Chile '25 • Day 10: Torres del Paine, Chile

BACK TO CHILE

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Guanaco in Argentina

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ROAD TRIP

We may have had to drive 4+ hours, but we ended up less than 50 miles as the crow flies from where we started. There just isn’t any direct route through the mountains of Patagonia in Argentina, to Patagonia in Chile. First stop before hitting the road though, Don Luis bakery. I think we ordered half the shop! If we didn’t have breakfast at the hotel, this would have been a good breakfast stop during our stay in El Calafate.   

On our way out of town we started seeing guanacos (photo above) all over the place. In El Calafate we had seen it on restaurant menus but did not see any while driving to Argentina. Related to the llama and all over the place from El Calafate all the way to Torres del Paine. We did see several emus though (no photos sorry).

The ride on Argentina Ruta 4 was smooth sailing, but... The last few miles in Argentina we were on gravel roads. Pretty rough, but as soon as we were back in Chile, the roads were good again. For while that is. The shorter route to Rio Serrano (just outside the Torres del Paine National Park) was a good 30 miles of gravel road. When we finally made it to the main road between Puerto Natales and Rio Serrano we though we were out of the woods, but no such luck! A good portion to our destination was also gravel roads. It looks like they are working on this and some portions were even paved with concrete pavers and not asphalt. Miles and miles of gravel roads starting with the turn off to the immigration station in Argentina, and continuing on through much of the way to Torres Del Paine

Rio Serrano - Gateway to Torres del Paine National Park

TINY BEDROOMS

Since we had to make some changes to our travel plans due to flight availability in Chile, we’re staying our first night at a smaller hotel, and all they had were some mini quonset huts. I mean mini. It works out well though as we can just drop off our luggage in the morning at our hotel for the next 4 nights, then head out to explore the park until our rooms are ready.

From Rio Serreno where we are staying, the peaks of Torres Del Paine are in full picturesque viewing. As you can see behind those quonset huts!