October 21, 2008
Torres del Paine- Day 2
written by Spencer Alexander on October 21, 2008 at 03:07AM in Traveling
Having arrived yesterday in the infamous Torred del Paine park of Chile, I am now a two day veteran of the park. No more feeling like a noob, I’m a pro today; no more getting pushed around by the occasional branch, I’m going to be pushing back; no more getting blown around by the wind… actually this one will happen no matter how long you spend in the park. For those of you who missed the adventures of day one, go back and check it out.Morning of Ice
This morning was cold. I mean really, really cold. The type of cold where it takes an hour or two of laying in the sleeping bag, plus a hot cup of tea, before you’re ready to face the world outside of the protection of your sleeping bag.
We took it pretty easy this morning; although we had a long day of hiking ahead, there was no real rush, and as long as we were packed up and ready to go by 9 or 10, we’d make our destination. Not to mention I haven’t even busted out the super-powers yet.
Although I had my doubts when I first woke up at 5:30am, the day turned out quite beautiful. Skies were blue, winds are low, spirits are high, and bodies are warm-n-dry. All important.
Our goal for the day was the campground named Italiano. It’s a good distance away, but luckily the path was flat-ish most of the time. The first couple hours of the day were the same scenery and the same route that we took yesterday, and they went pretty quickly. It was the rest of the path where things got really interesting.
Afternoon of Beauty
The rest of the day was incredibly beautiful. The entire day, we were completely surrounded by beauty: to our left stood two or three gorgeous lakes, each a different color of blue due to the differing amounts of glacier flour in them; to our right were a few different mountain peaks, all peaked with snow, all surrounded by a thin mist of clouds; in front of us were rolling hills covered by the occasional stream; behind us, well, we talked about that yesterday. The entire day truly felt majestic. We enjoyed walking at a nice, easy pace and enjoying the wilderness around us without being overly worried about or destination.
For lunch, we had soup and sandwiches… again. In fact, all of our meals are repeats: for all three breakfasts, we have oatmeal with apples; for all lunches, we have soup and sandwiches; and for all dinners, we have pasta with red sauce and cut-up hot dog meat. Yummy.
Hiking thoughts
One of the strangest things about the second day of hiking was the weight of the pack… it wasn’t bothering me at all! In fact, to the contrary, I felt a bit strange without the pack on. My body has adapted to weighing an extra 30 or 40 pounds. The first day, I never thought that I would miss the weight of my pack, but today, I definitely did. Good thing I had 8 hours (or 26.5 km) of hiking with it on my back.
During all of that time with the pack on my back, I was having an incredible amount of fun, and I started to wonder how I could make it a more permanent situation. Some thoughts included “Food for the Earth,” a hippie food stand[(run by me, of course)] up in the middle of nowhere, and all profits went to helping the park and the environment. I even considered applying to be a park ranger; I was having way too much fun while hiking.
Evening of Exhaustion
The evening turned out to be quite tiring; the last leg of the hike was definitely the worst. At one point, we were scrambling up a rock-slide on all fours; luckily the rocks had settled years ago. We were hiking up until about 7:30 or 8, and the absolute latest we could stay out hiking until dark was 8:30; we were cutting it pretty close. Luckily we arrived at campamiento Italiano before dark, had a chance to set up our tent in a nice, wind sheltered section, and make some delicious pasta with hot-dog slices. Yum yum yum.
Night of Sleep
Tonight will officially be the second night in a row that I have gone to sleep before dark. It’s pretty incredible. We have a long, long, long day of hiking tomorrow, so we’re letting our feet rest for a while.
Good night!
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