Hiking in Patagonia Chile

Lady Florence Caroline Dixie and her accompanying party were the first tourists to visit the park and in her book of 1880 she described the three towers as 'Cleopatra's Needles'. It must have been amazing for her coming from Victorian England to see the Southern Patagonian Ice field and the huge glaciers: Grey, Dickson and Tyndall. Also the huge lakes with their vivid colours due to the rock flour from the glaciers suspended in their waters.

Why? Because even today in the age of the Internet and photography, we were absolutely taken by the landscape of Torres del Paine. They say you get four seasons in every day in Patagonia and it's true - blazing hot, super cold, huge 90mph gusts of wind, horizontal rain. There really is something bizarre about this place, yet it adds to the attraction and it’s on the wish list of so many hiking and outdoor enthusiasts.

Being extremists when it comes to pushing the limits, we set out to do both the Circuit route and the 'W', building on the traditional Circuito Grande, which should take around 7 to 8 days. Day one took us to the mighty towers (the Torres del Paine) and camping in the woods close enough to hike early morning. Day two took us around the right side of the park, into the lowlands and grassy valleys, through grazing cattle and over bright blue and turquoise rivers to a wonderful grassy camping spot called Seron. Beautiful birds and a bushy-tailed Patagonian fox were wildlife highlights.

Day three pushed us through the valley to Largo Dickson and the mighty glacier, then through the steeply sided forest valley past crashing waterfalls and wind-twisted trees to campsite Los Perros. Rustic and in the shadow of a huge ancient glacier perched 1000m up on the mountain side chains of gaucho porters bought in the nightly supplies, including some much needed chocolate cookies!

Day four was not for the faint hearted. We had to push ourselves up through the notorious John Garner pass, a snow and rock swathed landscape with winds of up to 100mph pushing us over razor sharp jagged rocks and rivers of fresh glacial water. At the summit we were rewarded with the most stunning view - the Grey Glacier, a solid landscape of ice frozen for an eternity and stretching some 10km across the valley, and up it as far as the eye could see. As the ice reached largo Grey, huge icebergs would break off and float about the blue lake like marshmallows atop hot chocolate.

Day five took us all the way along Lago Grey to the second valley on the W-route and camp Italiano, on route we bumped into some of our friends from treks in Bariloche! The views of the lakes really are spectacular and every time you looked up, seeing the snow capped peaks felt mysterious and special. After walking 22k and setting up camp at Italiano, we decided to do the 12k round trip up the windy valley to see Glacier Francia and the views of the towers from the other side. The view down the valley of the lakes and the towers at sunset were beautiful and made the tough walk up hill worth the while.