Nova Scotia Nature Trust's Expedition for the Earth Dispatch

February 7, 2013 – On the Last Leg of the “W” Trek

Part I

Its 11am on the 7th (11am Chile time) and we are on our last leg of the “W” trek in Torres del Paine. Each day has seemed to be as good as or better than the last. We had an amazing experience here in Torres del Paine National Park.

Today, I’m calling you from along the shores of Lago Grey. We’ve already been hiking from our refugio at Paine Grande for about two hours and we got to a viewpoint where we can look out and see the icebergs floating in Lago Grey, which is really thrilling. You got to remember, we’re not too much above sea level here, but in this environment, the powerful, massive glaciers above us define everything. If they spill into the lakes and through the forest out to the pampas or the dry plains in the rain shadow side of the mountains in Patagonia---we’ve seen it all. Right now, the sides, the icebergs I’m looking up at, big piece of the Patagonia icecap. You might know that the Patagonian icecap which runs along the Chile- Argentina border is the largest piece of ice between the arctic circles. The largest non-polar ice in the world, between the Arctic Circle in the North and Arctic Circle in the south, there’s no greater piece of glacier ice than the Patagonia ice cap. I’m looking at it now, amazing experience!

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Part II

Our Chilean guides, Felipe and Harry, who we now call Harry, Professor Puma, for the famous wildcat of Patagonia. Professor Puma and Felipe both have a tremendous amount of knowledge of all aspects of natural history here and they’re great teachers. They’ll stop and explain things along the way and of course with this particular group we have a keen interest in learning and it’s been a tremendous asset to have them along. Harry does not speak much English, but Felipe has very, very fluent English so he always translates the professor’s learned explanations of the natural history, geology, glaciology, birdlife, flora, fauna and everything. It’s a tremendous area here in Patagonia and we’re really lucky to have these guys along.

We will be returning to Paine Grande today and taking a catamaran across the lake to return to Hotel Torres, where we started this experience in Patagonia and we look forward to reporting to you when we get back there. Signing off now for Nova Scotia Nature Trust in Patagonia.

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