Backpacking Patagonia on a Prayer
Potless, mapless, foodless, sore, hungry and a bit derranged, I returned to Chilean civilization on December 22.
It felt extraordinary, myself and the weather had conspired against the trip from the beginning, but somehow it happened. Less than two weeks ago I had just walked into Argentina via Paso Cochomo
and I was fixed on returning to Chile by foot in a journey I dreamed every bit as grand and heroic as could be. I would blaze an inspiring route, hiking across epic, snowy mountain passes on empty trails and untracked land with just my wits and backpack. This would take me right across Parque Nacional Nahuel Huapi, around the mighty Volcan Tronador and straight on to Chile, forming a complete circuit. 1 week crossing nations.
Bariloche snuffed those dreams with a cold shower soon as I arrived.
I was greeted with rain and 30 mile an hour winds. The park guards said all the trails were closed and would stay that way for the next several days. In addition my planned route was unthinkable. A heavy winter had locked the deep mountain passes in enough snow to track a cat. High river flow had also blown out a crucial bridge just before Chile. I was crestfallen. There was nothing left for me to do but disregard the warnings and press on with the trek.
Where there’s a hard trek there’s a much easier trek nearby.
Hopefully. After consulting with locals and maps I found one, changing the route to avoid the impassible parts. I planned to drop out of the mountains quickly, hike to the border town of Pampa Linda (see map above), and pass Tronador to the South instead of the North. As I started on the trail with some friends from my hostel, I was feeling pretty good. The wind was light, my backpack was heavy with everything I’d need, and we moved easily up the trail to Refugio Frey. A late start and missing the first bus hadn’t checked my optimism. We took some photos together before I continued on alone. “For the papers.” they joked. “When no one finds you in a couple days.”
Wind was heavy and a light rain picked up as I climbed. I scrambled up snowy slopes and steep boulder fields, nerves rattling in the building wind and frequent cobble slides.
After a nerve wracking ascent over the first rough pass I descended into a gorgeous valley. The faded and sparse trail markers (below) made the descent a fun puzzle of a scree slope.
Hungry and tired I was lured by the valley to call it early after finding a nice campsite about two hours walk from Refugio Jakob. I set up camp, made a fire, went to cook… and promptly realized I’d managed to leave my cooking pot in the hostel. None should be surprised. This didn’t go over well for moral, but I made some tortilla hamburger on my stove wind screen instead and pondered whether to head back to Bariloche tomorrow. I drifted off thinking of lost pots, hot tea, and the thrashing noise a tarp makes as steadily gathering wind and rains mercilessly beat against it.
Shivering and damp I heard nothing but the howl of wind and roar of rushing water as I headed up the trail in the heavy murk of dawn. I had been woken extra early by the sensation of splashing as my nice sleeping spot proved to be ever so slightly convex, turning to a muddy puddle beneath me. I had sloshed around madly stuffing things into dry sacks and changing into my rain clothes. My take it easy mentality had quickly turned to get-the-hell-out as soon as humanly possible. I was forced to wade a stream turned raging torrent, soaking myself to the waist. I crossed another pass even snowier than the one before. Nothing could express the relief I felt stumbling into that Refugio at 9am. The staff just looked amused. I laid my things out, knowing they’d never dry in this cold and settled into a deep sleep.
When I woke the rain had stopped, replaced by snow.
It was bitterly cold. We spent the rest of the day huddled around the meager stove, drinking endless rounds of maté tea as Argentinians do. The wind continued to shake the plastic dome shelters of the refugio all night, whipping snow up in the bleak darkness outside. Wrapped in my sleeping bag in all my warmest fleece and down I felt enchanted by the sounds of the storm contrasted with my snug safety. Again I pondered returning to Bariloche.
I waved goodbye to the staff at the Refugio and set off along the trail back to Bariloche the next day. Every step piled on a deeper sense of aimlessness and insecurity. I’d need to start all over again. I needed a hostel, more groceries, new plans, hitchhiking, and certainly a new cooking pot. What was I going to do with myself? A lovely warm sun melted out the mountains, yesterday became just a bad dream.
Before long I arrived back at the Refugio to everyone’s bemusement. I had a new plan. Walk more, and steal a ceramic mug from the refugio on my way out to cook with. Another quiet couple were leaving tomorrow for the same route I had planned to take and I decided to accompany them. I spent the rest of the day drying out my things and day hiking around. The mountains were spectacular.
