Sabbatikos

Thirty three years ago, while in college, I traveled to Chile with my father, (Santiago, Puerto-Montt, Patagonia, and Tierra Del Fuego) as a film student schlepping my 16mm Bolex camera along with me as I worked on my senior thesis film: “Película Patagonia.” I’ve always wanted to return. Our journey began with “Santiago, Day 1” on March 1st, 2024. And this is the beginning of the end of our journey, 4 nights and 3 days staying in Patagonia.

We had a few days of travel before we arrived. We flew 5 hours back from Easter Island to Santiago where we spent another night at the highly unrecommended and filthy, Holiday Inn at the Santiago Airport. You can’t beat the convenience, however. The next day we boarded our 3 hour flight from Santiago to Punta Arenas, Chile’s southern most city, on the Straights of Magellan. We were met by our driver for the 4 hour drive to Torres Del Paine National Park and our lodging at the exclusive Patagonia Camp (20 cozy yurts nestled in the woods on Lago del Toro). Along the way we saw many guanaco and rhea and the beautiful ever-changing Patagonian landscape and the associated weather. It is cold here!

We arrived at Patagonia Camp around 7pm and were greeted with calafate (pisco) sours. I immediately realized that this was the berry that I ate 33 years ago. The local legend says that if you eat these berries you’ll return to Patagonia one day! And here I was.

At our orientation we learned that the weather for the following day was either going to be: “You will get wet” or “Horizontal rain.” High winds. Heavy rain. Given the weather, we chose from the available excursions then snuggled into our comfy beds and let the storm sway our yurt (on stilts) to sleep.

The next morning we woke early go on a private tour of the Miradores (Lookout Points) Hikes. We drove about an hour into the park and at one point I recognized a familiar bend in the river. I had been at this place where there was once just an estancia (a local farm – still there where we previously stayed). Now there is a hotel, cabins, ranger station, services, etc. None of this was here when I was here last. But I remember that distinctive bend in the river.

We continued on to Mirador Condor, a steep and windy hike to the top of a nesting area for Andean Condors. We almost immediately saw one soaring on the thermals above us.

As we approached the apex of the trail between two large buttes, our guide, Carolina, told us that the already intense winds would intensify as all the wind has to be funneled between these two points of land and to brace ourselves. She wasn’t kidding. The sustained wind-force was at least a consistent 60 mph. It was super-intense and slightly comical.

We continued to climb our way to the very top of mirador condor to take in the views, experience the ever increasingly intense winds, and take more photos and videos.

We started our descent on the leeward side of the hills, but even then, we experienced some winds so intense that it made forward descent actually difficult. The wind was pushing us back up the hill, defying gravity. It even ripped Clara’s KEXP beanie from her head! She luckily stabbed it with her trekking pole just in the nick of time. It was some of the most intense wind and wind gusts we had ever experienced.

During a few calm moments, with spectacular views, we passed a calafate bush and had an opportunity to properly consume the berries that would guarantee us another trip to Patagonia sometime in the future.

As we approached the road below, with excellent views of Lago Pehoe, we walked to Hotel Pehoe (the first hotel in Torres Del Paine National Park), across a narrow bridge to the little island in the lake upon which it sits. From here, weather permitting, you can see a commanding view of the Cuernos del Paine (or Paine Horns). An even better vantage point for these mountains was our next destination.

We drove a few miles down the road to our next hike, the Cuernos del Paine Lookout, a short 4-mile round-trip hike starting at a striking (but windy and wet waterfall) that Tawny, Clara, our guide Carolina, and I hiked to. It was cold. It was wet. It was raining horizontally.

After the windy and wet waterfall, Tawny smartly walked back to the vehicle to stay dry and to put her Spanish skills to the test and talk with our driver Jorge (who only spoke Spanish), while Clara, Carolina, and I continued on for another few hours of hiking. We actually had reasonably good weather! The rain and wind let up “a bit”, and the clouds lifted a little higher for a slightly better view of the horns.

It was all well and good until the last 25 minutes or so hiking back. As soon as we left that “lifted view” of the horns, they socked in, the wind whipped, and the rain was torrential – and sideways. We were sopped. However, it made dinner that much tastier and the snuggly yurts that much snugglier when we got back to “camp”.