Day in Torres Del Paine
Sowell Family's Travels on Gijima
Skipper: Tim Sowell Admiral Tracy Crew Sean & Alex
Wed 12 May 2010 23:11
7.30 am, and sure enough it was drizzling at not above 0 degrees, so we
rugged up. We were doing a day touring by van around the Torres Del Paine
national park, the forecast was -1 to +2 degrees, and I assume they did not
take into account chill factor, as the wind was blowing hard, which I
expected, after looking at the weather models, that showed a good low going
around the horn.
Just before we entered the park we stopped at a Café for a hot drink, we ran
into 3 of the girls off the boat, they are going camping/ trekking for 4
days like Tracy did 10 years ago, we did not envy them as the wind was
blowing 30 + knots and was freezing, with regular mist drizzle coming
through, it will be interesting if we see them back in town tomorrow. We did
get great views of condors flying in the wild (this is the first time I have
seen them out of captivity), I did not see them flap their wings they just
glided with the wind, through the valley at total ease. We saw many animals
and even sheep which took me back to Australia, the grass is very dry.
The mountains are dramatic rising out of the flat plain, you have some which
are part of the Andes and Torres Del Paine main towers are not as they came
from volcanic actions 1000s of years ago. These rock faces just rise up and
up, we saw the tops yesterday from this side it was in mist. We saw the
horns as the mist parted, but the mist was only around the mountains, to our
left the sun was out shining on the ranges which also had snow.
We saw an iceberg a nice large one, which had run aground (you can see the
photos) the deep blue and white is always amazing to see, this berg had
dropped off a Glacier and drifted down the lake, the wind was blowing 30 +
knots and negative chill factor as we took these pictures. On the walk back
Sean talked about the pool and warmth of El Salvador only 2 weeks ago.
