Chile · Patagonia
Torres del Paine (Puerto Natales)
The best trekking in South America: three granite towers, a glacier you can walk to, and wind that never lets up.
Torres del Paine is the granite showpiece of Chilean Patagonia: three sheer towers, the horned Cuernos rising over turquoise lakes, and Glaciar Grey calving into a lake full of icebergs, all within a day's walk of each other. Most people come to trek the W, four or five days between refugios along the massif's southern flank, or the longer O circuit around the back. Puerto Natales, a windswept port town two hours south, is where the buses, the gear shops and the beds are.
Suggested stay
4–7 days
Language
Spanish
Currency
CLP
Timezone
UTC-3
Why you'll love Torres del Paine (Puerto Natales)
The towers a steep day's climb up the Ascencio valley ends at a moraine ridge with three vertical granite spires reflected in a green tarn
The W four or five days of long walking between refugios, your bed booked months ahead and everything else on your back
Ice Glaciar Grey pushes a blue wall into its lake, reached by catamaran, by kayak, or on foot across the hanging bridges above the shore
Wildlife guanaco herds on the eastern steppe, condors over the Cuernos, and the densest puma population anywhere in the Americas
Best time to visit
Oct-Mar
Peak trek, windy · 12-17° days
51.726° S, 72.506° W
UTC-3 · America/Punta Arenas
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Weather & when to go to Torres del Paine (Puerto Natales)
Month by month: typical highs and lows, rainfall and rain days.
✓ Best Oct-Mar
Conditions Jan Peak trek, windy · Feb Peak trek · Mar Autumn color · Apr Cool autumn · May Cold, closing · Jun Winter · Jul Coldest · Aug Cold · Sep Spring starts · Oct Spring, windy · Nov Mild, windy
Cards tinted by verified verdict · big number = typical daily high, small = low · hover for conditions
When to avoid Torres del Paine (Puerto Natales)
June to August is the off season: cold, dark and blustery, with refugios shut, the Pehoe catamaran stopped and the W walkable only on a guided winter trek. It is also when guided puma tracking is at its best. Wind is a constant year-round, strong enough to knock you off your feet.
Top things to do in Torres del Paine (Puerto Natales)
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Mirador Base Las Torres - the day hike to the towers
hiking scenic 👍 PopularThe park's signature walk: about nine hours return from the Torres trailhead, up the windy Ascencio valley, through beech forest and then a brutal final hour of boulder-hopping to a moraine ridge above the glacial tarn. The towers are often in cloud, so start at first light and give the weather time to move.
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The W trek - four or five days across the massif
hiking adventure 👍 PopularThe classic route strings the Base Las Torres climb, the French Valley and Glaciar Grey into one line walked east to west or west to east, sleeping in refugios or at campsites along the way. Beds and tent sites must be booked before you are allowed to set out, and they sell out months ahead.
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Valle del Frances - the French Valley to Mirador Britanico
hiking scenic ⭐ Highly recommendedA steep side valley climbing between the hanging glacier on Paine Grande and the back of the Cuernos, with avalanches audible all day. The lower lookout catches most of the show; the upper Britanico viewpoint puts you inside an amphitheatre of granite. The hardest leg of the W and the best one.
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Glaciar Grey - the ice face at the head of the lake
scenic adventure 👍 PopularA catamaran runs up Lago Grey past drifting bergs to the glacier's snout, and kayak trips paddle out among the ice. Walkers reach the same view from Refugio Grey, where three suspension bridges cross the gorges strung along the eastern shore.
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The O Circuit - right around the Paine massif
hiking adventure ⭐ Highly recommendedSeven to nine days looping the back of the range, walked anticlockwise only, over the Paso John Gardner where the Southern Patagonian Ice Field opens up beneath you. The northern half is quieter and wilder than the W, and open only through the summer months.
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Salto Grande and Mirador Cuernos - the short walk from Pudeto
scenicA flat track from the Pudeto car park reaches a broad waterfall pouring between Lago Nordenskjold and Lago Pehoe, then carries on to a shoreline lookout facing the Cuernos across the water. An hour or two, and the best view in the park for anyone not trekking.
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Laguna Amarga - tracking pumas on the eastern steppe
nature wildlifeGuides with radios and spotting scopes work the guanaco country around Laguna Amarga and Lago Sarmiento at dawn and dusk, where the cats are more visible than anywhere else on earth. Best in the cold months, when the days are short and the herds are concentrated on the low ground.
