Volcan Osorno

Took a trip yesterday around Volcan Osorno to an abandoned Refugio and back. The day started off as every other I've seen in Puerto Varas - dense fog/clouds and threatening to rain. The trails were poorly marked but I managed to stick to the trail which took me up through the clouds. The reward was worthwhile as I escaped to a perfect day up above.
I hiked all the way to the old Refugio at Desolation Pass, but the clouds were even thicker on that side of the mountain and the beautiful views of the lake seemed like
They weren't clearing up any time soon. Back to the side I climbed up since i was able to see the clouds start breaking up as I was leaving them. Great views of the lake
That peak in the back os Volcan Tronador (also seen from Bariloche). And there is another visible off to the left of the picture with a name something like "pointy-guy", which would be an apt description. 3 volcanos visible at the same time. Then I just hiked down to the crystal clear lake and the black sand beach. Also visited the waterfalls of Petrohue, but not much to mention there.
That's more or less the end of Patagonia for me. Taking an overnight bus this evening to Valparaiso for a night and then back over to Santiago for the weekend.

Puerto Montt

Headed down to Puerto Varas after Pucon, but I heard back from Paul a day too late to join them on their hike into the Cochamo Valley - which I still really wanted to start on my own even though I wouldn't have enough time to do the whole hike. It's the valley/mountain pass Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid used while hiding out in South America. And it's also very beautiful - often compared to Yosemite. But I'm running out of days even for that considering the Refugio there just closed for the season today and the buses are in low season. So instead I used this crummy weather day to take a 30 min bus ride to Puerto Montt - the main shipping port of southern Chile. I originally planned to spend more time there but everyone I've met said it's lame ("muerto montt" as the nice chica at my hostel calls it...took me a while to realize what she was saying and even longer to figure out she meant dead as in "boring", not "murderous". Although apparently it is also the most dangerous city in Chile).
Anyway. Hit up the Angelmo artesian fair for the best prices in chile, hit up the fish market where the cocinas cook up meals fresh off the boat. Here is the marisco soup I ordered. Guaranteed the freshest seafood I've ever eaten and I was also convinced the most likely to make me sick:
But it was actually pretty good and I'm still feeling chipper hours later. Still have no idea what all I was even eating. With all my work there done I left soon thereafter. The rest of the city is a dump and gives off an uneasy feeling. The food picture is the prettiest I could frame from my time there.

With still lots of time to kill I took the advice of the hostel excursion adviser (whom was initially convinced I was Argentinian this morning - score! Until his first complete sentence when I didn't understand a word he said. But at least I can mimic pleasantries with the best of them) and I went to Frutillar which is a small German influenced city just past Puerto Varas. Honestly not much to see there although the weather was bad. Otherwise seeing the volcano from the black sand beach could be nice.

Tomorrow I'm getting up early to day hike the first leg of the volcano Osorno.

Volcan Villarica

Alright folks - volcano summit (check)
The hike was really simple and easier than imagined, but also more fun than I thought it would be and there were other reasons I was happy to have had a guide.
Woke up early and our guide was eager to make us the first group to the chairlift. He delivered on his promise and we cheated and took the lift up, but it was necessary or else we would be the last group waiting for everyone else. From there its just a short hike to the snowpack where we put on our crampons. Soon after we hit a ridgeline and the wind was howling, soon some of the group was slowing down so we split up into groups. A group of 5 guys pushed ahead and were the first tour group to peak. The last leg was pretty heavy with volcanic gas and we had to stop occasionally - stinging the eyes and choking the lungs...poison has a taste for sure. Once we summited we walked around the crater on the inside to avoid the gases. We sat up there for 15-30 minutes to take lunch an about the time the second group came up we left. Here is a pic from the Villarica (from Ruca Pillan which means "the house of spirits") summit:

