Woke up with really stiff legs, and wasn't sure if I could make it through another day of hiking! But, eventually stretched out and felt a bit better. Today was going to be a big day. In order to finish the hike in 8 days instead of 9, we would have to hike 21k today. But the map made the hike look relatively easy. Not too many topo lines to cross. YAY! I thought...
But the map was deciving, damn you map! We started out as usual with an early morning steep descent. This was becoming an every day occurrence that really worked to wake you up! But again, we reached the top to an amazing view. It was the same scene we had seen the day before, with mountains and Glacier Grey in the foreground, but this time there was also another addition to make the view even better, if that was even possible. The scene was perfectly framed by a rainbow!!! Wow it was incredible! We took about a million pics and then continued on.
I was cursing the map again as we went, up, up, up, along the mountainside, and then down, down, down, and repeat. But I couldnt complain because we had a great view of the glacier all day. Then we came to the first valley we had to cross. This consisted of a metal staircase or more like a vertical ladder going up over loose soil and chunky rocks. These rocks looked like they were ready to give way at any moment and the vertical ladder staircase was kinda attached by metal wires and ropes... to the loose boulders. Yes I was scared for my life! So I started climbing the ladder, holding on with a death grip, and reached the middle about 15 feet up, and realized the ladder was broken into two pieces and was held together by a few short ropes tied together! Ahhhhh! Thought I might die for sure at this point. Then I hopped over that (as agile as I could with a 35 lb backpack!) and reached the top. Another problem, there was about 2 feet in between the top of the ladder and the actual surface! Another not-so agile moment fearing my fate falling off a cliff, and I managed to scramble on to the ground. Yay, safe!
We continued on, reached another ladder like the other one, and managed to climb that one as well. A cool suspension bridge followed on the next valley. We made it to the Glacier Grey lookout, and had an amazing view of the foot of the glacier, with its jagged edge and icy blues dazzling us.
Not too long after, we made it to Refugio Grey at lunchtime and they had a snack bar! This was the first regugio we had been to that had a really good stocked store, so we went a bit crazy. We chowed down on snickers, milky way, pringles, twix, chocolate milk and fanta in addition to the salami and cheese we had brought for lunch! It was AMAZING! After eating, we were in a sugar-induced coma, but we still had another 10 k to hike. So we had to force ourselves to keep going.
The afternooon was a bit rough as it was our first real experience with the insane Patagonian winds. The gusts must have been about 80k. At one point, the wind took my backpack and flung me right into a prickly bush! Not fun! Picked myself up and continued on past lakes and into a beautiful valley. Eventually we came to Grande Paine campground and refugio, which had a beautiful mountain as a backdrop. After a long 21k day we were exhausted. We set up the tent in crazy winds that were blowing some tents right over on to the ground they were so powerful, and set in for the night.
No comments:
Post a Comment