Torres del Paine

Torres del Paine is Chile's most famous national park, located in the chilean Patagonia, close to the border with Argentina. Images coming from this park symbolize and advertise Patagonia all over the world. It has huge granite formations, blue-coloured lakes, patagonian forest and even a glaciar. The best way to take the most out of the park is to walk for several days. It has well kept and identified paths and circuits, allowing you to do daily treks or circuits of 3 and up to 7 days. There are campsites and lodges along the different circuits, where you can rest and stay for the night. Everything is very well organized and it really should be an outstanding experience to spend a week walking through such a place, something I definitely want to do before leaving Chile.


This time, the weather was bad and we were too many, so we decided to go just for the day and do one of the treks, a 4-hour walk/climb up to the granite towers that name the park. We drove to the beginning of the path and then left the cars and started exercising. It is not a very difficult hike, but it definitely requires some good physical condition. It was very windy and cold, but fortunately it didn't rain much during the way. Though it is high season, we didn't find many people along the way and could walk up to 20 minutes without seeing anyone. What I found most amazing about this park is that it is very well taken care of even with all the visitors it gets. We could smell the forest, feel the pure air around you and fill our bottles from the different water streams along the way.


The last hour of walk was the toughest, but in the end we arrived at the base of the towers, a rewarding view of the three granite pillars surrounded by snow and a beautiful small lake at the bottom, from the melted snow. The weather here was crazy. In the half hour we spent on top, it rained, it hailed, we had fog, we had sun and I had the fingertips frozen. We then had to do the same path back, which we did a bit faster and arrived back at the cars at around 10pm. This is another interesting feature of Patagonia. Due to its high latitude, it was still day at 10pm and, at midnight, you could still see some light in the sky...

Patagonia

Mythical in all possible ways, Patagonia denominates the southern tip of the south american continent, shared by Chile and Argentina. It is definitely one of the wildest areas on Earth, with large parks under governmental protection, barely untouched. You can see almost everything around here: whales and penguins, huge condors, high snowed mountains, impressive glaciars and lakes, endemic forest and prehistoric creatures' remains. Ok, it's true, Patagonia has a lot of tourists, so how can it be this virginal place? Tourism developed the region, created good accessibility to some places, a lot of organized tours and different leisure activities, but as soon as you move a little bit aside from the predetermined routes, you are all alone and you can feel the wildness around you. The weather helps a lot on that, always cold, rainy and windy, permanently changing between cloudy and sometimes misty and some glimpses of sun. Hard to describe...

We were a group of seven people: five portuguese, one italian and one scottish, willing to discover Patagonia in seven days. We flew from Santiago to Punta Arenas, the "capital" of the chilean Magellan region and started the adventure from there. It lies on the shore of the Strait of Magellan, first crossed by the portuguese Fernão de Magalhães in 1520, which marks the end of the south american continent (from there south, there are just islands). In the middle of the strait there is an island called Isla Magdalena, home of tens of thousands of penguins and, if you go to Patagonia, you have to see penguins. We took a ferry from Punta Arenas to the island and it was, indeed and literally, full of penguins. The island is protected as well, so visitors are only allowed to do a small track up to a lighthouse and back. But in fact it doesn't matter, because penguins cross the path in front of you and let you get quite close. They are everywhere and they are the cutest animals I've seen in Chile. They do walk funny like in the movies, they watch you with curiosity, they play, they run, they scream...


The next day, we left Punta Arenas to Puerto Natales, a town three hours north, closer to some of the Patagonia main natural attractions. We took side roads along the way, stopping, enjoying the silence and the views, which made it a longer journey. We crossed a small town called Rio Verde, where we visited the nice and cosy city hall and talked a bit with the mayor about the region. Making contact with people is always the best way to learn about places. In Puerto Natales we stayed in a family place, the home of a friendly old couple, which was cheap and reasonable.

