint. Its hard to hear after all of the hiking everyone did, they couldn’t fully complete the loop. But that doesn’t matter. If they had a good time, then good for them. It’s worth it.

Chileno camp was great. They had fantastic, reasonable priced ham toasties that we demolished quickly. We caught up with our Dutch friends, Vera and Thomas, one last time and had lunch with them. They had enjoyed the viewpoint at sunrise, and were now killing time before their steep decent to the bus.

The trail next was through the forest again, and my knee slowly got worse. The weight in the morning, and the massive elevation gain had made it not sensitive, but weak. Sheltering it made us go slower, but that was alright, we had all day. Finally we made it, 17km in, to the Torres ranger station, which means that two things lie between us and the viewpoint, 1km distance, and 400m up.

Well, we didn’t come this far to do 99% of the hike. So lets haul our tired broken asses up this rocky slope and see the towers we have seen from four different angles once again. We were ready to go.

This path was steep. The rangers, or as it turns out, volunteers, have done a very good job at making stairs out of roots and rocks for this ascent. Many day hikers were struggling here. Many trekkers were as well. We certainly were. But for different reasons. Cardio can be a huge problem. But our legs were giving out long before our heart. Nonetheless, slow and steady powered us up the mountain, until the towers came into frame. And what a sight it was.

Peaks clouded by mystery, there were the once solitary Torres del Paine. Three towers standing proud above a frigid lagoon. Near a hundred tourists taking in the sights, some in awe, some actively pouting about the weather. At least it isn’t raining.

Well we had gotten up, but now we had to get down. It’s cold up there. And so we said goodbye, and departed down the mountain one final time. The first steep section was brutal. I could only lead with one foot due to my structural difficulties. But we were in a great mood. So many things could have stopped us from getting to the top. But none of them did. We plunked our way down the stairs, and wandered through the woods back to Chileno.

We took a break and had some snacks, but didn’t stay long. The up and down valley certainly wasn’t pleasant on the legs, but it was fine. We got our bags, and with the weight back on, it felt a lot worse. Our muscles felt every step. My knee gave me constant reminders of its existence. And we had a steep lose dirt slope in front of us.

Many passed us. We equaled the speed of the ladies in their 60’s who were too nervous to fall so they took baby steps instead, holding back their tour. This group was a nice bunch, but ever so slowly we over took them, after some basic conversation. Using all of our energy to focus, we made it down, and now just a couple kilometers lay between us and salvation.

This is where we met Jeff, a want to be retired business consultant from Cincinnati, on what may be the final family trip with his wife and his kids in their 20s. We didn’t see the rest of the family, he told us that he jumped ahead of them. But we had a lovely conversation about life with him. What caused us to go travelling. What he want’s to do in retirement. Why he can’t retire (if you own a company, its really hard to emotionally break free). How we see the rest of our respective lives panning out. It was a fitting conversation to end the massive journey that we had taken. We took the fork to our camp, and said our goodbyes, leaving lifelong impressions on each other.

And that was it. We checked in, set up our tent, had the best dehydrated curry noodles that could ever exist, then enjoyed some showers and called it a night. Oh yeah, there were showers at every camp.

We woke up the next morning completely sore. Any adrenaline that was protecting us was now gone. Our legs ached. But we made it to the shuttle pick up, and took one last look at the mountains that had consumed our lives over the last week.

Adios