Torres Del Paine: Eighth Wonder Of The World?

The view from across Lake Pehoe in Torres Del Paine National Park

This was a long day. Caught my tour at around 5:10 a.m. Back at the hotel at 8:30 p.m. All to do something that the travel "experts" universally agree you should not do: visit Torres Del Paine National Park in a single day.

It's a long ride from Punta Arenas, at about four hours each direction. As we got closer to the park, we see this interesting critter.

Those are guanacos.

It is a type of camelid, a family of mammals whose New World members include llamas and alpaca. The guanaco looks like the product of an unholy union of a llama and an antelope.. The top half looks pure llama, while the bottom half makes the guanaco run and jump like an antelope or gazelle. And, yes, I mean top and bottom, and not front and back. Let's take a closer look.

I don't have any video, unfortunately, but they are amazing.

But I didn't come here to look at wildlife. I came here for the mountains.

It was a cloudy day, so we were not going to get the picture-postcard view of the Three Towers that are the signature feature of this Chilean national park, the Torres Del Paine for which the park is named.

You can see the three towers of the Torres Del Paine in the picture below, just right of center. They are the mountains that are not snow-capped.

These are, geologically speaking, very new mountains. They are only about 12 million years old. Babies.

You can tell they are new because of the sheernesss of the sides. These are like skyscapers rising vertically up from the pavement. There is no gradual ascent here. That's for older mountains.

Let's zoom in for a closer view.

We drove a little deeper into the park to the Sarmiento Lake area. We're getting closer.

If it were clear and sunny, you might be able to see that the three towers of Torres Del Paine that is the park's namesake are mostly granite, capped off with black volcanic rock. By the way, the name "Torres Del Paine" is a multi-cultural name. "Torres" is Spanish for "towers." "Paine" is not named for the Revolutionary War figure that authored "Common Sense," Thomas Paine, but is the word for "blue" in Aonikenk, a local indigenous language. It is pronounced "PINE-eh," in case you wanted to know.

Unfortunately, the clouds are getting thicker at this point.

Here's me. Lakeside. Torres del Paine over my left shoulder.

And this is the lake without me standing in front of it.

One more close-up zoom of the Torres Del Paine:

Off we go to the next viewpoint.

Lago Nordenskjold:

Where they have a calafate bush, growing wild. Keep in mind, Mid-November is early spring. The berries are just beginning to grow.

And here is a viewing platform and its view:

And here is the view without a viewing platform.

Next stop: Salto Grande. The Big Waterfall.

 

Onward to the next viewpoint:

Zoom:

Island in the lake:

Zoom:

All pictures of the mountains up close are zoom shots. We did not hike that close to any of these mountains.

The viewing platform at this viewpoint was getting crowded:

Time to move to the next stop.

Or would you prefer this same picture in landscape instead of portrait?

And the next stop is the final stop in Torres Del Paine: Grey Lake.

You can barely see it in the picture, but looking south from the new bridge is the old rope bridge, which was used until recently.

Capacity was only three at a time. I don't think I would have wanted to have been one of the three.

See that blue object in Lago Grey?

That is an iceberg.

Behind the iceberg, in the far background, the break in the mountains to the left of the iceberg: that is the glacier.

Glaciar Grey.

Lago Grey (Grey Lake). Rio Grey (Grey River). Glaciar Grey (Grey Glacier). Detecting a pattern?

Mountain scene with a glacier dead center in the picture:

Another shot of the Greys Glaciar and Lago.

A few years back, TripAdvisor declared Torres Del Paine National Park "the Eighth Wonder of the World." It is magnificent. Even on a cloudy day. Eighth Wonder, though? You decide. But it would be better if you don't decide just based on my cloudy-day pictures.