Day 6: Seron to Dickson
We thought we had a super long day ahead of us (which my feet were not looking forward to), but it turns out there's a typo on the map they give out at the park entrance. A typo that means we had about two hours less walking to do. Hooray!!
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| Gotta love those reflection pics. |
We walked through more fields of daises, and as we were hiking up and out of one valley into another, we got to watch two condors fly over us. Holy crap those birds are huge.
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| Coming over into the new valley |
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| Big birds |
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| Our next camp was over by all that snow and ice |
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| So much closer! Camp buildings in view |
We had heard that Dickson was one of the prettier camps, but I didn't realize we'd be camping across the lake from a glacier! We were both pretty tired by the time we got to Dickson, so we decided that since tomorrow was Jan 1, we'd buy a box of wine, relax, and not worry about getting up early the next day. Aka rest day. There were several other people that were all doing the same thing.
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| Dinner view |
We made ourselves a great pasta/soup meal and drank our box of wine. Along with some guys from Israel, England, Canada and Argentina, we rang in the New Year in the middle of nowhere next to a glacier. It was pretty great.
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| This is me realizing I had to try to carry my cup of wine down a ladder |
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| NYE wine and glacier pics |
Day 7: New Years Day
It was also pretty great the next day watching everyone else pack up and leave while we luxuriously sat around and did nothing. Took a shower. Washed some clothes. When it started to sprinkle we all retreated to our tents for naps. Definitely one of the more strenuous days I've had so far.
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| Walking down to check out the huge iceberg |
We went down and walked along the lake some more. There was a huge iceberg that had broken off of the glacier and was sitting on the beach a ways down from us. Unfortunately, it was on the other side of a river so we couldn't get to it.
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| Iceberg! |
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| Ominous cloud |
Day 8: Dickson to Los Perros
Feeling refreshed, we were up and ready to go the next day. According to the map (the same one that had the previous typos), we would be spending four hours walking steeply uphill. Turns out it was a much more pleasant walk than we expected. We got to see a new glacier, and the trail kept us in the trees and out of the wind and sun for the most part.
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| A new glacier! |
Los Perros was a paid camp site, but it didn't have a refugio. But it's cooking shelter did have a woodstove, and we got invited to sit down at a table with some new friends. One of them made us real coffee with a tiny moka pot they had brought with them. Glorious. We also shared some chocolate and played cards. Playing cards with people from a variety of nationalities is fun. It seems like even if we all know the same general game, there are lots of much smaller rules that very from place to place. Like which cards are the special cards, or how many cards you have in your hand at once.
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| Falling right off into the water |
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| The wind tried to blow us over here |
For dinner we essentially tried to eat everything heavy that we were carrying, because the next day we were going up and over John Gardner Pass, which we kept hearing about and how difficult it was. We had started our hike on Dec 26th. Apparently on the 25th, there was over a meter of snow on the pass. Luckily, it had all melted by the time we got over to this side of the park. We still couldn't believe the luck we were having with the weather, but no one wanted to talk about it too much, in case we jinxed it.
I would just like to note that this was also the coldest of the camp sites by far. I slept in essentially all of my clothes, including hat, scarf and gloves. Multiple pairs of socks. And I could still feel the cold radiating up from the ground through my sleeping pad. Thank goodness for sleeping pads or I'm not sure I would have gotten a minute of sleep.
Day 9: Los Perros to Grey over John Gardner Pass
The next day, we were up early to take on the pass. The map made it look like we were walking straight up one side of a mountain and straight down the other. While it was definitely our steepest day, I don't think it was as awful as anyone expected. We followed a series of orange markers and orange paint dots through the trees and up above treeline. I could see how it could be quite hard with crappy weather that reduced visibility by much. Those little orange dots would get a lot harder to find, and we were walking on rocks more than a dirt trail in an incredibly exposed area. Luckily for us, there wasn't really any wind anywhere except the very top of the pass.
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| We got to walk up next to this |
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| More reflections |
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| Look! The top of the pass! |
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| The view back down the valley we'd climbed up |
We made it to the top of the pass and had almost ten minutes to ourselves to take pictures before the wind picked up and some other people joined us at the top. The view from the top was amazing. Glaciers are so freakin' COOL! The texture. The color. It's massive moving ice!
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| Another glacier!!!!!! |
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| Cool clouds over the glacier |
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| Coming down next to a frozen stream |
Coming down the other side was even steeper than the way we went up. I was incredibly thankful it hadn't rained recently because it would have been tons of slipping and sliding down muddy trails. My poor short legs and lack of coordination would have made it pretty exhausting.
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| Where the glacier met the lake |
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| Getting down closer a bit |
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| The texture was so cool! |
Just after lunchtime we made it to the closest camp on that side of the pass. It was free, but it also had swarms of bugs. We made the executive decision to push on for another five hours to get the Grey. Yep, it was a pretty long day, but we had good company and lots of glacier watching to do as we walked down along it.
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| There were two bridges like this. Not a big fan. |
By the time we got to camp, my legs were pretty tired. This camp is one of the ones that's used on the W trek, so we were back with the masses. Le sigh. This also meant that this was our last night in the park, and think we all had pretty mixed feelings about this. We all sat down in the cooking area and essentially all threw out all of our food and had a shared feast. And by feast I mean pasta and instant potatoes. Yum.
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| More glacier. <3 |
Day 10: Grey to Paine Grande and Catamaran out of the park
The next morning we had a three hour walk out of the park to take the catamaran to where the bus picked us up. Because Ellen and I excel at mornings, we were running a bit late. There was one last mirador to the glacier that we could go to, and even though we were late our friend insisted that we run up there. So happy that he did, because it was one of my favorite views from the whole trip.
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| Its so blue!!! |
After that we hustled down with our basically weightless packs and arrived back at Paine Grande with time to spare. We took some pictures, changed our shoes and got ready for the boat. I was pretty sad to say goodbye to the park. As tired and as torn up as my feet were, getting to spend this much time in nature always reminds me not to take things like this for granite*. It was an amazing ten days with great people and the best weather I could have asked for.
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| We got sent off with a nice rainbow! |
This was by far the longest backpacking trip I'd ever done, and this was Ellen's first! Ten days, approx 130km or 81 miles. And a few days with some decent elevation change. I'm pretty impressed. I must admit that I was a bit nervous that if the weather was horrible or anything else went massively wrong that it would also be Ellen's last backpacking trip. Instead, it was a ton of fun to get to share this with her and see her get so stoked on random nature stuff too!
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| Line for the boat |
Maybe for next time, we need to find somewhere that's a little warmer in the mornings and we'll be able to drag ourselves out of the tent a bit earlier. I'm not sure if I'll ever be this lucky with weather for a trip ever again. In a place that is known for its crazy weather (four seasons in one day), we got consistent sun and minimal wind for ten days! Muchas gracias Mother Nature.
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| View from the catamaran. |
* Once you drift to geology puns you know you have hit rock bottom, am I right Pops?
