In November of 2024 we spent a week hiking through Torres del Paine National Park, on the famous W trek route. It takes 5 days, and there are specific campsites to stay at along the way. Because the camps are the only option for accommodation, they’ve jacked up the prices, and charge $190 a night for a tent, $31 for a box dinner, and $8 for an hour of wifi. We tried to minimise these costs by buying our own tent and mats, and taking enough food to last both of us the entire trek without having to buy anything. This ended up being 5.7 kilos of food, mostly meat, and Creed carried all of it and grumbled about it a lot. We spent most of the trek believing we’d packed far too much food, but we finished on day 5 with only one cereal bar and half a cured sausage left, and only because we didn’t really like the taste of it.
We had an early bus on Sunday morning to head to the park. It’s a couple of hours from town, and then there’s another hour’s drive through the park, and then an hour long ferry to get to the start point of the W trek. The bus windows were very steamed up, so we didn’t see much of the scenery until the ferry, where we decided to take the top deck for the best views. At this point we got extremely cold from the wind, and worried that we hadn’t packed enough warm clothes to survive the coming days. Patagonia is known for having very temperamental weather, with sudden rains and strong winds, and we knew our cheap little tent wouldn’t stand up to much if the overnight conditions were bad. We actually had 5 spectacular days of clear skies, lots of sun, no rain and minimal wind. I burnt my neck quite badly on day 2 and was very conscious of putting on lots of sunscreen for the rest of the trip, but still managed to burn more.
Day 1 of the hike was 11km alongside Grey Lake, ending close to Grey Glacier. This was our shortest day, but also our first day with our bags at their heaviest, so we took it nice and slow. There was very little to do at the campsites, so we were in no rush. After putting up our tent for the first time we discovered that the top of it was entirely made of mesh, and that the rain cover only came half way down the sides, only just covering the mesh portion. We were very fortunate not to have any rain while using this tent, but the main concern was the amount of heat let out through the mesh. We covered it as best we could with our camp towels, which did make quite a difference, and slept in everything we could possibly wear, including our Antarctica coats. We were still cold. The sleeping bags we’d rented were also a lower quality than we’d been told, though we had also been charged less than expected, so we’re not sure if we rented the wrong thing.
On day 2 we left our stuff at camp and continued along the trail to get a better view of the glacier. We hiked to an incredible hanging bridge, and then the trail got very steep and we didn’t expect to have better enough views for it to be worth continuing, so we headed back to camp. After packing up we did the same trail back along the lake to our second campsite, right where the ferry had dropped us off the day before. This was the extremely hot day, and we got our tent set up early enough to let it collect some of that heat. We also put an emergency blanket over the top of us once in our sleeping bags, so this night was a little less cold. This campsite was the most scenic of the lot, with the mountains looming over the field of tents. We played cards in a cushioned area of the lodge with large windows and a heater, enjoying the view and the warmth.
Day 3 was a big one. We first hiked along a smaller lake for around 7km, before arriving at a refugio that is no longer used as an overnight camp. Here we were able to have a large brunch, and then leave our bags behind for the upcoming 5.5km hike and 650m climb. It was steep and rocky, and we took many short breaks, before reaching the first viewpoint of a steep mountainside covered in fallen glacial ice. Sections of it would crack and fall every two or three minutes, with a huge crashing sound like thunder echoing through the valley, creating waterfalls of snow and ice and a domino effect of movement down the mountain. We sat and watched for around half an hour, before motivating ourselves to continue along the steeper part of the trail. We were in the forest for much of this section, but could still hear the glaciers calving in the distance. We finally arrived to a clearing with almost 360 degree views of towering mountains. A couple coming back the other way convinced us the view was even better from the end of the trail, so we pushed on and climbed and climbed and scrambled up a final enormous rock, to arrive at possibly the most spectacular view of the whole trek. Sheer cliff faces surrounding us on all sides, ending in sharp peaks piercing the blue sky, reminding us just how small and insignificant we are compared to nature.
We stayed until the angle of the sun made the grey cliffs begin to glow orange, and then began the long descent. Creed injured his knee on the way down, so we made our way slowly, in no rush as always. Our camp on this day was the first where we hadn’t been able to book a spot for our own tent, and had to book one from the camp. We’d raged about this (rightly so when they charge $190 for a tent booking), but when we arrived it was clear to see why – it wasn’t a field with plenty of open space for pitching a tent, it was a steep wooded hill, with tents jutting out from the earth in small clearings, raised on one side with ladders to make them flat, almost like a car top safari tent set up. I can’t explain it better than that, so please see the picture. It wasn’t worth $190, but it was significantly nicer than the mesh tent we’d been happy to ditch the night before, significantly more comfortable than the thin roll mats we’d also ditched, and significantly warmer.
On day 4 we did not have any peaks to climb, but still had 16km with a lot of ups and downs and very little shade and a fair amount of mud. It ended with a 300m climb, which was slow going but meant we didn’t have to do it the next morning.
On the final day we had booked a return bus at 3pm from the park because the 5.30pm sold out, and we’d been told that the shuttle from the welcome centre to the bus stop left at 2pm, and based on our previous days and speeds we were concerned about missing it. We decided to head off at 5am on day 5 so that we didn’t have to feel rushed, though of course in reality we left at 5.30 because we don’t like getting up for alarms. This ended up being the best decision, because we avoided both the extremely early sunrise hikers and the regularly early people leaving after breakfast at 7am. We didn’t see a single other person on the trail until the last half hour, when all of the sunrisers were descending, and by the time we got to the top the last of them we leaving and we had the place entirely to ourselves. This was the most famous view of the trek, the Mirador Base Torres, where the iconic three granite towers that Torres Del Paine National Park gets its name from overlook a beautiful turquoise glacial lake. To enjoy it in solitude was a magical moment.
The final descent was surprisingly easy, and we made it in plenty of time for the shuttle, eating the last of our trail snacks on the way.