Chile: Rockin' in Torres del Paine

The Andes is the world's longest mountain range, stretching over 7 000 km through 7 countries in South America. When I went to Antarctica, I learned that the Andes range goes even further... underwater... to Antarctica! The Andes is also the tallest mountain range outside of Asia with its peak, Mount Aconcagua, in Argentina, rising to 6962 m in elevation.

In Chile and Argentina, I did some hiking in some beautiful National Parks. I was amazed by the types of rock faces we were seeing; they looked so different from our Rocky Mountains back home. So I was curious to do some research to learn more about how these rocks and mountains were formed. I'll focus on Torres del Paine in Chile, one of the world's most spectacular massifs.

It all started 12 million years ago...

Hot, volcanic magma spilled over the earth, cooling and hardening into the igneous rock called granite. Granite is very tough, it's about a 6.5 on the Moh's hardness scale of rocks. Thousands of years passed where layers of sedimentary rock on top helped to compress the granite even more.

Glacier Gray

Glaciers came next, covering the area. As they grew, retreated (calved), and shifted they wore away at the rocks (called erosion). (Check out my previous post about glaciers.) The glaciers lifted the layers of softer sedimentary rock and moved it as they moved. The rocks were slowly worn away until only hard, resistant rock was left: granite, in the shape of impressive, near 3000 m tall towers now called Torres del Paine.

I spent three days hiking and camping around the park. I saw one of the ancient glaciers, named Glacier Gray, and I woke up at 4 am to hike to the towers for sunrise. Seeing the first light of the day hit them made them even more spectacular!