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Lago Pehoe - the catamaran to Paine Grande
scenicThe crossing from Pudeto to the Paine Grande refugio takes about half an hour over improbably blue water with the Cuernos standing behind you, and it starts or ends most W treks. It stops running in winter, which is what shapes the trekking season.
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Lago Sarmiento and Laguna Azul - the quiet eastern lakes
scenic nature wildlifeTwo big lakes on the park's dry side, well away from the trekking. Sarmiento is ringed with white thrombolites, mounds built by microbes at the waterline, and Laguna Azul gives the classic head-on view of all three towers with almost nobody else there.
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Cordero al palo and centolla - eating in Puerto Natales
foodPatagonian lamb splayed on an iron cross over an open fire is the regional dish, roasted for hours and served with little more than potatoes and salad. King crab comes out of the fjords in season, and the town has grown a proper restaurant and craft-beer scene around the trekking trade.
Best areas to stay in Torres del Paine (Puerto Natales)
$ Budget $$ Mid-range $$$ Premium
Puerto Natales centre
Most visitors $Windy port town of trekkers and gear shops
Explore hotels in Puerto Natales centre →
Rio Serrano
Lodges and drivers $$$Hotel cluster at the park's southern gate
Explore hotels in Rio Serrano →
Torres sector (Cerro Paine)
Towers trailhead $$Trailhead estancia below the towers
Explore hotels in Torres sector (Cerro Paine) →
Lago Pehoe and Pudeto
Lakeside views $$$Island hosteria on a turquoise lake
Explore hotels in Lago Pehoe and Pudeto →
Puerto Bories
Quiet and upscale $$$Restored meat works on a quiet shore
Explore hotels in Puerto Bories →
Live nightly prices from Booking.com, Agoda and others, centred on Torres del Paine (Puerto Natales)
Getting to & around Torres del Paine (Puerto Natales)
Getting there
Fly into Punta Arenas, take the bus about three hours north to Puerto Natales, then two hours more to the park gates
Flight
Presidente Carlos Ibanez del Campo International (PUQ)
Punta Arenas sits roughly 250 km south of Puerto Natales. Scheduled coaches meet the main flights and run up Ruta 9 in about three hours; Puerto Natales also has its own small airport, with a handful of summer services.
Coach
Puerto Natales bus terminal
Buses run up from Punta Arenas through the day, and across the border from El Calafate and El Chalten in Argentina in roughly five to seven hours.
Ferry
Puerto Natales port
The Navimag ferry threads the fjords down from Puerto Montt over about three days, an arrival in its own right rather than a shortcut.
Drive
Ruta 9
Sealed the whole way from Punta Arenas; the park roads beyond Cerro Castillo are gravel and heavily washboarded.
Getting around
Park bus from Puerto Natales
Two departures a day in season to the Laguna Amarga, Pudeto and Administracion gates, about two hours each way.
TBC
In-park shuttle
A minibus links the Laguna Amarga entrance with the hotel and the towers trailhead, timed to the arriving buses.
TBC
Catamaran across Lago Pehoe
Pudeto to Paine Grande in about half an hour, several sailings daily in summer and none at all in winter.
TBC
Rental car
The only way to move around the park on your own schedule. Internal roads are gravel and the nearest fuel is back in Puerto Natales.
TBC
Transfer van
Private transfers from the Puerto Natales hotels are the usual alternative to the scheduled buses, and the only option out of season.
TBC
Walking
Once you are on the trails everything is on foot, with five to eight hours between one refugio and the next.
Free
Day trips from Torres del Paine (Puerto Natales)
Cueva del Milodon
Half dayPrehistoric sloth cave
A huge conglomerate cavern where a settler found the hide of a giant ground sloth in 1895, preserved well enough that expeditions came south hoping to shoot a living one. A fibreglass mylodon stands inside now, and the climb to the mirador above is the better half.
Getting there
car | tour
About 30 min by car or tour from Puerto Natales
Balmaceda and Serrano glaciers
Full dayFjord boat trip
A catamaran runs the length of Seno Ultima Esperanza past cormorant colonies and a sea-lion haul-out to two hanging glaciers, ending in a short forest walk to the foot of the Serrano. Cold, windy and spectacular, and it sails only in reasonable weather.
