Wild Patagonia: Torres del Paine

End of December 2006 I visited the national park "Torres del Paine" in Chile/Patagonia. The trip started in Buenos Aires and was a round trip in Patagonia. We visited all the beautiful places in Patagonia, like the Glacier Petito Moreno, the Fitz Roy area (Argentina) and Tierra del Fuego. This was an exciting trip, but I still remember the national park "Torres Del Paine" as the absolute highlight.

End of 2006 the roads to the national park were still unpaved and the area was not very crowded although the park is famous and the main refugios on the east side are well developed for tourism. At the same time many roads in Patagonia were under construction for a better accessibility of the main tourist attractions. The question I had in mind whether Torres Del Paine will change to a place of mass tourism or hopefully would remain a quiet gem under the national parks. I'm not sure, but it is a matter of fact, that Chile is an extremely expensive spot to travel and the park itself is well known for rough weather conditions. So at least there is a good chance that the park stays fairly unattractive for mass tourism.