{"id":45767,"date":"2019-04-23T11:00:17","date_gmt":"2019-04-23T18:00:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/?p=45767"},"modified":"2025-01-13T15:29:31","modified_gmt":"2025-01-13T23:29:31","slug":"squaring-travel-with-conservation-in-torres-del-paine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/travel\/squaring-travel-with-conservation-in-torres-del-paine","title":{"rendered":"Squaring Travel with Conservation in Torres del Paine"},"content":{"rendered":"

A chainsaw whined in the rain, wind gusts moaned off the veiled mountainside, and though the naked tree trunks leaned as if tormented, the two dozen volunteers breaking trail never complained, as far as I could tell.<\/span><\/p>\n

We\u2019d come to Torres del Paine, Chile\u2019s busiest national park, to lay a 560-foot boardwalk over a tract of sensitive moorland amid a forest of bone white trees. It would be the penultimate segment of a new five-mile trail that follows an old horse path, dispersing foot traffic along the park\u2019s most heavily walked stretch. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cHere it comes.\u201d Trip leader David Summer grinned over his chainsaw. I hunkered behind a shrub shield. The wind, doing 60, tore a screen of water off the lake and threw it at us. A regular February summer day in southern Patagonia.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe are gonna find those times when you hit a wall, physically or emotionally,\u201d David had warned us a few days before. <\/span><\/p>\n

I was on swamper duty with a few others, numb hands tossing aside downed trees that David, a retired fire director with the U.S. Forest Service\u2019s Pacific Northwest and Alaska regions, had hewn to forge a path for our boardwalk, which would also bridge a surging creek.<\/span><\/p>\n

He\u2019d been down here before with<\/span> Conservation Volunteers International Program<\/span><\/a> (Conservation VIP), a volunteer-based nonprofit whose work helps sustain landscapes, cultural sites and biodiversity around the globe, and the organization that organized our trip.<\/span><\/p>\n

Conservation VIP works directly with the National Forest Corporation (CONAF), Chile\u2019s national park service, which determines the park\u2019s most pressing conservation needs. Michael Arcos, a technical coordinator for Torres del Paine, says support from collaborators like Conservation VIP makes important projects possible.<\/span><\/p>\n

We\u2019d volunteered to help preserve a harried landscape we\u2019d never seen but wanted to. Now, like Torres del Paine\u2019s barbed, glacier-hung peaks, our faces were hooded and inscrutable. But I sensed that, on our second day of work\u2014shivering, wet, miserable\u2014some had begun to wonder what I\u2019d been wondering from the beginning: Why did we come here?<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Volunteers

Volunteers work on a section of boardwalk in Torres del Paine. (Photo Credit: Nick Davidson)<\/p><\/div>\n

Some 260,000 trekkers<\/span> visit Torres del Paine each year, collectively straining the park\u2019s aging infrastructure and trail systems. And since 2005,<\/span> tourists have ignited all three of the park\u2019s wildfires<\/span><\/a> (lightning is rare), which have scorched a fifth of the park’s acreage.<\/span><\/p>\n

The most recent wildfire<\/span> burned from late-December 2011 into early March<\/span><\/a> the next year. Open fires\u00a0<\/a>are\u00a0<\/span>forbidden in the park, but despite regulations, a man camping near Grey Glacier<\/span> lit his toilet paper<\/span><\/a>, lost hold of it, and the constant, gale force winds fanned the flames. More than<\/span> 43,500 acres<\/span><\/a> were charred on the forested ridges lining Lago Grey in the park\u2019s central-eastern zone.<\/span><\/p>\n

Human-caused erosion is more insidious. One of the most heavily trampled segments on the park’s W Circuit\u2014named for its shape\u2014sees extensive traffic on a regular basis. But on a truly wet day in Torres del Paine, hikers pummel the trails to sludge. Here and there, park rangers lay boards across the worst spots, but it\u2019s often a losing battle.<\/span><\/p>\n

Torres del Paine generates revenue by charging visitors for admission (roughly 6,000 pesos for Chileans and 21,000 pesos for foreigners) and by collecting fees from park concessionaires, similar to the National Park Service in the United States. Of all Chile\u2019s national parks, Torres del Paine generates the most revenue. But the\u00a0National Forest Corporation spreads that money across all its parks and leaves a meager budget for basic tasks, like trail maintenance, in Torres del Paine.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cTorres del Paine is the only park that generates significant revenue,\u201d said Chris Braunlich, Conservation VIP\u2019s CEO. “It’s similar to America’s National Park Service in that a large portion of the revenue goes to the NPS, then is redistributed. But [CONAF\u2019s] budget is extremely limited compared to what you would expect in a U.S. park.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