The way down was faster, but far more interesting than the way up. No crampons necessary. First you down climb the rock crater. The loose volcano rock sometimes slips and careens down on the groups still climbing up. We were trying to be careful, but when we were 15 minutes down a guy just summiting kicked a rock the size of a huge watermelon loose and it was heading straight for a group in the same chute at breakneck speed. Right before it got to them it his a larger rock and multi-balled into 3 pieces, spraying in different directions and just missed a few of them.
The second leg starts when you hit the snow. You don't walk down- you "bum-slide". I was climbing with the rich and famous of London, don't ask. But really there are grooves in the snow and you slide down the volcano using your ice axe to dump speed if necessary. It was pretty fun to do and even more fun to watch other people fail at. A lot if the other guide companies seemed to prepare their employees poorly and at the bottom they would just take people out.
Ok so the whole thing was awesome and I didnt even have to worry about the joint pain. Then we get back to the hostel and the company provides celebratory beverages and we unpack. Then I think I already mentioned my friend in Ann Arbor has a friend living in Pucon...we went to his place and had a the second bacon cheeseburger I've seen on a menu in 7 weeks (delicious) from the porch with this view:
Then I got a chopp para llevar in my nalgene and joined some hostel friends at the natural hot springs Los Pozones. I was tired from lack of sleep but I was a great end to a great day. And then I had the greatest sleep of this trip.

Today I wanted to go to a national park, but ended up going to a closer beach to hike around. Not the level of hiking I was looking for, but very relaxing and worth the $1.50 bus transfer. Gonna meet up in a bit and then off tomorrow for Puerto Varas.

On to Pucon

I escaped the authorities once again and I'm now back in Chile, Pucon to be exact. After Eric left I realized that this is more or less the first solo traveling I've done in my life if you don't count work and single travel days. I stayed in Bariloche an extra day to try and figure out my next move. This guy from North Carolina wanted to rent a car and drive the 7 lakes - I agreed to join on the condition that he also wanted to hike the volcano. We didn't have immediate luck in funding other passengers to defray costs, but when I sent a facebook feeler to our Chalten hiking buddy he already had a car rented for the next day with two open spots. Count it.
This started the most culturally exhausting two days of my trip. We made friends and cooked dinner with another American, an Aussie and Kiwi. Then I had to meet up with the car group - my German friend living in Spain and two Spaniards (only one joining the car ride) whose English was worse than my Spanish. So i had my first night out speaking almost entirely Spanish. The next day we drove up the 7 lakes trail, but it was cloudy and I didn't take many pictures - pretty, but similar to northern MN with mountains instead of rocky cliffs. We found a cool youth hostel and our Spaniard ran into a Catalonian doing a round-the-world she had met in Ushuaia. Devon and myself booked out bus to Pucon and then we had another night out of dinner and Spanish. Exhausted we went to sleep and got up for our 6am bus across the border. Beautiful sunrise views of Volcano Lanin, although it clouded up by the time the bus stopped for customs and immigration. We got our hostel and booked our guide for the Villarica volcano hike tomorrow - then check my mail to find a friend knows people here. So I'm waiting to hear back from them, but I'll probably go check out the guy's pub tonight an maybe get enough insider info to stick around here a little longer.
If the weather is nice I'll make sure to post tomorrow about the volcano hike. If the weather is looking bad we postpone...

Not a Fisherman

You know the saying - Teach a man to fish and take the fool's money. Or something like that. Joking, although I did look like a fool:
Hey who knew it was going to be 35 degrees at 9am and misty enough on the river to block the sun. But eventually the sun broke through and we had our 65 an sunny day we had planed for. Manny did the best he could with the talent he was given, but Eric and I just couldn't put it all together in time - Eric had on big one on his line for 10 seconds before it got away. I had a couple nibbles which also could easily have been rocks. But regardless the Limay River (which means "clear" in Mapuche) was beautiful. We learned to fly fish - wet and dry flies, wading and floating, in a picturesque Patagonian setting. As it turns out we were fishing during the season where there aren't many fish in thr water, but the Brown Trout that are present are lunkers. So maybe we aren't as bad as we appear. If it weren't so expensive I wouldn't have any reservations about the experience.

Still in Bariloche - Eric punked out to Burnos Aires today on his way to Peru. I checked the weather forecasts and hostel prices in Arg and Chile an made the informed decision to stay here for a couple more days. Tomorrow I'm trying to wrangle up a group to rent a car and see the 7lakes route. Then it's on to Chile for real to climb the pansiest of the three volcanoes I've found unless I can find some more adventurous hiking buddies now that Eric is gone.

