03.09.08 - Torres del Paine

Day 3 – Regresamos a Valle Frances

Seven forty-five this morning was a magic moment. The sun had risen but had not bathed the mountain with amber warmth, until just that very moment.



The hoards of refugio breakfast diners flooded out into the cool air to photograph or just absorb the delicate scene. In a matter of moments, the literal moment had passed and the field of view cooled to a typical zebra striped gray.  (See last picture of the day for contrast.)



This morning, I stayed behind with the packs and let Birgit, Linda, and Lipika head out about 8:30am. There was no room left in the refugio for this night, so we would be camping in tents, which were not yet vacated. About ten in the morning, I was finally able to transfer the gear and head out on the trail.

The solo pacing provided a change of focus. I stopped to enjoy the lichen patterns on granite stones. These designs are strong when the granite is actually adhered to and a shadow remains after lichen has withered away.



The day’s trek would be a retracing of the last 5.5 kilometers, of the prior evening, to opening of the French Valley, combined with another 5.5 kilometers of climbing to the viewing point above Camp Britanico. Now simply multiply the kilometers by 2 and that is the return distance total for the day or 22 kilometers.

Someone must have had fun on the beach with the bi-tonal stones. It is amazing that both white granite pebbles and the darker gray stones of the striped mountains seem to line the shore of Lago Nordenskjold in near perfect proportion to the volume found in the standing mountains.



This morning I was pacing at a rapid rate, given the freedom of no expedition pack weighing me down. Pushing through the kilometers, the sound of thunder rung through the opening Valle Frances.



In reality it was not thunder at all but glacial avalanches breaking free to head downward. Just as my first views of the Graciar Frances came into focus a snow avalanche slipped off the harder frozen base. If you look at the center of the picture, below, a stream of snow echoed the bigger slide. In reality, it is extremely difficult to document the bulk of the slide because it has already gone by the time the thunder sound-print reaches the viewer.



The reward for 11 kilometers of trekking, combined with 750 meters of elevation gain, is a backside view of one of the Torres or Towers.



With a veritable “point and shoot” camera it is very difficult capture all the textures and shades of this alpine environment. There are deep greens, combined with bone-dry grey tree snags, golden grasses, baby blue sky, white snow, and granite spires. It is a frigid day’s climb to the end of the French Valley but highly recommended.



A huge bonus of the day’s trek was catching up with the Dutchies, who armed with a tent and food avoided the 11 kilometers of backtracking by camping at the opening of the Valle Frances. We have spent basically the last week together and not seeing them for over twenty-four hours left a real void. Marijn and Lotte are an incredible couple. They are both individually honest and exceptional, while paring to make a overtly welcoming couple. I loved their sense of humor and wit, that somehow easily traversed the language gap. Marijn, with his flaming “doo-rag”, from mountain biking the "World’s Most Dangerous Road" in Bolivia, could hardly be an urban tough, but he had fun in the attempted mime.



It is so difficult to pick which of the hundreds of pictures to share, so I’ll try to keep with distinctly varying shots. Even though the scene is completely different, the volume of this impression reminded of Yosemite.