One doesn’t have to search very hard for Americans while backpacking. Our voices will find you. You’ll hear what city we’re from before you see it displayed proudly on our Hydroflasks.  

While I spent the better part of my travels whispering and bantering my way through the world, I’m just as guilty of having a natural internal volume that is not only ear-piercing, but also ear-shattering. Every time I would spend a morning in Brisbane’s Black Milk Coffee, I would be scolded, shhh’d, and subjected to a handful of eye rolls from a guy I was dating. “Taugh lew-oud, mate. Shut the fack up!”

After about the fifth visit to the coffee shop, it finally sunk in that I actually was speaking at a loud volume, and not just possibly drawing the attention of the 3+ cute baristas who the guy wanted to comingle with after I set off on the next leg of my journey. 

I digress. 

Since I had already been made aware of my volume in Australia, I needn’t get a lesson from backpackers in South America. When I met fellow Americans, I bit my tongue. 

The first Americans I met in South America were a brother-sister duo who always used each other’s names while talking to each other. 

“Jack, would you like me to call the bus company?”

“Yes, Lucy, I would.”

“Wonderful, Jack. Let me give them a ring and I’ll let you know what they say about tomorrow’s reservations.”

“Thanks, Lucy.”

These two came from the same womb, mind you. The three of us sat alone in the lounge as this conversation carried on, and I wasn’t sure if I was feeling symptoms of jet lag or if I was dizzy from Santiago’s heat.  

I wouldn’t pay to see their two-man show but I enjoyed their company as I planned my three-month trip. Jack assured me that Torres Del Paine, while expensive, was an accessible hike. Having booked eight days of hiking (in a possible state of delusion,) it was nice to hear that I had actually made a sensible decision to come down to South America and lug a backpack through Patagonia for a week by myself. 

Jack and Lucy were not brash and bold, but they did have the one trait shared by all Americans. Their heads had the perfect aerodynamics for jokes to just fly over them. It takes a few months to identify the subtle art to banter that did not make it past Ellis Island. The line between the absurd, the sarcastic, and the mean is more thin than the soles of my hiking Vibrams. Bantering Brits and Aussies, do not worry. There are no ghosts in the wind. Just me whispering to the Californians or the Texans that “they’re just joking.”

Subtlety has never been America’s strong point. (Alongside affordable health care, handling the Coronavirus, and electing someone who is not the Cheetos mascot and Satan’s lovechild.) But you know what? This is not such a bad thing. If Americans were subtle, I would never have met the doctors, and I might not have gotten through my eight-day hike without their unintentional lessons of positivity and perseverance. 

This Does Not Mean the Doctors Were Inspirational By Any Means. 

I was in good spirits the first time I met the doctors. The hike from the entrance of Torres Del Paine National Park to the Serón campsite took less than six hours. By 2 p.m, I had already set up camp and started to mingle with the rest of the hikers.

Torres Del Paine only allows 80 hikers on the 80-mile “O trek,” or circuit trek, at a time. Campers reserve their campsites ahead of time and must present their reservations before the Dickson campsite, which was my second stop. Hikers can enter from one of two locations, so you’ll either meet hikers who have the same schedule as you or are four days ahead or behind. 

The doctors, I learned, were four days ahead. 

I was in my tent, enjoying the quiet of the night and the idea of a shorter hike in the morning. 

That’s when I heard them. 

The stomps came first. Or maybe it was the sighs. All I remember is that very quickly, there was an issue. 

“WHERE DO I PUT MY BACKPACK, KEVIN?” 

None of the campsites had reserved spots and the tents had been spread out throughout the area quite sporadically. The right answer to her question was “anywhere.” 

I fell asleep to the sounds of the sighs, rustles, and complaints, forgetting all about my new pals until I rubbed my eyes and enjoyed my morning shower. The opportunity to eavesdrop was quickly presented to me, and I never turn down an opportunity like that. 

“KEVIN?”

“Yes?”

“Did you pack the Imodium, Kevin?”

“Uh, I don’t think so.” 

“Well, do you remember when I told you to pack the Imodium?” 

“Uh.”

“Well, I had assumed that you packed the Imodium because I told you to pack the Imodium.” 

I didn’t need to make coffee after hearing that conversation. I truly felt alive. 

I saw poor Kevin before I saw the rest of the doctors. He stood with his head down, stirring a pot of something for the group of three women chatting around him. We started chatting and yes, they were also American. Yes, they were from Boston and D.C., all doctors, all pals, all first-time hikers. 

Kevin asked me where my group was. 

“Oh, I’m traveling alone.”

“Wow. Must be nice.” 

“KEVIN!” 

This was my favorite group of people, and I couldn’t wait to talk to them before and after every multi-hour hike. Their exasperated sighs cured my homesickness. The pure frustration over anything brought me back to my homeland. I was filled with a feeling that I would like to call “Schadenfreude-lite.”

