In light of yesterday's wonderful discovery around having brown water at the hotel, my first words of the day to Marc were "do we have clean water yet?" Unfortunately the answer was no.
Today's hike was expected to be challenging as we were targeting a vantage point of the Paine Towers that had a final ascent similar to our Laguna de Los Tres trek last week. The weather was cloudy with light rain but anything can happen weather wise in Patagonia, which could be good or bad.
Marc hiked for the 1st 90 minutes to a great viewpoint of the valley and then returned down to the hotel to rest up and continue reading "Ready Player One". I continued on with the rest of the gang. The weather was toying with us for most of the trek out to the towers. Rays of sunshine, rain showers, wind gusts, etc.
Our guide didn't think it made sense to go to our initial target because of the conditions but he did want to take us to a spot to *MAYBE* see the towers without too much difficulty. Low and behold, we caught a glimpse of them in the clouds. Score for us.
The wind picked up quite a bit as the sun continued to come out in the Lake Nordenskjold Valley near the hotel. I went ahead as I wanted to see how Marc was faring at the hotel.
In case you are wondering, windy conditions at your tail as you are going downhill with narrow paths/large drop-offs are less than ideal. I was making progress when I saw the sign for a shortcut. Ahhhh..... Some other word was also on the sign but I knew our hotel had a campground, so I figured it was the same place......
About 10 minutes in, nothing looks familiar but I tell myself to stick with it. Another 10 minutes in, I see my hotel down in the valley but the path I am on is not heading in that direction. I should turn around, right? Sure, but I don't. Now I am almost 40 minutes into this "shortcut" and I am now assessing if I should continue on the path and hitch a ride to the hotel (probably not), head back up the trail to the sign and head down the right path (smart) or identify a way between both paths to see if I can cobble something together (hmmmm).
Note the handwriting in red on the map, which was my "foolproof" plan. :-)
Obviously I went for the brilliant plan of looking across a huge swath of land to see if I could trek down to the proper path without killing myself or getting eaten by a puma. When I started, I gave myself about an 80% chance of success. I immediately thought I was making some progress since I found some horse tracks (aka horsesh**). My logic was if a horse could walk this, so could I. Flawless, right?
I get about 60% across and I am bush whacking trees & branches. No more horse tracks though. I am walking on top of lots of bushes. More swashbuckling brilliance. I then run into a bunch of trees and can't see a thing, so I decide to get to a higher point (slightly going backwards).
I now see that I am about 85% across, so this is good. Progress. Now what about those fighting guanacos or the wild puma that could attack me? Hmmmm. Stay positive, Jill. The other hazard was that if there was an unknown chasm that made it impossible to cross but wasn't visible from my earlier vantage point..... Oh boy.
Fortunately I started hearing familiar voices, which ended up being one of the couples from our tour so I knew I was close. I find a spot to pop out of to get visual confirmation and I traverse some more bushes to get to them. When I yelled out to them, they said, "Where did you come from?" Ah yes....
So thanks to some literal horsesh** along with some schmuckitude, I saved myself from a very dumb move around a "shortcut". We got back and we're talking to a couple of Brits about fitness. She starts talking about burpees and I tell her that she should try CrossFit because why not? The discussion then shifts to me explaining the "shut the car door (with your tush)" as a way of improving squat technique. The gal loved it and then we went our separate ways.
I get back and see Marc. He is in good spirits and looks well rested. I immediately ask to see the map of the park. Then I really got to see what an idiot I was for taking a "shortcut" from a sign in a language that I didn't completely understand.
I guess I should've have listened to my Dad because had I followed his tried and true advice around "staying with the group", my little detour probably would not have happened. Oops.
Our guide didn't think it made sense to go to our initial target because of the conditions but he did want to take us to a spot to *MAYBE* see the towers without too much difficulty. Low and behold, we caught a glimpse of them in the clouds. Score for us.
Heading back to the Refugio for lunch, we saw the sun shining in the direction of our hotel but not in the direction of the towers. The Refugio is a place where campers stay, shower & eat. It also is a place for day hikers like our group to take a break. By the time we made it back there, we found 2 of our crew engaged in a serious game of Jenga.
The wind picked up quite a bit as the sun continued to come out in the Lake Nordenskjold Valley near the hotel. I went ahead as I wanted to see how Marc was faring at the hotel.
In case you are wondering, windy conditions at your tail as you are going downhill with narrow paths/large drop-offs are less than ideal. I was making progress when I saw the sign for a shortcut. Ahhhh..... Some other word was also on the sign but I knew our hotel had a campground, so I figured it was the same place......
About 10 minutes in, nothing looks familiar but I tell myself to stick with it. Another 10 minutes in, I see my hotel down in the valley but the path I am on is not heading in that direction. I should turn around, right? Sure, but I don't. Now I am almost 40 minutes into this "shortcut" and I am now assessing if I should continue on the path and hitch a ride to the hotel (probably not), head back up the trail to the sign and head down the right path (smart) or identify a way between both paths to see if I can cobble something together (hmmmm).
Note the handwriting in red on the map, which was my "foolproof" plan. :-)
Obviously I went for the brilliant plan of looking across a huge swath of land to see if I could trek down to the proper path without killing myself or getting eaten by a puma. When I started, I gave myself about an 80% chance of success. I immediately thought I was making some progress since I found some horse tracks (aka horsesh**). My logic was if a horse could walk this, so could I. Flawless, right?
I now see that I am about 85% across, so this is good. Progress. Now what about those fighting guanacos or the wild puma that could attack me? Hmmmm. Stay positive, Jill. The other hazard was that if there was an unknown chasm that made it impossible to cross but wasn't visible from my earlier vantage point..... Oh boy.
Fortunately I started hearing familiar voices, which ended up being one of the couples from our tour so I knew I was close. I find a spot to pop out of to get visual confirmation and I traverse some more bushes to get to them. When I yelled out to them, they said, "Where did you come from?" Ah yes....
So thanks to some literal horsesh** along with some schmuckitude, I saved myself from a very dumb move around a "shortcut". We got back and we're talking to a couple of Brits about fitness. She starts talking about burpees and I tell her that she should try CrossFit because why not? The discussion then shifts to me explaining the "shut the car door (with your tush)" as a way of improving squat technique. The gal loved it and then we went our separate ways.
I get back and see Marc. He is in good spirits and looks well rested. I immediately ask to see the map of the park. Then I really got to see what an idiot I was for taking a "shortcut" from a sign in a language that I didn't completely understand.
I guess I should've have listened to my Dad because had I followed his tried and true advice around "staying with the group", my little detour probably would not have happened. Oops.