Wednesday, March 02, 2011

W Trek - Day 2 - 19km - 6.5 hours

We slept deeply until 6am when the sky started to lighten and woke us up.  We wanted to get an early start, to get a side trip closer up to glacier (with just a day pack) before heading back down to Paine Grande.

It took us an hour to reach Los Guardas campsite.  There was supposed to be a lookout point 30 minutes beyond the camp, but we only saw signs to a lookout about 5 minutes away. This lookout point was almost on top of the glaciers and was amazing. (Later we talked to other trekkers  who found the more distant lookout, oh well).

We went back to the refugio to get our packs, and a box lunch we had ordered. The lunch was huge!  I was thinking about how much it weighed :) in my pack.

The trek back to Paine Grande was enjoyable. The views in the distance were amazing, but so was the path (which we didn't notice the first day).  If you paid someone to create a rock garden and landscaping it wouldn't look half has good.

We arrived at Paine Grande lodge at 4:15pm.  This was more hotel-like, although still with bunk beds and shared bathrooms.  We were able to get a room for just the two of us. We showered and stretched, and the headed to the bar for a celebration beer ($4) (we also had one after day 1).

Dinner was a buffet, lots of food which was good, but not as tasty as Refugio Grey.

So far we've been lucky with the weather.  The wind hasn't been too strong (gusts up to 40km?) and no rain yet.  We've been wearing our capilene base layer with a wind breaker, and by zipping and unzipping and taking gloves on and off we've been comfortable in the changing weather conditions.

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