Three days in, from Puerto Natales to the base of the towers, a sunrise repeat of that same climb, then the long walk past Los Cuernos and up into the French Valley. After all of that, sleeping inside four solid walls at Paine Grande felt like the height of luxury, especially once we heard how many tents didn't survive the wind overnight.

Porridge, again, and a plan for the day

Same breakfast as every morning, porridge with peanut butter and a crushed up Snickers for good measure, because by day four you stop pretending you're going to get bored of it. The plan was a four to four and a half hour walk to Refugio Grey, followed by something neither of us had done before, an ice hike onto the glacier itself.

Eating porridge for breakfast at Paine Grande campsite on the W Trek

The same porridge, peanut butter and Snickers combo as every other morning.

Along Lake Pehoé towards Grey

This stretch is supposed to be one of the easier days on the W, and it mostly was, flat, and with Lake Pehoé's turquoise water running alongside for most of it. The weather wasn't playing along though, grey skies and a wind that dropped completely one minute and nearly knocked you sideways the next. Even with the cloud cover, reaching the mirador with the Grey Glacier laid out below was one of those moments that stops conversation, knowing we'd be standing on top of it by the afternoon.

One of the genuinely underrated parts of a multi day trek like this is the people. You end up walking next to strangers for hours at a time, trading stories, and by day four some of those strangers have turned into the people you're sharing camp with every night.

Camp Grey, and the two companies running this trail

Eventually the trail clings to the hillside above the lake before dropping down into Camp Grey. This is where the campsite system on the W actually clicks into place, Las Torres run the eastern side, Chileno and Frances, where we'd stayed the previous nights, while a company called Vertice runs the west, Paine Grande and this one. The Las Torres sites are nicer but pricier, Vertice's are more basic but cheaper. Lunch here was a distinctly unglamorous dry peanut butter sandwich, eaten fast because the real plan for the afternoon was still ahead of us.

Welcome sign for Refugio and Camping Grey, run by Vertice, on the W Trek

Vertice run the west side of the park, Las Torres run the east.

Bigfoot, and the side quest onto the ice

The ice hike isn't part of the standard W Trek, it's a separate add-on run by a company called Bigfoot, the only outfit licensed to take people out onto the Grey Glacier itself. With our hiking friends Abi, Priya and Sean, we headed to the meeting point, got handed a rucksack of crampons, and jumped on a boat that would take us out to the ice.

Bigfoot Adventure Patagonia base camp sign at Glacier Grey, since 1997

Bigfoot, the only company allowed to run ice hikes on the Grey Glacier.

The boat itself was worth the trip alone, weaving between icebergs with granite peaks rising on either side, the wall of the glacier getting bigger and more obviously ginormous with every turn. From above you can actually make out the crevasses cutting through it, which is either exciting or slightly terrifying depending on what you're about to do next.

Iceberg floating near the Grey Glacier, seen from the boat, Patagonia

Weaving between icebergs on the way out to the glacier.

Crampons on, and out onto the ice

Helmets, harnesses, ice spikes and axes on, and we stepped straight onto sediment covered ice that honestly didn't look like much at first, more grey rubble than glacier. A few minutes further in, that changed completely, the ice shifting into proper streaks of blue and white, crunching under every step. The spikes mean you're not going to slip, but you absolutely still watch where you put your feet, especially walking near the edges of the crevasses our guide kept checking with his axe.

Hikers walking across the Grey Glacier roped up with crampons and ice axes

Out onto the ice, checking every step near the crevasses.

Crevasses form because the ice is always moving, slowly, like a very cold, very brittle river, and when it bends over uneven ground underneath, the surface cracks. Looking down into one from above genuinely gives you the fear, in a good way. At one point our guide rigged up ropes and lowered us into an actual ice cave, running meltwater below, freezing wind funnelling through, and this impossibly deep blue all around that no photo really does justice to.

Blue ice cave and crevasse formations on the Grey Glacier, Patagonia

Lowered into an ice cave, the bluest blue I've stood inside.

We finished up on a high point of the ice with the whole glacier stretching out behind us, ice axes up, genuinely buzzing off the whole afternoon.

Two hikers raising ice axes in celebration on top of the Grey Glacier

Buzzing after an afternoon most people never get to have on this trail.

One last night in the park

Zodiac back to camp, tents already erected this time, hired sleeping bag, mat and pillow, not quite as comfortable as the actual beds from the night before but honestly fine after the day we'd had. Noodles again for dinner, a genuinely overpriced $10 cheese and crackers from the tiny on-site shop, and a drink at camp with the group before turning in for what we were told would be another windy night.

Hiker relaxing with a drink at the campsite on the final night of the W Trek

One last night in the park, sore legs and all.

Four days, sore knees, and by the end of it genuinely no idea if the boulders on this trail or the early starts did more damage. Ask either of us and we'd both still do it again tomorrow. If you want to see how the whole thing started, or exactly how we planned this trip in the first place, I've written both of those up too.