Planner Part 4: Closing Notes

This is my column. It is paired with my daughters column. She just wanted to write one blog, but we’ve morphed it into a series that we alternately write. Two people, two perspectives, narrated in acts, like a play’s script, describing an epic journey that we took as a family to the Torres.

By: Samya Ghosh.
February 21, 2020

Planning for Torres there are few more things to keep in mind. I will repeat what other blogs say but in terms of backpacking prep, here’s my list of most important things to plan for:

1. Get a good backpack. No, actually get a great backpack. We went to REI and got Ospreys, but got fitted and tried a few. Perhaps the best decision we made
2. Same with the hiking shoes. To each his own, but I prefer shoes to the boots and Torres will not pay homage to your boots, so unless you need ankle support or are more comfortable with boots, don’t get them to help protect you against the trail elements that these shoes are facing. With boots you’ll still be plenty wet by day-4. With boots your socks will still be wet
3. Get good gaiters. We got cheap ones off of Amazon. Didn’t help.
4. Get a rain pant and rain jacket. Good ones, but doesn’t have to be the super expensive Arcteryx ones. If the elements choose, you’ll be wet. Rain jacket quality helps you with the marginal scnerios.
5. Poles: I am conflicted. Except for day-4 coming down, I didn’t use it. Day 4 I used it because my knees hurt, on the descent. Ritika and Shubhangi swear by it.
6. Food/Drinks: get Nuun, prolific quantities of it. Forget other drinks (unless you cannot operate without a coffee / tea in the morning). We used Maggi and Indian Masala Upmas (both ready with hot water pours) for our meals and were super happy. You can buy freeze dried stuff from REI and some of them are tasty, but we lie outside of the standard spectrum of “hiker” taste buds (I think and I am basing this on the fact that we did not see another Indian or Asian family even in all of the O), but the point being, if we could make it work, you probably can with a little thought. Our Maggi’s did not weigh more than the freeze dried stuff.
7. One important learning from the hike: experienced hikers limited their throwaway by consolidating their food categories into single ziplocs. While the Maggi foodpacks or individual Gatorade or trail mix packets don’t add a lot of weight, you often have to carry these with you after eating what’s inside (some camps have waste bins, others don’t and you CANNOT AND SHOULD NOT leave your waste behind)
8. The Torres water is some of the tastiest that we’ve had (universal opinion – I polled people). A filter is useful for your piece of mind, but most streams if you’re filling upstream from Camps have some of the cleanest waters anywhere.
9. Be ready for 4 seasons and dress in layers, but be prepared to stay in wet clothes for bit. If you need extras, socks and undergarments. Be smelly but don’t carry the extra load of clothes. You’ll be too tired to dress up and down, unless you are truly uncomfortable.
10. Shoe and sock warmers and glove warmers (those active coal packets) are very useful. Learnt that the hard way in Alaska. Helped in Torres as well.
11. You will need toilet paper and a good poop digger min-shovel. Don’t be embarrassed by this. There’s plenty of cover. Just be careful of running off into the wilderness in an area that is upstream or within half a mile of a camp. We didn’t need to make use of this, because our ablutions were ceremoniously completed at camp toilets, but we were prepared.

Post Torres, we spent the day (since we could not have made it to Mirador Torres and back) driving to a few spots around the park. Ishani’s blog has some pictures of these places. Worth the visit even if you do the O hike. We also spent a charming evening at Puerto Natales getting fed and drunk. This was preceded by an uncharming couple of hours cleaning out ourselves and shoes. We stayed at an Estancia (Peurto Bories) which seemed like a working farm. The way we smelled when we entered, I think the sheep dogs may have done and put in their papers. If this were the US they might have filed OSHA claims for permanent damage to their noses as a workplace hazard. Puerto Natales is a charming town for an afternoon and evening. I would particularly recommend Vinnhaus. Try it out and let me know how you feel.

Our Torres journey had closed out. I was not proud of how Day-4 went for me personally. I think I should have been much more supportive of my daughters and wife and instead got impatient and irritable with them. But that is the personal journey you undertake doing Torres. Even hiking as a family unit, Torres (any multi-day backpacking trip) is a powerful way to learn a little bit about yourself. I travel for work and my travel ethos are often focused on getting to my destination quickly, efficiently and with as few surprises as possible. Leisure travel, especially a backpacking trip in an end of the earth destination like Torres doesn’t care about these notions of travel. They will toss it out and laugh in your face. That I chose to get mad with that and worse, take it out on my family made me smaller. But also opened up a path to learn and grow. These places demand that you slow down, that you respect where you are and awe that your puny presence is even allowed in a place of such magnificence in company as hallowed as your family. Next time around, I’ll have the patience to enjoy their unfiltered, undistracted presence instead of worrying about where we’ve got to. Next time, I’ll stop a moment to take in the bounty of what surrounds me, instead of worrying about increasing my pace. That is the journey I think we are obligated to take for ourselves. Because (and to plagiarize Ishani) isn’t it sometime said: “the journey is the destination“.

Next Part