Patagonia is a beautiful and exciting place to be. Patagonia is a huge area in the southern parts of Argentina and Chile. It has many gorgeous hikes with beautiful glaciers. One of the most famous parks in Patagonia is Torres Del Paine in southern Chile. One of the most famous hikes in the park is known as the “W”. It’s known as the “W” because if you look at a map it looks like a W because you are going up three different valleys. Our goal was to do this hike. From the moment we entered the park, we started to see new and strange animals. One of my new favorite animals is a creature called a guanaco. Guanacos are basically wild llamas. Also, there are wild horses, however, we never saw any. Pumas are another common animal in the park. The pumas hunt guanacos and rabbits.
Guanaco
Unfortunately, we didn’t see them. On our first hike in Torres Del Paine, The French Valley, we saw a gorgeous glacier with waterfalls running off it. There are many lakes up in the mountains because of the glaciers melting. On our way back, our guide, Mariana, told us that the reasons all the trees were dead was because of a fire a tourist made because he was camping in an area he wasn’t supposed to, then he tried to burn some toilet paper but the wind was so strong it caught lots of trees on fire. In the end, he was fined only $600 even though he burned 50,000 acres. Also, once we went around one hill, the wind kicked in. It was blowing me away so much, that Mariana had to grab me to keep me from going off the trail. The wind was going 30 miles per hour and the strong gusts of wind were 60 miles per hour.
Very windy on the trail.
After a long day of hiking we went and ate dinner at the Refugio, then had a nice scalding hot shower. My Mom said that it was the hottest shower she had ever had in her life. The rooms had three bunk beds that you would share with other people, but our room was just us and Mariana. I skipped the second hike because the wind was constantly going 60 miles per hour and I knew I would slow everyone else down, so I stayed inside with my Mom, who had injured her knee. The third hike was very fun. We hiked up to see the towers that gave the park its name.
Gazing at the towers.
We saw a huge glacier. We also saw many avalanches on the glaciers. It’s a normal thing for avalanches, though. The waterfalls from the glaciers formed a lake at the base of the towers. We saw two men get in the ice-cold water for a picture. We stayed at a hotel called Eco Camp. It was a collection of green domes that are used as hotel rooms. In our dome, the loft which was where Alex and I slept was burning hot. We would open the windows, but we could not open them that wide because of the wind. We had a very spiffy dome. It’s called Eco Camp because they try to be ecologically friendly. We did a lot of hiking and now I think my legs are broken.
The French Valley.