More Photos

One of the high points if the Torres. We were barely able to see it's immensity through the clouds from the top of the John Gardner Pass, but we got to hike next to it for hours the next day with perfect weather and were able to walk almost right next to it.


One of the more interesting sections of the Torres. Vertical ladders sections tied together with thin lengths if wire, precariously tied to poorly rooted shrubs on the side if the cliff which "get blown out occasionally by flash floods" according to the guidebook, "use your wits".


Step 1 of hiking the Dientes circuit takes you straight up to the top of Cerro Bandera (the Beagle Channel in the background named after the ship Darwin first sailed through with it's Captain Fitz Roy). Awesome views with Ushuaia visible on the western shoreline, not pictured.


View from the top of Paso de los Dientes, on my day 2 day hike from camp, giving first views of the spongy lowlands of Isla Navarino with foggy views if Cape Horn in the background. Cape Horn is the literal end of the Americas beyond which lies only Antarctica and the roughest seas in the world.

Perito Moreno Glacier

I already wrote a bit about the hike on the glacier. This goes along with the backlog pics, but Internet is starting to get boggy so I didn't want to try to post too much at one time. Here is a view of the group heading out to the glacier:

And of course no glacier hike would be complete without complementary scotch on the thousand-year-old rocks (they fished icebergs over the deck of the boat to chip off and use as ice):

Backlog pics

Finally got a few pictures transferred from my camera although I tripled my time limit just getting 6 pictures so this'll have to do for now. Beside it's my third post in one hour. This is a shot of the Torres del Paine at sunrise. I woke up to the view from my Refugio bed and ran out to take some pics. Wish I had the energy to wake up at 4am to hike up and see it up close...next time: After spending the night in Punta Arenas Billy left for home and I had a double bus ride to El Calafate to meet Eric up. This is a shot I took on my layover in Punta Arenas (my favorite city so far). Small, beautiful, backpacker friendly, the best burger and beer I've had so far. This is the view from the edge of the city over the Last Hope Sound:

Hostel 1004 mini-post

Just thought I'd post the view from this awesome hostel we found (maybe the only help this Lonely Planet guide has actually given me this trip). There is no sign, it's on the 10th floor of an office building. The doorman makes you take a hidden, decrepit elevator if you walk in with your backpack (michillo). The elevator takes about a minute per floor - there was a dog passed out in it when we went up today. You walk out into a hallway with dirty standard door numbers except for a brightly lit sign at the end of the floor, with security cameras, saying 1004.
Awesome kitchen, great amenities and the best views of Bariloche to boot:

Nahuel Huapi Traverse

Eric and I just got off the trail yesterday from I think the consensus toughest hike in our lives. According to my plans this was supposed to be the cake walk hike but a combination of weather, overpacking, and me not reading the description close enough made it otherwise. Although instead of a lazy walk through summer lake country we got a difficult, but rewarding hike continuously up and down mountains with a story to tell.
Day 1 started with a cramped ride up a cable car to the near peak of Bariloche's local ski mountain - Cerro Catedral. We had the pleasure if being sandwiched in with a couple from Washington on their second lunamiel on the same hike. All campsites were next to refugios - we had full camping gear but a lot of people we met were hiking hut to hut with daypacks. The hike was tougher than expected, but well marked and only slightly cold.
The next morning we awoke to frost and decided to get a late start to let the tents dry. The hike was tough. More or less straight up and down a couple mountains, but we made great time an introduced our friends to Pass the Pigs (easily the greatest travel game of all time - packable, a huge hit on the trail, and probably my best pre-trip purchase behind my hiking boots).
Another freezing cold night, I didn't sleep much but we awoke to great weather and word that the Refugio administrator had cleared us to attempt the next section of the hike. There were sections bordering on rock climbing that aren't safely traversed in wet or icy weather, much less with a full pack, and the route is poorly marked so good visibility is key. The hike was brutal gong from valleys to hiking 2000+ meter ridge lines and back again, but we could see for miles including their mammoth Mt. Tronador and Chile's Volcan Osorno. Photo from the peak of Cerro Navidad:
Made camp at a great sheltered site which was key because the wind was gusting and it was getting cold. Only enough energy to make dinner and fall asleep. Woke up at 3:30 am to freezing rain. We had discussed a rest day or half-day if needed to let our legs rest since we had extra food, but upon waking decided it didn't matter how our legs felt - the toughest day was behind us, but this one would take the silver and freezing rain and wind strong enough to blow me over weren't ideal conditions to hike in. We sat inside the tents till lunch to see if we could attempt the first half as there was actually a park site en route. The second half of the day was spen inside of the refugio laughing at the horizontal winds, rain and snow while playing cribbage and trying to freeze slower...even inside we could see out breath. Eventually we actually decided to head to the tents to warm up - at least we had sleeping bags there. I crawled in with about every piece of clothing I had with me. Made a terrible dinner and went to bed hoping the weather would pass and we could finish the hike.
Well sleep is a strong term, it was more like tossing and turning. I think I was more sore from all the laying around than I've been from hiking around this whole time. We woke up to a few inches if snow covering our tents, again straight-line winds and drifts up to my knee. This completely axed our plans and on top of that I was pretty sick from my dinner although I'm not sure what I ate. At the time of writing this I'm just starting to feel better 2 days later. We packed up in the snow and hiked out an alternate route at much lower altitudes and camped at the Swiss Colony. Here is a sight I hope to never see again:

