We have spent the past few days visiting the Torres del Paine National Park. It has been a superb experience as we have been blessed with wonderful weather for trekking. That was just as well as we have trekked some 50km (30 miles) over three days, so it would have been a shame if it had been raining throughout.

It is quite a journey to get to Torres del Paine. We flew to Puntas Arenas and then travelled 250km north to Puerto Natales where we had a first glimpse of the key peaks. It is then a further two hours drive, mostly on gravelled roads to get into the park itself. It essentially takes a day to get in, and a day to get out. But it is well worth it.

To say that Torres del Paine is special is to understate its magnificence, quite hard to capture in pictures though I have done my best. In her great book ‘Travels in a Thin Country’, Sara Wheeler quotes a book called South America’s National Parks as follows:

“Torres del Paine is not a mere park, but a park of parks, a destination of travellers to whom a park is more than a place to be entertained, but rather an experience to be integrated into one’s life, Torres del Paine is the sort of park that changes its visitors ….”

How we shall change is not quoted, so we shall have to wait and see.