The third day was still relaxed, we took the cars and wandered around the area, to a prehistoric place called Cueva del Milodón. The Milodón was a prehistoric creature, similar to a bear, that lived in the area together with other well-known creatures like the sabertooth tiger. Some remains were found in this cave, which made it a natural monument and a place to visit. The cave is huge and impressive and above it there is a viewpoint, accessible by an easy half an hour walk, from which you get an endless view of the region. Close to the cave is Lake Sofia, where the famous andean condor can also be seen. We didn't see any, but the lake was worth it by itself. In the next posts, the real and impressive Patagonia will be shown, as the following days were the most exciting of them all.

Familiar Places

When I arrived and had to choose the city to live in, between Antofagasta and Santiago, I didn't hesitate. Antofagasta looked to me as an ugly and boring city, just good enough for a settlement to organize trips to the North. Well, it took me quite some time to discover the charms of Antofagasta, mainly because it is not a city made for the tourists. This means you have to dive deep into the chilean lifestyle to find the good spots. So now I know that Antofagasta has good restaurants, a fancy casino, european music and good beaches. And the key to all this is as simple as friendship. On the 18th September, I made contacts in Antofagasta. I went there once to see them and left as friends. Now, I went again, just after the new year, for some beach life and... I guess I left a piece of me there.

In these first days of the year I had, for the first time in Chile, the chance to go deep into the life of a chilean, to share it and for some moments to be part of it. I have friends in Santiago, chilean friends who showed me a lot of what it is to be a chilean, but Santiago is the capital and the deepest chilean roots are not there anymore. In the new year's week, I had the chance to go one step further into the chilean roots, sharing some time with families and not just the friends. I was so well and warmly treated that it felt more like... home. Somehow, in Antofagasta this experience felt purer, more traditional, and this difference made me feel lucky, for being accepted in such special environment, for being given the chance to be part of it for a while. Also for the first time in Chile, I left part of me somewhere, in the most unlikely place I could imagine. I am now binded to Antofagasta and, no matter what happens, I will never look at it the same way as before, there will always be a smile every week, when passing by to the airport. It's all about the moment and "if you find that moment... it lasts forever..."

Summer Carols

For the first time in my life, I didn't spend Christmas with family. For several reasons, I decided not to go to Portugal and one of them was curiosity to see how would Christmas and New Year's eve be in summertime. In general, Chile doesn't live Christmas as intensely as Portugal. No Christmas lights on the streets and discrete symbols inside the shops (even these were only there around one month before Christmas and not the typical two to three months of Portugal). If you add the fact that I don't watch TV and the heat was quite strong, one could easily pass Christmas without noticing it.

I spent Christmas with colleagues, working in Paranal (we never close...), some of which brought their families for a couple of days. It was strange to see children running around, playing and screaming, a rare sight around here. Even weirder was to listen to a version of Silent Night while the Sun would come in through the windows and everyone was in summer clothes. Something just didn't fit... We had a cocktail and a special dinner on the night of the 24th and after that someone from here, disguised as Santa Claus in Nike shoes, came to give children their presents. It was all very quiet and peaceful, family style.

As for the New Year's eve, things were quite different. I went with some friends to Valparaiso, famous for its amazing fireworks. I stayed at a friend's house, with her family and more friends, where we had a nice asado for dinner. We then spent the midnight on top of one of the several hills, overlooking the beautiful bay, from Valparaiso harbour to the end of Viña del Mar and the beach of Reñaca. The view was outstanding and as soon as the fireworks started, I realized the difference between Portugal and Valparaiso. They weren't prettier than in Portugal, nor more amazing and they didn't last longer (around 20 minutes), BUT here they launch them from several boats lined up along the bay. I counted 10 simultaneous launch points, which created an amazing lighting effect of both cities (see video below). After that we went to a disco in Valparaiso (the very same I found the first time I was there), where I met some friends from Santiago. We were there until morning and then left to another place, a friend's friend's house, where people were singing and playing songs. I got back home at 10 in the morning and slept the whole day! Damn good!!