Added photos:
Picture of the sites at Refugio Jakob. High exposure to the wind and too rocky to properly stake the tents - glad we didn't get bad weather here.

Picture of the ice needles we woke up to each morning it was freezing cold, but not snowing. I'm not sure on the physics here, but these needles would grow overnight - pushing the top layer of dirt up with it. Its not a race, but the winners measured up to 2" long. Pretty impressive.

Biking and the end of the Caja

Eric and I went biking around the Chico circuit today. Kinda touristy and overblown, but a cheap, active way to blow a day. It looked like a decent distance on the map even though we knew it was in km, but it still only took 4 hrs with a stop at the Berliner to pick up some bebidas para llevar and another to eat lunch and chill the drinks in the lago Nahuel Huapi. We missed most of the rain and got back just in time to bid farewell to our Israeli friends who introduced us to some food called shakshuka or something like that. I'll have to research it more at J-garden when I get back.


The bigger news of the day was that we finally broke the chains of our white box! In Calafate, on our second day there we decided to buy a couple things and send home some others that we didn't feel were necessary to carry around. Well that day the post office (correo) closed before it's posted hours so we had to bus it up to Chalten. No big deal right? The next day we take it to the Chalten correo only to be told that 6kg is too heavy to send - but they can do it in Calafate. Ugh. So we have to pay to store it at the campsite while we hike, we're forced to come back to the site to pick it up, and have to bus it up Ruta 40 to Bolson. Of course when we get there they tell us it's too big but they can help us out in Bariloche. So we cart it around all over Bolson including the long walk to our campsite out of town. Finally we arrive in Bariloche and are sure our troubles are over. Run by the post but it looks closed for siesta. We return again 2 hr later only to realize that we misread and on Saturdays they close for good at 1. And of course they are closed on Sundays. I'm not even convinced there really is a post office - just an elaborate network of correo fronts to promote job creation. But then finally after putting off hiking till it's gone the box was mailed for an obscene rate today...but I think they could have named their price we were so happy to be rid of it.

Hiking starts again tomorrow - back in the countryside for 5 days.

Bariloche - Part 1

High winds and projected rain delayed our biking today, but morning was sunny down by the lake:

To the left you can see the mountain ridges by where we'll be biking. Their ski mountain is over there somewhere as well. Hiking/fishing would be in the same direction, but further south (left) offscreen.

Going to try to find March Madness, but not holding out much hope (for finding the game down here). Go Blue!

