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This was a big hiking day. Our plan was to first hike up to the Mirador (viewpoint) at the base of the Torres (Towers). Then we would hike back down, collect the pack from Refugio Chileno, and then continue all the way to Refugio Cuernos. On this day, our hike covered the right-most portion of the famous "W" route. I calculated it was 21 km total. The weather did not look promising when I got up. It was still raining, and there were thick clouds outside the window, it was impossible to see much of anything. It was discouraging, but we were in Patagonia and expected lots of bad weather. I consoled myself by remembering that we had glorious views of the Torres del Paine yesterday, so at least we got to see them. After breakfast, we put most of our gear into one of the lockers at Refugio Chileno. I carried my pack with our valuables and rain gear, but we left behind Melanie's pack and all of our other stuff (including the boxed lunch we received from the Refugio.) So we were lightly loaded when we started our hike. When we stepped outside at 9 A.M., the rain had stopped. It was still overcast with thick clouds, but at least we wouldn't be hiking in the rain. The trail runs north over relatively level ground, mostly under tree. After about an hour, we reach the fork in the trail - the right branch led to a campground, but we took the left branch up a rocky slope to the Mirador. It got progressively warmer and sunnier as we went up. The clouds lifted enough that we could even see across the Valle Ascensio to the peaks on the opposite side of the valley. At the top of the slope we followed orange markers over a boulder field and soon found ourselves at the famous viewpoint. It was 11 A.M., so it took us 2 hours to hike up. We were fortunate with the clouds - although we couldn't see the tops of the Torres, we certainly could see a good portion of them. This was a much better result than I expected when I saw the weather conditions at the start of the day. Although we had heard stories the night before of tremendous winds at the Mirador, the wind was mild for us. We happily took our photos, but didn't stay too long because the clouds descended and soon the towers were obscured again. By 1:00, PM we were back at Refugio Chileno. We ate our lunch (a gigantic chicken/cheese/lettuce sandwich), picked up the rest of our gear from the locker, and headed out. Our destination was the next inn, Refugio Cuernos. Since we took the "shortcut" route, I think it was a distance of 13 km. From Windy Pass, it was mostly downhill to the shore of Lago Nordenskjöld. For the rest of the day we hiked west, with beautiful Nordenskjöld on our left and the towering mountains of the Paine Massif on our right. The sun came out and all afternoon we enjoyed wonderful sunshine with very little wind - quite pleasant compared to stories we had heard about Patagonia conditions. The trail was a bit hillier than I expected. The map shows the trail following along the lake shore, but there are some hills along the way that you have to march up and over. The good part about the hills was that the top of each one provided a fine viewpoint of Lago Nordenskjöld. It seemed like it might start to rain on us at a couple of points later in the day, but it did not. We did see a marvelous rainbow arcing over Nordenskjöld. Continuing onward, the Cuernos del Paine came into view, and by 5:45 P.M. we had reached Refugio Cuernos. It was jammed packed, of course. Due to our relatively late arrival, we were assigned to the second seating of the dinner, which was at 8:00 P.M. My legs were quite tired at the end of this day, and I wondered if I had planned too aggressive an agenda, because tomorrow's hike was an even greater distance with a greater elevation gain. Over all, I felt it was a tremendously successful first full day of trekking. Panorama Photos
MapsThis map shows this day's hiking route - up to the Mirador Torres, and then back down and over to Refugio Cuernos 
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Click on any thumbnail to begin the slide show at that photograph Torres del Paine Photos
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