El Calafate to Puerto Natales 14th November

We woke at 6am this morning thinking our transfer to the bus station was at 7am. It turned out it was actually 7.50am so we missed out on 50 mins in bed.

We got to the bus station and boarded the 8.30 bus for Puerto Natales – a 6 hour journey (nothing compared to the 18hrs we'd done before).

About 4 hours into the journey we hit the border with Chile. We had to all get off the bus and queue at the Argentinian side for our passports to be checked and then 10mins down the road we all had to pile off again, take all our suitcases with us and queue for over an hour for 1 man to check everyone's passports and then get all our bags x-rayed. We then all piled onto the bus and continued to Puerto Natales in Chile.

We were met off the bus by Pablo our assistant guide for Ecocamp, a trekking group we were staying with for the next 3 nights. Pablo took us to a restaurant to meet the rest of the group. There were 2 other Brits, 2 Belgiums (who'd actually been on the same bus as us), 2 Germans, 2 Americans and a token Ozzie. Our guide was called Michael and was from France, but was now living in Chile. We were given a very nice 3 course lunch and we then boarded the bus for Torres del Paine National Park....a 3 and a half hour journey.

On route we visited the Cueve del Milodon – a cave which was 30m high, 80m wide and 200m deep. In 1895 a large piece of skin was found in this cave which was eventually traced to a giant sloth called a milodon. The skin was deemed so fresh it was thought this creature was still alive but an expedition sponsored by England's Daily Express found no creatures alive and instead it was thought the skin must have been preserved in the cold Patagonian climate. A piece of the skin can be found at the Natural History Museum in London.

The Milodon is on the right !!

We then drove on to the Park. We stopped just before the park to admire the amazing view – the Monte Almirante Nieto, the Paine Towers and the Paine Horns. We were really lucky to see the full view as normally part is in cloud. Note the shape of the clouds – these are created by the exceptionally strong winds over the park !!

We then hopped back in the bus, collected our passes and drove into the park. See the bridge we had to cross – everyone had to get out and walk across it – it was just wide enough for the bus to get through.

Then we arrived at Ecocamp – it was amazing !!! We all had individual pods for rooms, there was the main bathroom pod and the communal pod with a big dining room and 2 lounges – really impressive!! We all had a pisco sour cocktail, 3 course dinner with vino and then headed to bed (with our hats and socks on) to get some sleep before our first walk in the park.