El Bolson

Bolson is a neat not-so-little touristy town living in the shadows 4 hrs south of Bariloche. Bolson gives of the petchuli (sp?) hint of a hippie town although I heard we missed the worst of it by a few weeks. As it was it was a pleasant place to spend a couple days unwinding between hikes. I've never seen the word "artesian" on more business signs in my life. Crafts, breads, jellies, and pleasantly enough beers. We spent the first night in a nice hostel and met a shocking amount of Americans.
The next day we wanted to move to cheaper camping arrangement so we walked 1 km to camp at the largest brewery in town, just in time for St. Patricks day right? Wrong. I won't say they've never heard of the holiday, but we didn't see anyone celebrating and we were literally the only ones at the campsite...and it was kinda dirty. But it still had it's perks and we stayed there 2 nights. We struck out trying to fish - there is surprisingly little tourism infrastructure, but the town was fun and still had great views of the surrounding mountains. We did a short day hike instead.
Packed up this morning and bussed to Bariloche. So far all I know is that the town is huge and there are lots of options. We were hoping to hike up Volcano Lanin, but learned the travel time wouldn't be worth the investment even though the hike would be awesome. Plenty of other options though. Biking, fishing, and hiking in the Nahuel Huapi NP for the next 10 days.

No real pictures from Bolson because we didn't really do much. If we get out biking tomorrow I'll take a pic and sent out a short update. The lakes here are beautiful and remind me a little if northern MN!

El Chalten

Eric and I spent the last week in a city called El Chalten. It is the gateway to the famous Fitz Roy and Cerro Torre spires as well as general access to Los Glaciers NP including access to the southern patagonian ice fields. The city itself is a stark contrast to the Torres - the city is only about 600 ppl and you can see the tips of about most of the peaks from the city...a lot of what we did could be reached by day hikes.
We met some awesome people on the bus ride there and scoured for camping right as the weather started to turn. I had caught a glimpse of Patagonia weather in the Torres, but this was full on. It didn't stop raining for 24 hr and the winds threatened to blow our tents over. On top of that it was pretty cold so we took the day to supply ourselves and headed out the next afternoon. We struck immediately for the furthest point from town. Disgruntled that the campsite was on public property and we had to pay to both camp and day hike we discussed hiking to the pass and on to the next site down the following day. In the morning we learned that day hiking was free for campers. A fortunate turn of events considering we got lost on our hike where we accidentally followed a rescue mission to the mouth of the Marconi glacier instead of to the pass. In half defeat we discussed giving it a second go in the morning when our soon to be German friend Raik stormed in and formed an international alliance to hike to the pass in the morning.
I'm still not sure if this was one of the dumber things I've ever done. The first but was just really steep, but that gave was to melting ice, a glacial river crossing and the finally a 30 minute walk up and around a glacier (without crampons - above a crevasse). Eric and I wouldn't have attempted alone, but the snow was in fact perfect and Raik had a bit more experience with such things and said it was safe. We lived to type the tale and the views were stupendous. The clouds around Fitz Roy opened up a half hour after we got there.
We moved sites the next day and the the following morning hiked up to Laguna de Los Tres which us where this pic is from. Once again perfect timing. We hiked out the same day and booked our tickets to Bolson for the following morning up the infamous ruta 40. Packing our frost covered tents and 24 hrs of bus riding later we are checked into a hostel and ready to sample any of the 10s of microbreweries we've seen here already. Oh and ruta 40 is a pain although not too bad - although the layover town of Perito Moreno (no relation to the glacier) is a rundown town not worth visiting.

The view from Laguna Los Tres. I tried to fit everything that was going on in 1 pic. You can see both lakes, Fitz Roy in the background and the glacier streaming down on both sides of some no-name hill:



Added pics:
Cerro Torre from Paso Cuadrato. The othe great peak of the region. The mountaineer we met on the pass said he was here for a month a few years back and it didn't come out of the cloud once...more finicky even than Fitz Roy.

Fitz Roy from above Laguna de Los Tres...similar to the other picture but better focus.

Picture of 2 mountaineers following our footpath across the glacier up to Paso Cuadrato.

Chile to Argentina

I had a computer a few days ago and was in the process of transferring pictures when the power went out. It is all a conspiracy to deter over-tourism. The weather has been amazing. I haven't seen rain since the Torres. Even the famed Dientes near Tierra del Fuego was nice if only just a tad on the side of it's country's namesake. I made sure to take a pic on our first day so I had something to post:

