Our transit day to get to Puerto Natales was hectic. We left on a shuttle from Puerto Varas to Puerto Montt, flew to Punta Arenas, and bussed to Puerto Natales! As we had booked last minute and as we were amid high season we ended up staying at a new bed and breakfast outside of town, which was the family home of an elderly Chilean couple. They did not speak a word of English and also did not trust their guests with a key! We had a curfew in the evening of midnight, if we were not back before then, we were going to be homeless for the night!

The town of Puerto Natales was quaint but full of tourist agents, accommodation and restaurants aimed at cashed up tourists. We stumbled across a popular pizza restaurant called Mesita Grande on the first night and loved their gnocchi osso bucco so much we ended up eating there for three nights! Mesita was ok but in general food in the town was outrageously expensive. Adam and I headed to Caféteria Amerindia for a planning day one day, as the internet at our bnb was shocking. There was a fun Australian waitress working and their sandwich menu was delicious. That day we spent AU$100 on four sandwiches (two for take away birthday lunch the next day), a piece of cake, pot of tea and a coffee. Patagonia was already killing our budget.

The reason we were visiting Puerto Natales was for the Torres del Paine National Park. We had heard rave reviews about the W-track and were keen to sink our teeth into the wonder of Patagonia. We knew that the accommodation on the W sold out months in advance however we were not keen to anchor ourselves down months before, so we arrived thinking luck might be on our side or we would do a day trip. Unsurprisingly there was no accommodation available at a reasonable price, the cheapest we could find was a camping spot, with no included equipment, for US$350 a night. A day trip was therefore our only option. On Adams birthday, we headed out early to conquer the Torres pinnacles with a tour group including eight others and our Chilean guide Alvaro. On the two-hour bus ride to the national park we got talking to two Americans, Arleen and Bree, who were old friends travelling together for a few weeks. The hike commenced at the exceptionally impressive Nation Park office where they had modern clean toilets, a café and best of all, a bar with beer on tap!

The hike commenced with the group sticking together until eventually Alvaro let us loose and we set off by ourselves. The walk began on a flat road but soon lead us up a steep incline where we followed the path for four hours, alongside the river, until we finally reached the Torres. The walk there wound us through thick forest, past camping sites and horses. The last hour was the killer requiring us to scale boulders, dodge trickling river beds and follow the path leading only one way, up! We were one of the first in our group to reach the pinnacles and they were exactly as the Insta photos had led us to believe. Crystal clear blue water in the foreground, with the contrast of the three jagged, grey rock faces of the Torres pinnacles behind. What a sensational birthday present. We sat on a huge boulder with our picnic sandwiches and took in every moment. After completing lunch, we had a thermos of tea, brownie with an environmentally friendly paper candle and a round of happy birthday. We were again quicker than most on the descent, so we were first in line for a birthday beer on arrival back to the park centre. The only devastating part was when the slow pokes caught up, they told us they had seen a wild Puma.

The drive home was right on sun set so we watched out the bus windows as the sun projected a pink sky over the mountains and valleys of the national park. There were wild llamas called Guanaco’s prancing over fences and behaving like a kangaroo would in Australia. As the group had been slower than expected we ended up leaving the park quite late which meant we were not going to make the dinner booking I had made for Adams birthday at 8:30 pm. We had no way of contacting the restaurant and I felt terrible, as they had been extremely helpful over email in organising a surprise cake. When we finally arrived back into town in was nearly 10 pm and Alvaro thought we had absolutely no chance of any restaurant being open. We asked the van to drop us at Café Kaiken where our reservation was, mainly so we could apologise for not showing up. When we got to the restaurant door and the owner realised we didn’t speak Spanish, he crossed the road to our tour bus and asked them to translate to us that he was happy to stay open for us given it was a special occasion. He apologised that he wouldn’t have everything on the menu but welcomed us! He was so sweet. Bree and Arleen had no chance of getting dinner elsewhere, so they ended up joining us and together we had two bottles of red, delicious home style food and a surprise birthday dessert accompanied by Spanish happy birthday sung by every staff member! It was a special night.