read part 1 first kids!
Day 4
After the little tent mishap we set off with wet feet, aching legs, shoulders, hips, back and neck. Donning our backpacks for what we knew would be the worst day, we begun our 21k hike bearing all our gear. Taking in some cool views, the only thing we looked forward to were the breaks chilling out in the nice weather. Driven by games such as "I have never", "pub quiz", "would you rather", "categories", "riddles" and the kilo of chips we had promised ourselves when we got back to Puerto Natales we pushed on through the pain. Oh and if you`re wondering....we all agreed that we would rather eat our own poo once a week rather than have sand in every meal you had.....the joys of "would you rather". Annoyingly I bet Leila that George Clooney voiced Buzz Lightyear (as I was sure he did, not sure why) compared to her correct answer of Tim Allen, with the loser having to have stupid hair for the victory night out. Lucky for me I have stupid hair anyway so not too devastating a challenge.
We crossed some cool bridges on the way, anything to take our minds off the fact that everything hurt was a bonus!
However the bridge was nothing compared to the light relief that this couple provided! You`ll notice it soon enough! All I`m gonna say is....where`s the equality?!
Taking a "shortcut" at the base of the W (not highlighted on the map) we discovered that although shorter, the ridiculously steep climb was almost not worth it. Didn`t seem so at the time anyway but upon reaching the part where the paths met back up again, we were glad we took it.
We stopped at this point and took in some of Chile`s super noodle equilavents, noodles have never tasted so good. In the extasy of noodle heaven, we thought it was a mirage when Cyrille walked past, a day ahead of us coming back down the other way. After a quick catch up, we parted ways again and pushed onto Campamento Chileno, not where we would stop as it was a better idea to push onto Campamento Torres to save time on the final day. We did take a break though and saw this infant fox which was pretty cool, who pretty much stopped to pose for the camera.
With the final push from Campamento Chileno to Campamento Torres (which seemed like an eternity) I was that happy that I genuinely kissed the sign, albeit this photo a re-enactment as Jen found it amusing when she saw it the first time.
Setting up camp for the last time, we hung up our sleeping bags to air, and our socks to dry and got a nice meal of noodles with more salami.
Day 5
With a fairly decent nights sleep, albeit it short...the talk at the erratic rock days before highlighted the importance of getting up at 6 am so that we could make the towers for sunrise an hour later. Thanks for that erratic rock! So, getting up half asleep we packed the day pack as well as the sleeping bags (yes the sleeping bags) and set off guided by the dim moon light and a torch which I stuck under my hat to fashion a head lamp seeing as my actual head lamp had broke days before. That`s what 5 pounds gets for ya!
Although only a kilometre in length, this trek was by far the worst. It was easily the steepest walk of the entire W trek, literally clambering on rocks for most the way, trying to find our way in the dark following the reflective pads stuck to rocks as others obviously go up in the dark. About 15 mins in Jen`s leg had all but given up and we lost Derek Mark and Leila who pushed on. With Jen moaning away I did my best to get her going again, whilst watching Derek`s headlight become a distant glimmer. 30 minutes in and my legs now decided they didn`t want to work either but with Jen struggling more than me, I did the gentlemanly thing and took Jen`s sleeping back and slung it on my back along with mine and the day pack. Such a gent me. 45 minutes later having stopped every 5 minutes to catch breath we lost the path, After a quick argument about where the path was we kinda guessed and found an orange marker again, but it seemed to be leading us down the mountain. Persuing anyway we saw headlightsup some rocks who shouted to us "this way". Thinking it was out friends we trusted the night voice, leaving the path and clambering up some boulders (against all the signs telling us not to leave the paths) and upon reaching the lights we were met with "you`re not our friends"! turns out it was another group of people but they kindly pointed us back to the path where we finally got to the top and met up with our actual friends. With the sun still down the view was still cool but the picture doesn`t say much!
And if you were wondering why the sleeping bags...this is why! Arriving at the top in about 90% darkness, others looked on in envy as we snuggled into our sleeping bags!
With the sun coming over the opposite hill, the towers would soon be lit up, creating an ery atmosphere.
The sky was illuminated red one way with the ultimate goal being the other way.............
Enough of that wordsworth nonsense, after an hour at the top, everything hurt again but down the mountain we had to go! Being 9am and knowing that we had to catch a bus at 2pm from Hotel Las Torres off we set down the steep cliff side, gratifying ourselves with what we had achieved in the dark on an empty tank, seeing as we could now see the path in the light.
For the last time, we packed up the tents and set off down the mountain with our packs. With our legs, shoulder, hips, back, neck and now knees pretty much giving up, we went on at the slowest pace we had set the whole 5 days, with the end point seeming to be an age away. Two thirds of the way down we could see the chimney smoke of the hotel, giving us just enough motivation to push on an finally collapse in the hotel with the most well earned beer of my life. Who cared if it was 6 quid for half a litre, it was the greatest thing in the world.
Some of you may have worked out from the hints in the this enormous blog that having only 1 set of days clothes I would have worn the same black body warmer throughout the whole trek. A body warmer stinks at the best of times but after 5 days of sweat and rain it becomes a whole different ball game, often highlighted by the others in the group if they trekked down wind from me! Thankfully Mark smelt just as bad! Upon getting to the end hotel I took off my shirt in the men`s bathroom and gave the old unders a soapy clean, much to the disgust of the chap who walked into the swanky hotels bathroom to see a topless hairy mess after 5 days.
After some wine we went out for a nice meal with me respecting the laws of betting and sporting my ridiculous hair do.....eat your heart out Hugh Jackman as Wolverine!
Ohhhh..... and if you think I had it bad, you may not have clocked it with my writing......but Jen had to don the same weight as all of us, with a bag that was literally the size of her.......mad respect.
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