After hiking the first portion and heading back we got to unwind in town, then another night in Punta Arenas. Then sadly Billy had to leave - big ups for joining when you could Bill! I go lucky and caught both legs of the bus ride to Calafate by way of Puerto Natales. A full day of travel but I seamlessly met up with Witham already owning the town. Argentina is so different even though i am only a 4 hr bus ride from where i was in Puerto Natales - the accent, the rediculous degree of mate drinking (which i love by the way). We spent one day doing laundry and taking in the city and booked out glacier hike. Touristy yes, but less so than envisioned. The one company that has a monopoly actually ran a longer excursion than we knew of
And it took things to another level. Instead of hiking 30 min up the side of te glacier we got to take a 3+ hour trip to the middle, take lunch on the glacier, and view up close some caves and sink holes. Amazing experience and loved finally getting to use crampons. It cost about as much as my last two weeks combined, but I was expecting about as much. Calafate is expensive, but we're on our way to El Chalten in 4 hrs to hike Fitz Roy and Cerro Torre for a week, or less if the weather cooperates.

About to go rogue again - hope to post from Chalten, but it's small. Bariloche at the latest. Hasta luego!

The Torres

Well I won't be able to get any pics up (I guess I need to make a point to snap a couple with my phone since wifi is plentiful, but physical computers I could dump my camera onto are scarce), but I have some spare time at the Punta Arenas airport waiting for the next adventure so I'll give some thought on the longest hike of my trip.
Overall impression was good - we saw a LOT in 8 days. It wasn't exactly the wilderness I expected, but based on the views I can see why they have taken the effort to build up the campsites. The front side is called the "W" and I expected that to have large refugios and amenities, but even some of the sites on the back side had privately run pay sites with running water and some form of latrine. I won't say I was disappointed, but maybe I was.
We started from Laguna Amarga an did the circuit counter-clockwise. The first couple days were relatively flat thru Andean desert terrain and we logged long miles these days. We took a rest day on day 4 when Billy's blisters needed a break and rested up for the toughest day. The next day we powered through the John Gardner pass and had our first bad weather - a constant drizzle and low clouds that sometimes prevented us from seeing the path markers and unfortunately also the view of glacier grey as we came over the pass. The word of the day that day was "mogado" - wet. The next day was clear however, and while it didn't offer the vista of the pass my favorite memory of the trip is hiking right up next to the massive glacier. It. Is. Huge. It was also fun camping next to it. You would hear a crack every so often and cringe at the thought of another storm before realizing it's just the glacier calving off into the lake, or itself.
After this point we had made it around to the "W". Good thing with food getting scarce (planned) an some larger meals needed to keep going. The terrain turned from glaciers to stunning mtns at this point, but surprisingly the trail didn't turn to tourist trekker super-highway at this point, although you did run into more people. It was fun to profile people based on their gear brands and try to say hi in their native tongue. We started hitting long miles again to make up for the rest day so we could go see the Torres at sunrise. After one long day I tried a jogging day trip up the French Valley to see the lookout at the Cuernos (one o the two main sets of peaks you go to see). I probably should have cut my losses and gone at a normal pace because my knees were shot after that. The next day we hobbled through the rain to our take-out point, staying at our first Refugio which was awesome. We were too injured to make it up the 3 hour hike before sunset, but I actually had a great view from my bed. We dried our stuff the next day an headed to Puerto Natales for a night and the Punta Arenas last night. Both beautiful port towns.

Final thoughts:
Surprising lack of wildlife in the park
Their bumblebees are bright orange
Stray dogs are everywhere in the cities
Glacier gray is possibly the most amazing thing I have seen
Baguales is a brew pub in PN. Their beer is very good and they make one of the best bacon cheeseburgers I have ever had. The word of the day that day was "tocino" which means bacon.
Every day more and more vocabulary comes back. I love it. I wish I could post a word of the day every day, but I just don't have consistent Internet.

Ok. Off to Puerto Williams and hopefully the Dientes Circuit. We're on a tight sched here so we have to see how Billy's feet, my knees, and the weather look when we get there. We may just have to do a couple days of the circuit. Hope all is well back in the states!

Counting Sheep

Dreams really do come true, Billy was counting sheep last night and we woke up to this sheep in our backyard. Apparently the hostel employees have never seen it before either. This also gives me the opportunity to try to add a picture that isn't gigantic - but if it is it's because the sheep is actually huge, no joke.

