Compulsory sightseeing

"Stuttgart is a charming town, clean and bright, a smaller Dresden. It has the additional attraction of containing little that one need to go out of one’s way to see: a medium-sized picture gallery, a small museum of antiquities, and half a palace, and you are through with the entire thing and can enjoy yourself." -- Jerome K Jerome, Three Men On The Bummel

Southern Chile appears to lack Stuttgart's charm in this regard. On consulting the guide book earlier, I was frankly irked to discover the existence of the Torres del Paine national park. It is apparently stunning, something of a 'you cannot go to this area and not see it' deal. However, it is also a right bugger.

It's not exactly my cup of tea; the guide book continually rambles on (no pun intended) about camping and eight-day hikes, not to mention quoting an opinion that you need to spend at least three weeks in the place to see it properly. Just getting to the place is a hassle; details are somewhat confusing, but it looks like you have to go from Punta Arenas to Puerto Natales (a 4h bus journey), then get another bus on from Puerto Natales. Of course, the park being a curiously precise 242,242 hectares in size, merely getting from the 'main entrance' to whichever of the overpriced luxury hotels the non-camper chooses to stay in is probably a battle on its own.

I am half inclined to give the thing a complete miss. Most likely is to take the 'easy' option of a full day bus tour of the highlights of the park from Puerto Natales. Since you pretty much have to go back to Punta Arenas to get a bus on to anywhere else, even that takes three days for the round trip, most of it spent on buses.

I'm going to let my subconscious grind away at this for a bit. Unless I can't get bookings for my Tierra del Fuego plans on the dates I want and am tempted to fill in time by doing things in a different order, I won't go to Torres del Paine until after Tierra del Fuego, so it makes sense to put off worrying about this until the TdF stuff is sorted.

Maybe I'll have the balls to just not go. :-)