In 2007, Chris and her husband, Richard, a civil and structural engineer, joined a group of volunteers who had identified major problems on the park\u2019s trails and offered to help. Later that year, the trip\u2019s leaders established Conservation VIP as a nonprofit comprised entirely of volunteers, and Chris, who had a background in finance, joined the board as CFO, before eventually becoming CEO. Chris and Richard have returned to Torres del Paine many times since.<\/span><\/p>\n

Richard saw the park\u2019s need for bridges and offered to design and build a few, including one completed in 2014 that spans 170 feet across a 15-story gorge near the foot of Grey Glacier. Yosemite National Park, Torres del Paine\u2019s sister park, sent two of its staff to help.<\/span><\/p>\n

Conservation VIP has fixed trails all around the park, but over the past two years, they\u2019ve sent three volunteer groups to build the new, still-incomplete five-mile trail where we now worked, in a portion of the park with views that few have experienced.<\/span><\/p>\n

The plan: connect the new trail to the old one, and create a one-way loop around Laguna Scottsberg to thin out hikers. When complete, it will be among the first new trails to be developed since the park\u2019s inception in 1959. Torres del Paine was historically owned by a group of estancias whose land CONAF gradually bought. Its trails weren\u2019t planned and cut; known as \u201cuse trails,\u201d they were formed by someone walking or riding a horse along the easiest route.<\/span><\/p>\n

This year\u2019s work was different, because boardwalks require expensive materials to build. REI Adventures donated $30,000 to the<\/span> Adventure Travel Conservation Fund<\/span><\/a>, which awarded Conservation VIP the grant to build the boardwalk.<\/span><\/p>\n

In preparation, Chris spent three weeks wrangling supplies and working with CONAF to ensure we\u2019d accomplish our mutual objective. They\u2019d helicopter the raw materials to the site, and we\u2019d clear a path and start construction.<\/span><\/p>\n

But Patagonian weather can be fickle for flying. When we hiked in, we saw we were short on wood. As is common in conservation, we\u2019d have to reevaluate the meaning of success.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"A

A volunteer hammers down on a wood peg under the jagged ramparts of Los Cuernos del Paine. (Photo Credit: Nick Davidson)<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cThis is not a drill on quantity,\u201d David bellowed. \u201cMeasure three times, cut once. We can\u2019t run to the hardware store.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Our third day was gloriously sunny, and our 30-person group divvied up tasks: digging holes, pounding posts into those holes, lining out string to set the course, cutting posts level, framing the boardwalk, decking it. Loving a place is easy when the weather\u2019s grand. But I still wondered who would love a place they\u2019d never seen enough to pay for a shot at hard labor to protect it.<\/span><\/p>\n

Pam Martin, a fit, retired basketball coach at Humboldt State University, was digging holes like a machine. Earlier, I\u2019d asked about her New Zealand beanie with a silver fern. A year ago, she and her wife, Carol, partners of 42 years, were exploring New Zealand when they learned Carol had stage IV ovarian cancer. Carol passed away three months later, having worn the beanie during chemo. \u201cAnd now I\u2019m trying to find my way,\u201d Pam said. Her wedding ring glinted on her finger. \u201cI just felt like I needed to go to Patagonia. I\u2019m a real outdoor person. It\u2019s kind of like my church. And physical labor helps me process things.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

At lunch, we watched purling clouds pass in front of sawtooth peaks draped in snow from yesterday\u2019s rain. \u201cI\u2019m not one to sit on the porch and watch the world go by,\u201d said Johnny Seay, a retired contractor. Johnny had come with his girlfriend, Jeanne, both of whom had volunteered with Conservation VIP the year before in the Gal\u00e1pagos. He led the bulk of our construction. Without him, the boardwalk might look very different, though he learned something, too.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIn U.S. construction, we bowl over nature and do what we want,\u201d he said. \u201cHere, we have to follow what nature wants us to do. That\u2019s new for me.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\"The

The volunteer trail workers pause from their labor to enjoy the sunshine.\u00a0(Photo Credit: Nick Davidson)<\/p><\/div>\n