To the Torres

Sitting here with free wifi at the hostel in Puerto Natales. It is good to be back in civilization. I'd like to catch you up on the whole trip but I'm not sure I'm up to the task on my small keyboard and with I can't really sync my camera to my iPhone and the Torres needs to be described with photo back-up. So I'll start with our whirlwind first days:

Staring the 16th we flew to Santiago, got in at 8am and saw as much of the city as possible (see previous post), back to the airport and flew out at 8pm to Punta Arenas. We got in at 1am, slept at the airport, woke up at 7 for our flight to Puerto William only to be told they had never heard if us. I guess I should have checked the translation for "reservations" in Spanish - still fuming over this one. So in the next 20 minutes we reworked our plans and were on a bus to Puerto Natales to do the Torres del Paine first with the earliest flight they could get us on to PW on the 28th. Just enough time to make it work. So we bused up and hiked our 20km to the campsite only to wake up and do the same first thing in the morning. A long 2 days to say the least.

I hope to be able to supplement this with a short TdP entry and a few pics soon if the hostel computers cooperate. We had a couple issues, but good weather an an overall positive experience. Sorry for the gigantic photo in the earlier post - I have to figure out how to format entries on my phone still...

Hasta Luego!

Santiago Part 1

Awesome first day in Santiago. Central market, cafe con piernas (look it up), cerro San christobal, and then we were lucky enough to get in touch with Andres' father to show us around. Estamos en el tavelli y fuimo a la fuente alemana - Salud!

The "Plan"

More like guidelines really. Right now I've got one round-trip ticket booked from Detroit to Santiago, Feb 16-April 10th. Logistically this is the simple part. Another 24 hours and two more flights south and i'm at my first hike. Obviously i'll have to iron out a lot of logistics in the next couple weeks. I've identified the following locations as place I want to visit, but will mold plans as time and desire dictate:

Puerto Williams - Not termed "the southern most city in the world" because it's not large enough to be considered a city. A 4-day hike of the Dientes Circuit, circumnavigating the Isla Navarino, will be the most remote of the trip. The island rests below Ushuaia and the Tierra del Fuego - a common launching pad for Antarctic expeditions.
Torres del Paine - The namesake of the blog title, this is one of the centerpieces of my trip. The full circuit around the peaks takes approx 9 days. The southern half is built-up with hotels and supplies, but the northern half will be another test. This is photo-op central.
Perito Moreno Glacier - A touristy thing to do, but likely worth viewing. This is the first stop in Argentina. Planning to hire a guide to rent crampons and mini-trek on the glacier through ice caves. The scotch bar at the end of the trip should be overpriced, but worth it. "on the 1,000 yr old rocks please"!
Cerro Torre/Fitz Roy - The other centerpiece of the trip. The spires are a climbing/photography mecca. I don't do either particularly well, but I can't wait hike around.
El Bolson - Just south of Bariloche this city has been described as a sort of patagonian bohemia. Microbrews, day hikes and hippies. Seems like a good place to unwind from all the hiking. We'll see how long I last here.
Bariloche - "The Alps of South America". Relatively large city with lots of good, but not overly difficult hiking in the area. I'm thinking of doing the popular Huapi traverse as well as the Banos de Caulle. There is a lot of volcanic activity in the area and the latter hike ends at natural undeveloped hot springs.
Puerto Montt - A coastal town back in Chile i'm looking forward to some good seafood and some freelancing. I have no idea what to do here, but I figure I can look into learning to fly fish or see if I can rent a kayak and explore the Pumalin Sound which has been compared to the Milford Sound in New Zealand.
Santiago - Can't explore all this nature without a little bit of culture. I'll spend my last few days taking the city in before flying back and coming to terms with my life as a bum.

Testing Testing - Uno, Dos, Tres

Hello, and welcome to the blog. As with any good backpacking adventure it is important to try out all your equipment before taking it into the field. I've never blogged before. In fact, this blog might be terrible. I don't consider myself a good writer, I have no idea what kind of internet i'll have down there, and half the point of this trip is to drop off the face of the earth for a while. I give it a 50-50 chance that this actually gets updated more than once when i'm down there. My apologies in advance.

I have a loose plan of what i'm doing and where i'm going. I'll try to get motivated and post a quick description before I leave and we can see how close the final product comes to it.