Los Dientes de Navarino promotes itself as “the world’s southernmost hiking trail”. Located on the Navarino isle at the southernmost tip of the American continent, this might hold true (unlike half a dozen restaurants in Patagonia calling themselves “Fin del Mundo” ;). The GPT includes it as section 67 and – unsurprisingly – extends it even further south towards Lago Windhond. Between the ferry and flight schedules, we had only two hiking days, so we stuck to the original Dientes de Navarino loop. Remote and magic views once again, without the cattle or arrieros we’ve gotten used to. The autumn colors of the shrubs contrasted beautifully with the green grass and the grey mist on the second day. And the rivers transported water from high lake to low, like a slippery staircase for giants.
We’ll also remember Los Dientes as a big mud fest. The beautiful lakes are situated in natural wetlands and the herd of hikers that had passed this season left a muddy, hoofprintlike trail. A generous pourdown of Patagonian rain on our first day topped things off. In the better parts we manoeuvred from tree root to patch of grass, and in the worse parts Veronika got knee deep into the dirt. Unfazed, she kept walking in front pointing out for me the tracks to avoid 🙂 And figuring out the route. Though It started out nicely signed, the path gradually declined to a “choose your own adventure” wetland cross country.
So yeah, great fun all around on this last section of the GPT. Which, coincidentally, is also our last bit of hiking. We’re returning to Belgium April 1st. We will be happy to sleep in the same bed for more than three nights.
We’re grateful for having been able to make this trip. The fabulous routes we followed and the friendly people we met will be in our memories for a long time to come. We’ve taken a break from “real life” and tested some of our limits. We don’t quite know what we’ll do from here and we don’t know where we’ll end up, but I guess things will turn out great. That’s what happened on the trail as well 😉
Thanks for following along!
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