Explora en Torres del Paine - All Inclusive

The area is spectacular, the view from the hotel about the most beautiful I've ever seen. We stayed first at the Explora El Chalten then used the hotel transport van to go to Torres del Paine, which was great as Patagonia is huge and hard to get around. [Note: 25% discount on 2nd Explora lodge visit on same trip.] The staff is excellent, professional and friendly, and guides are top-notch. The hotel is comfortable w/ lots of places to sit, store well-stocked w/ cold weather gear, food and wines excellent, and I love that once you get there, everything's included. Hotel is comfortable but not super luxurious (good bed, wonderful linens, but rooms small-ish) and not the least pretentious...I loved it but it's not for everyone. My one criticism is there are not enough lower-paced activities; I'm in pretty good shape, but 5'2" and not young; since husband is 6' and great hiker, I'd expected to spend more time at the spa & pool, but it's 127 steps down the hill so not easy to pop down, tho you can request a van to pick you up so at least you don't have to climb back up post-massage or swim.

A fantastic experience that will be remembered as one of the best trips taken. Explora is absolutely first class all the way. The room is modern and clean. The guides were extremely helpful, friendly and accommodating. The food was excellent. Location on Lake Pehoe is beautiful with views of the mountains. This is not an easy place to tour because it is a little remote and not so tourist friendly but the Explora experience was simply most memorable , and enjoyable.

Excellent location. Great service. Book other resorts owned by explora near by to have a better experience. Need a better website and ability to interact with individual lodges directly to organise your hikes before arrival. Very helpful staff , attention to details Great food. Have a shop on site in case you forget something .

The views from the hotel are incomparable! The hikes are easily reached and accompanied by great guides ! The Spa is quite a walk from the hotel , but the Sauna , dips in the ice cold lake and jacuzzis are wonderful! The hotel is unfortunately a bit dated , the bathrooms small and the food not always inspiring. The Lamb Asado at the Cincho was fantastic. If you are a serious hiker , don’t think twice !

Everything was excellent: location, friendly staff, food, service, cleanliness, equipment, and interesting hikes with knowledgeable guides. Every day, there was a multiple choice of hikes or tours for half a day or a full day, from easy to advanced. On the day of arrival, the staff offers an introductory meeting to clarify guests' goals and capabilities.

Since this is probably going to be long, the TLDR: The view is unbelievable, the guides do a great job, the food is good, and it's hard for me to believe there's a better way to experience this area. We were greeted at the airport by Explora staff and took a comfortable shuttle to the hotel (about 1.5 hours). Some amount of unpaved roads, but not too bad. After check-in there was a short orientation session that went over the five different zones for hikes, how signing up for them would work, and some general info about Explora. Right afterwards everyone was distributed among the guides where we chatted a bit about what we were interested in doing and what the weather was going to be like, and we got our first day of hikes scheduled along with tentative plans our other two days. Each day you can either sign up for a full day hike or two half-day hikes (or just one half-day if you wanted to take it easy). Full days and morning half-days leave in the 7:30-8:30 range, and afternoon half-days leave around 3:00, leaving you plenty of time to rest a bit and get lunch at the hotel. It was very windy while we were there, so the scheduled our French Valley hike for the second day since that's when it looked less windy (important since it involves a boat ride). Hike reviews: Pingo Chorrillo - Nice forest hike. Not a ton of views, but we did see some cool birds and the hike ends with a waterfall. Sarmientno - More of a plains hike, amazing color of the lake and cool rock formations French Valley - Full day so one of our longer hikes, a bit steep towards the end but amazing views of the glacier. It was warm our day so we saw (and heard!) some small avalanches too. Beer and soda and snacks waiting for us on the boat afterwards! Aonikenk - Some interesting ancient rock paintings, but kind of a flat hike overall. Also very windy! Laguna Negra - Gauchos led us around for some easy horseback riding. All the guides are great, all their English was quite good, and they were really knowledgeable about the area and what we'd see on the hikes. Definitely fun to hang out with and spend a morning, afternoon, or day with. We generally didn't get the same guides though I think that's mostly luck-of-the-draw. Rooms are spare but very nice, modern, clean, with lots of wood. The view (if you get a lake/mountain-facing-room) is legitimately startling -- it really does feel unreal. Just amazing. Wi-fi was totally fine in all areas of the hotel. We were in room 51 which is the furthest one in the newer wing and it worked great, roughly 4mbps up/down. Easily good enough for stuff like social media and posting photos, and we could stream an episode of Jeopardy before bed without any issues (yes we're nerds). Seems significantly better than earlier reviews, maybe they got Starlink or something? Laundry service was pricy but quick -- we could leave a bag out in the morning and it'd be ready and waiting for us the same day after dinner. Food ranged from dece