Goddamn Adventure Alan 

The second day of hiking would take approximately six hours to complete, according to Backpacker Steve. Backpacker Steve’s blog post on the circuit trek offered three different route options that could be done in 7-9 days. I chose an eight-day route, because I am a relatively fit human but knew I’d face some challenges on my first multi-day hike. I also booked a hostel the day after the hike, and a fancy hotel two days after the hike. I had read that weather could stop me along the way, and I was taking no chances at missing the one hotel that I would enjoy during my three months in South America. 

(Sure, I am the first to admit that I am one of the more neurotic backpackers that you’ll meet in a budget hostel. But in this case, the anxiety of Murphy’s Law on the Patagonian trails did pay off.)

The hike from the first campsite to the second was leisurely. Easy, even. TDP has very easy-to-follow trails and I was blessed with beautiful weather in early March. I arrived to the campsite in the early evening with a beaming smile and a thirst for adventure. Maybe I was a hiking gal. Maybe I could go back and do all the multi-day hikes in New Zealand that I ran away from. Maybe I could accomplish anything I put my mind to! 

I showed the rangers at the Dickson campsite my reservation with a smile. I put my backpack down, stretched my shoulders, and took out some cash to buy a beer. And look! My new friends were already at the campsite. I was ready to poke the Imodium bear. 

“Hey guys! What an amazing hike! Felt so great, right? Who’s up for a beer?”

“This is fucking AWFUL!” 

Uh oh! The doctors weren’t doing well. 

The doctors had planned on surpassing the Dickson campsite and getting in another hike to the Perros campsite, a three-hour hike before the John Gardener pass. They got stopped. It would get dark before they got to their campsite, which was a big no-no on the circuit trek. Rangers would cut people off as early as 2 or 3 to keep everyone hiking in the daylight. 

This delay would pretty much ruin the doctors’ chances of finishing the hike on the day they planned, which was the day before they were flying home. 

At some points during the evening I did feel bad and try to lift the group’s spirits, but any effort was overshadowed by the huffing and puffing and crinkling of papers that took over the area where campers could hang out and eat their meals. The three ladies spent quite a bit of the evening obsessively looking over printed blog posts from a man named Adventure Alan. 

Adventure Alan says, “O Trek can easily be done in 6 to 7 days vs. the 8-13 days recommended.” He said he did it in 4.5. 

The doctors pointed out to me multiple times that Adventure Alan was a guy in his 50s. Basically, if this old fart can bang out an 100km hike in 4.5 days, they could do it in six. So why were they being held back? 

The picture that the doctors painted for me was a middle-aged guy doing his best. No. This guy is legit. He’s been on hundreds more hikes than anyone I know. Adventure Alan makes trail snacks that contain soy protein powder and is a regular “canyoneer.” He’s no huffing-and-puffing beginner that happened to find the secret to conquering the O trek. But the doctors kept clinging onto his 6-day recommendation, utterly bamboozled at why the world was against them. 

I was not the only one entertained by Adventure Alan’s fan club. That night, I dined on a pre-made dinner at the campsite that I had ordered when I booked the hike. The dinnergoers and I were joined by sweet Kevin, who was ordering a pizza for the group to enjoy that night. 

“I just wanted to get away for a minute,” he told us, deflating by the minute.

“It does not seem like your group is having a good time,” noted a tall Swiss man who vaguely resembled our Adventure Alan. 

We all nodded, kept our smirks to ourselves, and wished Kevin luck as he delivered the pizza.

Chaos Was Coming 

Unfortunately, that was the last night I saw the doctors. I’m not sure what they decided to do, although they weighed their options for the whole campground to hear throughout the evening. They could go back. They could try and tackle three one-day hikes in one day, approximately 14 hours of the hardest hikes on the circuit. They could miss their flight.

Sure, I felt a little validated that my humble planning paid off. But more importantly, I was actually quite thankful to have met the doctors so early on in my trip.

During the first two days, I didn’t have any slip-ups or hang-ups. I didn’t run into any tomfoolery or bamboozlery. But I knew that one catastrophe or another was coming. It happened on every trip: an ATM ate my debit card in Bangkok, my day bag got stolen in Germany, I did not like the hostel I worked at in Kuala Lumpur. A catastrophe was coming in the next few days, I could prepare for that. Most importantly, I was given a glimpse into how not to handle the situation. 

No one at the campsite could help the doctors. (Unless someone had Imodium.) Even the doctors couldn’t really help the doctors. It wasn’t their fault that they were stopped by the rangers, and they couldn’t change their plans now. Filling the whole campsite with the sounds of their complaints, however, only made them the butt of the joke and the subject of bants from other hikers who had either planned better or kept their catastrophes to themselves. The doctors weren’t hurt, or sick, or in any real danger. 

They would be fine.

And even if my tent broke or my knees were in immense pain or I faced anxiety on the way up to the Towers (which all happened,) I would remind myself that things weren’t so bad and wailing wouldn’t make me anything other than the subject of some eye rolls. (One brief half-hour of quiet crying to myself and my hiking buddy was my limit.) 

Planning helps, but there’s always a chance that you’ll get thrown off your game. A ranger will hold you back from your next hike or the world will be hit with a global pandemic. But you control how you react to it, which can influence how others react as well. 

And if you think you need Imodium, just get it yourself.