Torres del Paine

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Description

Despite becoming steadily busier, there’s a fierceness to Torres del Paine National Park that no number of visitors can quite tame. Just witness the names of some of the Paine Massif peaks, the Andean range that seems to follow you around wherever you go: Sword, Blade, Shark’s Fin and Fortress.

The trio of sheer granite needles that make up the park’s calling card — the eponymous Torres (towers) — look like they’ve been constructed in Tolkien’s Mordor, and they’re accompanied by the spiky, twisting outcrops of the Cuernos (horns). They’re likely to be the first features you see on entering the park by car. Around this impressively diabolic-looking geology lie lakes of piercingly bright teal, grasslands and steppe, glaciers, cirques, valleys, waterfalls and rushing rivers.

Lest you forget that you’re at the mercy of the elements this far south, expect to be battered by winds, pelted by rain or sudden snow, or blinded by dazzlingly hot sun at pretty much any moment of the day. Sometimes, you’ll experience several weather systems in the course of a few hours. Welcome to Patagonia.