Getting there
ferry | tour
About 4 hr each way by boat from Puerto Natales
El Calafate and the Perito Moreno Glacier
1-2 daysArgentine glacier
The other great Patagonian glacier: a wall of ice pushing into Lago Argentino, with blocks calving off in front of steel walkways. Most people cross for a night or two rather than as a return day run, and Argentine entry rules apply.
Getting there
bus | tour
About 5-6 hr by bus across the border
A little history of Torres del Paine (Puerto Natales)
The Aonikenk, the Tehuelche of the southern steppe, hunted guanaco across this country for thousands of years and left the massif its name: paine is their word for blue. Europeans came late and slowly. Lady Florence Dixie rode through in 1879 and christened the towers Cleopatra's Needles in a book that made the region briefly fashionable in Britain, and in 1895 a settler near Puerto Natales found the hide of an extinct giant sloth in a cave, which sent expeditions south hoping to shoot a living one.
What followed was sheep. Vast estancias carved up the grasslands, and Puerto Natales grew around the cold-storage plant at Bories that shipped their mutton to Europe. Chile protected the area in 1959 and renamed it Torres del Paine in 1970, buying out ranches as the park expanded; the guanaco herds recovered and the pumas followed them. Fires since the 1980s, two of them started carelessly by backpackers, burned huge tracts of lenga forest, and the grey skeletons above Lago Grey are still standing. Camping is now allowed only at designated sites, and every bed on the trekking routes has to be booked before you set foot on the trail.
Aonikenk (Tehuelche) hunters range the steppe below the massif and give it the name paine, blue
Lady Florence Dixie travels through and publishes Across Patagonia, describing the towers
The hide of an extinct mylodon is found in a cave near Puerto Natales, drawing expeditions
Puerto Natales is founded; the Bories cold-storage works opens two years later
The area is protected as a national park, initially centred on Lago Grey
Chris Bonington and Don Whillans make the first ascent of the Central Tower of Paine
The park is renamed Torres del Paine and enlarged by buying out surrounding estancias
UNESCO designates the park a Biosphere Reserve
A backpacker's fire burns a large area of forest and steppe on the park's southern side
Know before you go
Payment
Cards & cash mixed
English
Limited
Wifi
Limited
Power
Type C / L
230 V, 50 Hz
Dialing
+56
The months our climate read flags to avoid: the wettest, lowest-rated weather of the year.
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FAQs about Torres del Paine (Puerto Natales)
▸ When is the best time to visit Torres del Paine?
October to March is the season. January and February are the warmest, longest-lit and busiest; October to December is excellent and quieter early on; March adds autumn colour to the lenga forests. Winter shuts the refugios, the catamaran and most trekking. Wind is part of the bargain in every month, so pack for it whatever the forecast says.
▸ How long do you need at Torres del Paine?
The W takes four or five days on the trail and the O circuit seven to nine. If you are not trekking, two full days in the park covers the Base Las Torres hike, the Pudeto lookouts and a boat to Glaciar Grey. Add a night in Puerto Natales at each end for the bus and for gear.
▸ Do I need to book the W trek in advance?
Yes, and earlier than feels reasonable. You cannot walk the routes without a confirmed bed or tent site for every night, split between the two concession operators that run the refugios, and the summer months sell out within weeks of opening. Park entry is booked separately online, and the reservations are checked at the gate.
▸ How hard is the W trek?
There is no technical ground and no altitude, but the days are long, six to nine hours with a pack, and the climb to the base of the towers is steep and rocky right at the end. The real difficulty is the weather: rain, hail and wind can all arrive within an hour, so boots and a proper shell matter more than fitness.
▸ Can you see pumas in Torres del Paine?
Better here than anywhere else. The eastern grasslands around Laguna Amarga and Lago Sarmiento hold a dense population living off the guanaco herds, and specialist guides track them at dawn and dusk. Sightings are far more reliable in the cold months, when the days are short and the cats hunt in daylight. You will not stumble on one from the trekking trails.
▸ Is Torres del Paine expensive?
It is one of the pricier corners of South America. Park entry, refugio beds with meals, transfers and the boats all stack up, and the lodges inside the park are a tier again above that. Carrying a tent and food bought in Puerto Natales is the standard way to cut it, though the campsites still have to be booked.