Chile: The Best of Patagonia at Torres del Paine

 

The namesake Torres soar over Torres del Paine National Park. 

     Patagonia is a huge region (260,000 square miles or 673,0000 square kilometers) of mountains, glaciers, fjords, lakes, temperate rainforests, deserts and plains. Its northern boundaries are the Colorado and Barrancas rivers in Argentina and the Huincul Fault (well south of Santiago) in Chile. It stretches from the Pacific to the Atlantic and its southern terminus is Cape Horn in Tierra del Fuego, an island chain divided between Argentina and Chile. Think of it as the southern part of the South American continent that tapers off sharply. And when you think of Patagonia, you're probably thinking of southern Patagonia.

      Argentine Patagonia is much drier than Chilean Patagonia. The Andes act as a wall to keep out moisture drawn from the Pacific. Chilean Patagonia gets much more rain and has forests at  latitudes where Argentina has deserts. In 2007 we visited El Calafate, Argentina, which is just over the Andes from where we were in 2024 at Chile's  Torres del Paine National Park. In fact, we met guests who had made the overland trip by car from El Calafate to Torres del Paine (pronounced PIE-nay). In El Calafate, what water there is comes from snow and glacier melt, most famously Perito Moreno, an Andean glacier that sheds icebergs into Lago Argentina.  We got to walk on that creaking and cracking glacier. Snow and glacier melt account for some of the lakes, rivers and waterfalls in Torres del Paine, but there is also abundant rainfall.  

       Torres del Paine is one of the world's most beautiful national parks. "Paine" is an indigenous word meaning blue. The Torres themselves are three granite peaks, part of the Paine Massif or mountain range, which itself is part of the Andes. The Explora lodge had magnificent views of the massif, but a good view of the Torres required a long drive to the other side of the park. In fact, long drives are a way of life here. To reach the park requires either a two-hour drive from Puerto Natales, which has a tiny airport and few flights, or more than four hours on the road from Punta Arenas, the famous port to the south that is the base for many excursions to Antartica. Explora had a van pick up us and other guests at Natales when we arrived, and Explora had a driver take us to the cruise ship terminal at Punta Arenas when we departed. More about Explora is in my main posting about this 2024 trip to Chile. 

      Explora has a menu of guided excusions for guests at all of its all-inclusive lodges.   At Torres del Paine, many of the excusions are mountain hikes, some of which require an hour or more in a van to reach the trailheads. The hikes vary from more than 18 kilometers to as short as 2 kilometers, or less than a mile and a half. Even those rated easy can involve some steep segments. The guides help guests choose  the most rewarding excusions, whether hikes, van-based sight-seeing or horseback rides. 

     We did two trail rides here, one at Explora's Quincho conservation reserve east of the park, and one in the park much closer to the lodge. There were horses also at Explora's Atacama lodge, but we didn't ride there. The conservation reserve ride included wildflower-covered hillsides with towering mountains in the background. It was as if we had wondered into the opening scenes of "The Sound of Music" but without the music. The ride closer to the lodge had us following our gaucho through shallow ponds and waterways, which was a new experience for me. Explora is very proud of its horses, which it breeds at a ranch near Santiago. We were told that Chilean horses (descendants of the conquistadors' horses), Arabian horses and German and English riding horses were crossbred to produce horses suitable for both trail rides and mountain riding with both inexperienced and advanced riders. Jane fell in love with her horse at the reservation. I found both of my horses responsive and extremely easy to control.

      Each ride had a special ending. At the reserve, we joined other Explora guests, most of whom had been hiking, in an old sheep-sheering shed where every few days gauchos prepare a parrillo (barbecue) feast with whole roasted lambs, beefsteaks, chicken, sausages, a table of side dishes and two kinds of empanadas, beef and a smoky cheese.  It was by far the best meal of this entire South American trip. The other ride, which was on a cold and rainy day (normal spring/summer weather in southern Patagonia), ended in the stable's tack room with a wood-burning stove and a gaucho making and sharing mate with us and four other riders. Passing the one cup, replenishing it, sharing the silver straw and being encouraged to partake deeply reminded me of 1970s college students passing a bong. 

     One of the attractions at Torres del Paine is Grey Glacier, a fairly middling glacier that you can see only from a distance unless you're in a boat. It wasn't much of a reward for the hike it required. A more satisfying, but still rather demanding, hike was to Lago Sarmiento de Gamboa, a lake not far from the lodge.  On the rocks near the shore are thrombolites, the remains of ancient microbes found in shallow and alkaline water that appear as a white, sandy crust or even rocks. One of these microbes, cyanobacteria, captures sediment in the water and cements the grains to create layers of calicum carbonate. Here the deposits have a clotted structure and are called thrombolites. These deposits are found only in a few places in the world and they are thought to have been essential to the development of life on earth by producing oxygen. 

      Here are some photos.

A gaucho arrives to get us started on our trail ride at Explora's conservation reserve
 east of the national park.  The wooden steps make it easy  for riders of a certain
 age to get seated. The saddles didn't have horns like Western saddles in
the United States but it didn't take long to get used to them

Our guide took this photo of Jane and me during our ride at the Explora reservation. 
Despite the sunshine, it was quite chilly. It never gets really warm in 
southern Patagonia.

Whole lambs and a tray of empanadas roast
in at glass-enclosed cooking area installed 
in a former sheep-sheering shed at Explora's
conservation reservation. 

Chicken, steaks and a variety of side dishes were
prepared on an open grill just outside the
glassed-enclosed area.

This photo of the Masif de Paine was taken on the way back to the park from
the Explora reservation. The Torres, the three spires in the middle, are at least 
10 miles from the road we were on.

The hike to a viewpoint for seeing Grey Glacier (not visible here) involved crossing
this beach on Lago Grey. Those are people near the water on the right.
The white objects in the water are icebrgs.

Grey Glacier spills into Lago Grey. This was taken
with a telephoto lens.

Here we are crossing a stream on our ride in the park.

This horse didn't get to go our ride and, since it was a 
cold and rainy day, it was probably happy to stay
home in its stable. We shared mate with our gaucho
and our guide in a tack room near this stall.

This mountain at Lago Gray gives some idea of the fierce beauty of Torres del Paines. 

Wherever you are in Torres del Paine, water and mountains are nearby. 

On the way back to the lodge from the parrillo lunch
we got a glimpse of what I think is the Salto
Grande Waterfall on the Rio Paine.

On our hike to Lago Sarmiento de Gamboa, our guide asked us to guess what the
white substance around the shore was. I guessed salt or other mineral crystals. She
smiled and said, "No." It  wasn't until we had made it down to the shore
that she explained how cyanobacterial created thrombolites.

Another view of the shore.

The thrombolite formations resemble coral, which makes
sense sense both are organic in origin. 

A guanaco at Lago Sarmiento de Gamboa.

A road runs between two lakes in Torres del Paine National Park. 

 

The Explora lodge overlooks this  cascade, called Salta Chica, which is fed by Lago Pehoe.