Hiking the O circuit of Torres del Paine, Chile

I booked a flight from Amsterdam to Buenos Aires and spent a couple of days in this beautiful city. As I do in almost every city I stay,  I booked a bicycling tour. In my opinion the best way to see all the highlights of a city, hear about the history and be active at the same time. I then took a flight to El Calafate at the West side of Argentina. Since it was so close to Perito Moreno Glacier, I decided to first take a look there before heading to Torres del Plaine. This 250 km² ice formation is the world's third largest reserve of fresh water and one of the main tourist attractions of Patagonia. I did the full on tour with a boat which went super close to the ice field and also a hike with crampons on top of it. Really enjoyed the views and even saw a large chunk of ice collapsing into the sea!

After enjoying the Perito Moreno to its full, I took the bus the next day to Puerto Natales in Chile which took about 9 hours. The bus ride was quite comfortable and I really enjoyed looking at the vast countryside, even seeing already the first alpacas next to the road! I arrived in Puerto Natales late afternoon so it was too late to travel further to the start of the O circuit. I stayed a night at a cosy hostal in Puerto Natales and took the earliest bus to the basecamp of Torres del Paine (Central campsite).

There are two major hikes to do in Torres del Paine: The O trek is a 120km circular hiking route around the Cordillera del Paine which includes the shorter W circuit of about 70 km. Since you are obliged to stay in the assigned campsites along the route (wild camping is not allowed), and there are only a limited amount of places available, you have to book your place at a campsite well in advance. This means you have to make your hiking plan also well in advance and you can not decide spontaneously to hike further on a day or the opposite to stay longer at a beautiful place.  However, the advantage of having limited sleeping places available, is that the O circuit is not busy at all and you will really get to enjoy the being-alone-in-nature feeling! I had booked a tent at all the campsites so I didnt need to carry too heavy of a load on my back.

The start is always a bit of a non eventful moment compared to doing for example a marathon race. No national anthem, no starting gun, you just start hiking. Probably more so if you are hiking on your own like I was. But as soon as you are up in the mountains, away from the crowd and you start getting into a rhythm, your happy endorphins start flowing. Yessssss this was what I had been longing for! The views were amazing, the hiking path easy and after 5 hours I already arrived at my camp for the night. 

The next days I always started early, being the first on the trail. A bit scary because sometimes it felt like the eyes of a puma were following me. Fortunately I had no actual encounter of wild animals, only a beautiful herd of (wild?) horses that passed me. It was very clear which horse was the leader of the pack since he proudly walked in front but checked regularly if every one was following. At night I ate my adventure food bags and drank a protein shake to prepare me for another active day ahead. After 4 days I arrived at the cross point with the W section. And the serene trail became a packed road full with groups of people and hamburger restaurants.... A bit exaggerated probably but that was how it felt at that time.