Trekking in Patagonia right after night in a hospital

I advise all family members to skip the next section. Thank you.

TO BECOME AN ABSTINENT

Thursday night with a few friends for drinks. Suddenly, blink, and I wake up on a bed in a big dark room full of beds and hospital equipment. I can see everything at least three times, only recognising the tubes comming out of my arms. What happened to me? Am I in a hospital? Being in South America, beds and hospital equipment don't necessarily mean it's a hospital. Confused, I'm wondering how to get out of here as fast as possible. I remembered movie scenes where the main character is dramatically removing all the needles coming out of his arms and runs away. However, my obviously drugged head is so tired that despite the situation and all the panic I fall asleep again (or pass out, who knows...).

I wake up again and see some doctors. My attempt to ask what the hell I'm doing here is thwarted as I'm not able to get a single word of Spanish or English out of me. After a few minutes and a few more attempts to speak I am able to ask where I am, can finally find out what happened to me and if I can go home.

Yeah, drugs in my drink. They said an ambulance had to bring me in. Well that’s just amazing. From all the cheap countries I’ve been before, someone must have drugged me in South America's most expensive one! My now finally sane mind is doing the math that an ambulance with a stop at the hospital will probably not be a cheap affair in Chile. How the hell does it work with the insurance company? Just call and say 'hello, I've been drugged please, here's the invoice'? I don't know.

Strangely enough, they let me go home after about 20 minutes. I've got a friend from Germany sleeping on the floor in the waiting room. At this point I'm incredibly grateful that someone was with me the whole time and helped me. I probably don't even need to mention that I wasn't feeling well for a few days and that I'll quite likely be abstinent for the rest of South America. No one will be able to get me into clubs and bars for a long time.

If any of my relatives have read this far and now have the nerve to drag me back home, preferably in a straitjacket, I warned you!

TORRES DEL PAINE

Even after the lovely ‘getting drugged’ experience, I’m still going to do the W circut in the Torres del Paine national park, which should take 4 to 5 days. Trekking is possible in either direction, I chose to go from the west (Paine Grande camp) to the east (Central camp), so I have to take a bus and then a ferry. You can either go as early as possible in the morning and start trekking that day or, if like me you don't want to get up at 5am, go a little later and do a little hike to the waterfalls and mirador Cuernos before getting on the ferry.

I get to Paine Grande, which is a campsite and mountain lodge, around 6pm and try to set up my tent in the horrible wind and rain. Let me tell you, it's not pleasant. About five times my tarp almost flew off, and since my fingers were completely frozen, driving nails into the ground didn't exactly make it twice as easy either.

I don't sleep at all that night, the wind is so strong that it's gusting and roaring through the whole tent and I'm starting to worry that the tent won't survive.

DAY TWO

The tent survived! But in the morning, tired and sleep-deprived, I had absolutely no motivation to get out of my sleeping bag and so I ate a yogurt and a banana in bed (by that I mean on a mat, huddled in my sleeping bag).

Today I am supposed to trek to Grey Glacier. The weather is very dramatic. By that i mean, it totally sucks, I'm cold and I want to go home! I wear my warmest clothes along with a waterproof layer and hope it won't be that bad. Wrong! After a couple of hours I return to the campsite freezing and wet, because the weather was really not in my favor. However, less than an hour after I arrived back at the campsite, the sun suddenly shone. It just couldn’t come out a few hours earlier, huh? Instant karma I guess.

Why are all the Czech and Slovak people suddenly in Patagonia? I swear during January and February I was speaking more Czech than Spanish or English. Something I really did not expect to happen.

DAY THREE

The continuation of the Patagonian journey of me and my gigantic backpack is here. What the hell am I carrying in this backpack? Oh yeah, if you want to trek as low cost as possible in the Torres del Paine, you have to carry camping equipment, food and stuff for cooking. Otherwise, you'll spend hundreds of dollars (no I'm not exaggerating) for accommodation in mountain huts or premium tents. And of course Ellie the photographer has to carry cameras and lenses.

Taking pictures in Patagonia is the worst. With the wind so strong I was never able to stand still and with every photo I hoped they weren't blurry.

DAY FOUR

As always, I managed to ignore all the alarms on my phone. So I’m having the fastes breakfast ever and let’s move on! The weather is absolutely beautiful again, everyone is changing and hiking in shorts and t-shirts. It's not even windy, which hasn't happened to me in Patagonia yet. The road goes past a mountain lake and snow-capped mountains visible in the distance. There is so much to see and photograph.

In the afternoon I reach Camp Central, where I will camp for my last night in Torres del Paine. They have a small cafeteria at the front desk, so after four hard days I reward myself with coffee and a small chocolate chip cookie.

The area around the campsite is similar to the beginning of Paine Grande, again hotel, resort, cabins and hostels. This area is completely crowded with tourists as from here you walk to probably the most famous view in Patagonia: Las Torres. Many tourists come here for a day trip, so it is clear that I will have to make tomorrow's hike as soon as possible so that I don't have to squeeze with the crowds of tourists at Las Torres.

The guys at the reception warn me that tomorrow the weather is supposed to suck. Rain and fog almost all day. Well there's nothing I can do, I'll still try to get up as early as possible and hope it doesn't rain too much.

DAY FIVE

I wake up around 4am to find it's not raining and the sky is super clear. Should I risk it and try to walk in the dark and hope for a beautiful sunrise? Hell yeah!

Wrong idea! After an hour the clouds and rain arrived. Luckily, between Camp Central and Las Torres there is still Camp Chileno, where I planned to take shelter if the worst happened. So I go straight there.

It's 6am and they have started serving breakfast at the campsite. I’m sneaking in and drinking coffee with other hikers, who are also waiting for the situation outside to get better.

Around 7am I continue on. The rain has stopped for a while and the sky is starting to clear. Yes! Finally!

Well, instant karma is comming to get me again! On the last climb before Las Torres, not only did it start to blow, rain and freeze terribly, it also started to snow. Snow?! Yesterday I was wearing shorts for god’s sake! It got so cold that my camera froze and stopped working. Photographers nightmare.

Of course, Las Torres is hidden under a thick fog and all we can see is the lagoon and snow. For a while the other hikers and I consider staying a while and hoping it will clear up, but everyone is so cold that we prefer to go back to the campsite for a warm shower.

Buses run directly from the campsite to the town. It's barely noon and the lady at the counter tells me that the only ticket I can buy is for 6:30 pm, all other buses are already sold out. Eventually, though, she advises me to try hitchhiking. We hitchhike with one more mountain guide and maybe 10 minutes later a guy who works in the park stops by. We drive through the park and what don't we see? Cougars! All the cars and buses suddenly stop and everyone runs out and takes pictures. Cougars are pretty common in Patagonia, but you don't always run into them. Which is probably a good thing, because I don't know what I would do if a cougar appeared out of nowhere on the trek next to me.