On the final day of construction, Dave Goldstone, slathered in mud, packed the last posts with rocks and sludge by hand. It was our last day on the boardwalk, and we were finishing the stretch of its substructure.<\/span><\/p>\n

Dave, a Brooklyn native, had worked for the New York City department of parks for 28 years, but before that he\u2019d spent eight weeks in Torres del Paine earning college credit as a landscape architecture student in 1975.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThere was absolutely no one here then,\u201d Dave remembered. \u201cI mean <\/span>no one<\/span><\/i>.\u201d He\u2019d lived with another student in a tiny cabin with no plumbing or electricity and a wood stove for heat. We\u2019d passed its weathered stone foundation on our way in. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cReconnecting with those memories was important for me,\u201d Dave mused.<\/span><\/p>\n

Near day\u2019s end we sat for lunch and surveyed our work.<\/span><\/p>\n

The boardwalk curved a backward L through the dead, wet forest. Three days earlier, a helicopter had made five additional supply drops, but the final 260 feet of the project still missed decking.<\/span><\/p>\n

A couple of weeks later, the last set of boards would be choppered in and a small team, including two retired U.S. Forest Service smoke jumpers, would drill them into place. Next year, Conservation VIP will send another group to finish the trail, or come as close as possible.<\/span><\/p>\n

Under the tricolored stare of Los Cuernos, the horned peak we\u2019d come to know so well, at least one reason we\u2019d come became apparent.<\/span><\/p>\n

So many tourists race here, race down the trails, then race home, seeing much, but taking in little. We percolated. Connected. Left the landscape better than we found it. We weren\u2019t tourists, after all, but part of the park itself.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThis group,\u201d Pam said, \u201cwe did something.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Conservation is a double-edged sword, a paradox that needs reckoning. We\u2019d traded toil for a chance for transformation, both for ourselves and the park. But we were still a bunch of foreigners who\u2019d flown thousands of miles to do it. How do we square the desire to protect a wild place with the need to experience it, footprints and all?<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe impact on the land is caused by foreigners,\u201d Chris pointed out, later. \u201cIt\u2019s very odd to me that we foreigners would go visit Chile and expect Chile to take care of this place so we could enjoy it.\u201d It occurred to me that hordes would descend on Torres del Paine in the future. Perhaps our going could help mitigate what would befall it otherwise.<\/span><\/p>\n

In some ways, Chris had said, the best thing we could all do is stay home. Then again, in a vacuum, people will move in to dam the rivers, quarry the mines\u2014take and take.<\/span><\/p>\n

Of any wild place we might leave to that vacuum or defend: \u201cUntil you experience it, you don\u2019t love it. And if you don\u2019t love it, you don\u2019t care what others do to it,\u201d she added.<\/span><\/p>\n

Learn more about REI Adventures and how our travel programs focus on conservation.<\/p>\n<\/span>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A chainsaw whined in the rain, wind gusts moaned off the veiled mountainside, and though the naked tree trunks leaned as if tormented, the two dozen volunteers breaking trail never complained, as far as I could tell. We\u2019d come to Torres del Paine, Chile\u2019s busiest national park, to lay a 560-foot boardwalk over a tract […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":45958,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[388],"tags":[268,1014,250,1810,12],"internal-tag":[],"class_list":["post-45767","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-travel","tag-chile","tag-conservation","tag-patagonia","tag-torres-del-paine","tag-travel"],"parsely":{"version":"1.1.0","canonical_url":"https:\/\/rei.com\/blog\/travel\/squaring-travel-with-conservation-in-torres-del-paine","smart_links":{"inbound":0,"outbound":0},"traffic_boost_suggestions_count":0,"meta":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","headline":"Squaring Travel with Conservation in Torres del Paine","url":"http:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/travel\/squaring-travel-with-conservation-in-torres-del-paine","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"http:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/travel\/squaring-travel-with-conservation-in-torres-del-paine"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2019\/04\/IMG_5254-2-e1554413745938.jpg?resize=150%2C150","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2019\/04\/IMG_5254-2-e1554413745938.jpg?fit=2800%2C1225"},"articleSection":"Travel","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Beckindale"}],"creator":["Beckindale"],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Uncommon Path \u2013 An REI Co-op Publication","logo":""},"keywords":["chile","conservation","patagonia","torres del paine","travel"],"dateCreated":"2019-04-23T18:00:17Z","datePublished":"2019-04-23T18:00:17Z","dateModified":"2025-01-13T23:29:31Z"},"rendered":"