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Written by: -
Jerry Azevedo
California, USA
Dates: - March 1997
Email: - jwazevedo@aol.com
Comments: - General information: Baños Morales, known officially as Villa del Valle, is an informal arrangement of houses at the base of the terminal moraine of the valley of the Río Morales. With the recent tourist boom, new construction is everywhere, the steeply pitched metal roofs still glinty in the clear mountain air. At 1850 m, the town gets nearly 3 m of snow in the winter. The town's namesake warm springs, spilling into a concrete pool that hugs the cliff high above the Río Volcán, still draw tourists who trust the curative properties of the sulfur-yellow waters, but the waters aren't quite the attraction that they were a few years ago, before a shift in the earth's bowels lowered the temperature to just 22 C. Now those who want true hot springs keep on driving past Baños to Termas Colina, another 15 k up the Río Volcán valley. There's no public transportation past Baños. However, a couple of companies in Baños offer excursions to the Colina springs and to other spots in the surrounding mountains. At the bus parking lot you can rent horses for the trip into the park. You pay for your horse plus a wrangler with a pack horse. I didn't get a price.
Rating: - 8
Terrain: - One of the few parks near Santiago with convenient access by public transportation, El Morado offers a scenic day trip into the Andes.
Hotels: - Baños Morales-- Places to stay: Staying overnight in Baños
is not cheap. Residencial Los Chicos Malos, within sight of the bus parking lot, offers
decent rooms for $26.50 a person. Similarly priced Residencial Díaz is just around the
corner. When I was there, the Hostería Baños Morales, adjacent to the springs, was shut
up tight. Travelers on a heftier budget can stay at Refugio Andino Alemán just up the
Río Volcán in Lo Valdes. This lodge is open year-round, and you can rent skis in season.
Backpackers can camp in the park at either Panimávidas or Laguna Morales (a.k.a. Laguna
El Morado on some maps). Camping is included in the price of admission to the park.
Places to eat: Several shacks around the bus parking lot offer drinks and simple
provisions, including home-made bread, but campers would be better off stocking up in
Santiago. The lodging houses all offer meals. At Los Chicos Malos I had some decent
empanadas and a Coke served on the shaded patio for reasonable price.
Moving on: Baños is a tourist destination, rather than a real town, so public
transportation is set up only to get you to the park in the morning and get you back in
the afternoon. You can't jump off the bus at each place that catches your fancy, thinking
you can catch the next bus that comes along, as you can in most of Chile. So if you're
thinking of a day trip, plan to see Baños or the other canyon towns, but not both. On
summer weekends, make reservations to assure yourself of a return seat, especially if
you're returning to the city on Sunday afternoon. Buses back down the hill leave Baños
between 18:30 and 19:00.
Route: - Getting there: The entrance to El Morado is adjacent to the village of Baños Morales (for information, see below) in the Cajón de Maipo, 95 km southeast of Santiago. The route from Santiago to Baños Morales ascends the Cajón, following the Maipo River through its spectacular canyon deep into the Andes, passing tiny communities that once served the small farms and mines along the canyon but now mostly cater to weekenders from Santiago. In late summer watch for the entrepreneurs along the route that sell preserves and pies. There's nothing quite so tempting as a fresh lemon meringue pie waved in the air by a young man at the side of the road. All bus windows have drool marks. Gerry Leitner describes the Cajón in detail in his "Travel Companion: Chile" guide. Frequent buses service the canyon communities as far as the police checkpoint at San Gabriel, but it's another 25 km to Baños on a rough dirt road, and the buses to Baños are geared to the tourist season. The bus line "Cajón de Maipo" runs a service leaving Parque O'Higgins (adjacent to the homonymous Santiago Metro stop) at 07:15 and returning at 18:30 on Saturdays and Sundays from January through March. (Service might be more frequent in January and February.) There's a roof rack for backpacks. The company charges $4.15, one way, for the trip, which takes from 2.5 to 3 hours. For the same price Turismo Arrpue (tel. 211-7165) offers a similar service leaving from Plaza Italia in the Las Condes suburb. In January Arrpue has buses every day; in February they run Tu-Th-Sat-Sun; and in March they run on Sat-Sun-Wed. Mansur Excursiones has mini-buses that go to Baños Morales from January through April.
Essentials: - Hiking in the park: From the bus parking lot in Baños follow the signs for camping across the Río Morales to the park headquarters, just on the edge of town. The ranger there will charge you 1000 pesos (about $2.50) and give you a simple map of the park. It's pretty easy. You switchback up the moraine and then follow a well-trod trail straight up the valley. The scenery is spectacular, a virtual textbook of glacial geography. The valley is ringed by mountains of over 5000 m, with broad scree slopes. Springs on the side slopes foster a green growth of grasses, and mineral seeps stain the rocks red, yellow, and white. A walk of 4 km, and an elevation gain of 300 m, brings you to Aguas Panimávidas, a meadow of bubbling, cool mineral springs. (The rangers warn against drinking too much of this water, as the minerals can upset the stomach.) You can camp here--and to my eye this is the prettiest section of the park--but most people keep going another 2 km, and another 150 m higher, to Laguna Morales, a more formal campground around a tiny glacial lake. There are pit toilets and wash basins with running water. The Chileans set up tents on the hard earth and ring their sites with low walls of stone. The atmosphere is festive and convivial; you don't come here looking for solitude. Beyond the Laguna camp, the trail gets rougher, but it's still an easy walk of 2 km, and 200 m in elevation gain, to the tongue of the San Francisco glacier, at the effective head of the valley. The experienced mountaineer or the foolish can climb up on top of the glacier. You can also approach the ice cave at the bottom of the glacier, but the river pouring from the base is treacherous to cross and big chunks of rock tumble down the face in the afternoon melt. The round-trip hike to the glacier from Baños, allowing a little time for exploring and snacks, takes about 5 hours, which gives you ample time to do the walk and make it back to town in time for the afternoon bus.
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