Torres del Paine, Chile - Day Four, Overlooking Glacier Grey

Torres del Paine, Chile - January 7, 2011. Day 4 of our hike. By now we are seasoned trekkers. We will hike up to Refugio Grey, overlooking Glacier Grey, where we will spend the night. It is 11 kms away. From there we will hike a little further (without-packs) to get a better view of the glacier, as we've been instructed by those well-informed.

We hit the trail at 8:45 a.m., my blistered feet well-bundled in mole-skin (a life saving tool for any hiker!) after yesterday's big trek. We were motivated to get to the refugio early to snatch up the good beds. The late-comers get the top bunks and we especially wanted to avoid the top of a triple-decker bunk. The trail had a lot of up and down and was not easy with a full pack. We were rewarded by awesome views of huge chunks of broken glacier floating past on the lake.

Yes, my pants are all puffy in this photo because it's very windy.

Seeing the glacier up ahead, we thought we were nearly there. But it looked closer than it actually was, and we still had a long way to go. We reached the refugio at 1:15 p.m., meaning it had taken us 4.5 hrs. Surprisingly, we appeared to be the first ones there, and we were rewarded with our own little room. A tiny room with just one bunk bed.

The refugio was smaller than all the others we had seen, but very cozy and wonderfully situated on the lake over-looking the glacier.

We ate our lunch at the refugio and set out with light packs for a closer view of the glacier. We started our with a trip to the nearby mirador. We clambered over craggly rocks to get a closer view of the glacier.

The views were good. But not good enough. We set out for Campamento Los Guardas, 4 kms away, which promised to overlook the glacier. It was 3:30.

The trail to Los Guardas was uphill and treacherously steep in places. I was amazed at those doing it with full packs.

We reached our destination after 1.5 hrs, and found a stunning viewpoint overlooking the glacier. We were right on top of it, staring into its cracks and crevasses.

I could have sat there for hours. But we had to get back to the refugio for supper. (It doesn't look like it, but it was already 5:30 when these photos were taken. The sun just set so late this far south in January.)

Approximate distance travelled: 19 kms
Approximate hiking time: 7 hours

Side note: The showers back at the refugio that night had only cold water. Or rather, not just cold water, but freezing, glacially cold water. So I waited before taking a shower, hoping the hot water would come back. I saw others emerge from the unimaginable figidness, and was not willing to bite the bullet myself. My dad went for a walk and observed the heating system outside, determining that it was not a matter of waiting for a tank to heat up, as the water was heated on demand, so they must have run out of gas to heat the water. I asked them to check if that was the case, and soon enough we had a new tank of gas and hot water galour! Props to my dad for that!