I hiked on, cooking out of a 12 ounce mug and passing through gorgeous forest valleys and lake shores.
My goal: Pampa Linda to buy more food. 2 extra days in the mountains and no cooking pot meant I didn’t have enough food to keep going into Chile. But I only had about $20 dollars worth of pesos left. Side note, my ATM card never worked in Argentina so my cash supplies had been limited to reserves the whole time. I set out early in the morning to hitch a ride on the 16km road to Pampa Linda. Turns out Argentinian don’t get up to go hiking till at least nine so I ended up walking almost the entire way without a single car passing me. I was estatic catching sight of Volcano Tronador, till I started imaging how I needed to be there by nightfall.
To complicate things further when I went to plug in my phone to my external battery, the phone with GPS and map, I discovered my charging cable no longer worked. No problem. I had brought an extra I thought, digging around my bag endlessly. There was no extra; what happened with it I’ll never know.
I was now mapless.
But I had barely used my maps before, instead relying on ample signs and markers along the way. The entire time I would spend on this trail I would only see a trail marker twice. This was the camino de Todos los Santos. Saints only use God as their guide. After a long ascent through muddy, overgrown bamboo forests I reached the border, so happy to be back in Chile.
Taking stock of my food I realized I only had food for two days max. I asked the border guards to see a map but their map was old and had no trail marked. I asked if I could buy food and they said not till Raulin, the closest Chilean town. I asked about how far they thought it was and they said they weren’t sure, but a three days walk. Maybe 70–80km. Again I considered going back. Longer than I remembered. I thought of the trail, entry and exit stamps, having no Argentinian cash. Not happening. I calculated I had about 22 miles to hike each day to not starve. Game on.
Full of enthusiasm and energy I started on the trail early. That’s when it started pouring. The wind rained down fat icy water droplets from the trees, a proper storm. Mercifully, I reached a little cabin after two hours walking where I decided to wait it out.
Fed up, I resolved I’d turn back if it didn’t let up by 1pm, because I wouldn’t be able to hike 22 miles before dark. It stopped at 3pm. I felt between two completely remote, harsh possibilities. Face the long march back or press on. Both felt overwhelming. But I had come this far. One day of starvation wouldn’t kill me I reasoned. So I pressed on.
I found a world little changed in the last hundred years. The trail was often barely a cow track, connecting distant homesteads through a 45 mile network of valleys that lead to the sea. And to cookies. I passed fields, farms, horses and muddy cowboys old as dirt who gave vague directions in a near incomprehensible Chilean drawl.
But it was gorgeous. The trail often melted into beautiful pasture like the one above and I was left to guess where on the other side it might be inclined to start back up again. I’d walk along a rough path only to have it roughen so much it all but disappeared, leaving me baffled, having to backtrack and try something different. But the trail did have a certain practical logic to it that I soon picked up, though it always kept me guessing.
By 9pm night was falling. I’d said goodbye to Tronador and ended at an abandoned farm house where I spent the night,
Just praying I was on the right path.
From the abandoned farm house the trail followed a river. I followed that thing all day, starting with two crossings back to back. I would cross that river at least 7 times, each requiring a change of shoes and some nerves on the swifter crossings.
But I hiked swifter and more steady than I ever had in my life. I had a powerful motivating force. Hunger. Much as I could handle the idea of just one little day of not eating everything within me drove me onward to make sure that never needed to happen. When I made one last ascent at 9pm, ending in a gravel road and another abandoned house I whooped for joy. After 13 hours and about 26 miles of walking I had done it. I settled down for the last of my food, sheltering on the front porch from the rain. The next day I met one of the neighbors who told me Raulin was only a few hours walk away. All I could think in that moment was soon I’d be drinking beer and eating cookies. Between bouts of rain the ocean greeted me with it’s cold but comforting hospitality.
I felt like I had survived an ordeal. Really I had just managed to survive myself and a little rough weather. In many ways this hike was the best and worst part of my entire travels in S. America. It was the scariness and the challenge that made it so great, not just the scenery. What I can’t quite convey is the feeling of finding these green perfect valleys, of meeting the old men of that place, seeing the refugios, listening to the radio while drinking maté in the storm, seeing a sign that confirmed to me I was going the right direction. That’s the bit of magic I was looking for. And who knows, maybe I learned something.
