I’ll start with my thoughts of our stops in El Calafate and
El Chalten, and after the great success of “the other side of the story” I’ll
try to get Rich to write down his flowery version afterwards.
After our great (my thoughts) time in Chile’s far south, we
caught a bus to El Calafate to see what more wonders Argentina’s side of
Patagonia has to offer. Similar to Puerto Natales, El Calafate itself isn’t
that special but it’s proximity to the Perito Moreno Glacier drives many
backpackers to this little town.
This brings me back to a promise that I made a couple of
posts ago. I wanted to tell you more about the advantages of travelling in winter.
So apart from the amazing colours of the vegetation, the main advantage is that
instead of hordes of backpackers we have Patagonia pretty much to ourselves! What
was maybe a little awkward at the 100-bed refugio, is pretty awesome when you
hike through amazing landscapes and instead of hundreds of other hikers you see
a handful on a three-day hike. The weather mostly isn’t that bad either with
less wind than in summer and rather ‘mild’ temperatures between 0-8 degrees (when
we were there). Another advantage is that many things are cheaper and that we
don’t have to plan ahead because there are always spare rooms, seats, tickets
for everything. So I actually think that autumn/winter is a great time to
travel through Patagonia!
Anyway, back to El Calafate: as mentioned the main
attraction is the Perito Moreno Glacier and what an attraction this is!
30km long, up to 5km wide, about 70m high above the water
and 170m total ice depth. Perito Moreno is one of only a few glaciers that are
still growing and the sounds from the expanding ice and the sight of this
majestic giant are just breathtaking! So I’ll catch my breath and let some
pictures do the talking.
My physical wounds from our hike through Torres del Paine
National Park had healed by then, so I thought it’d be time to treat Ritchie’s
mental wounds with a nice hiking trip through the Los Glaciares National Park
around El Chalten. Unfortunately the weather didn’t allow for the 3-day
treatment, so we just went on a little hike to a beautiful waterfall and a
one-day hike to Cerro Fitz Roy with two experienced ‘mountaineers’ from
Austria, Helga and Katharina.
The day-hike took us through some beautiful autumn and
winter landscapes, past a frozen ‘laguna’ and then to the foot of Cerro Fitz
Roy. The sky was very dramatic all day and the view of the mountain therefore
changed every minute which resulted in me taking way too many pictures again
which subsequently means that I have to post quite a few…
After our short trip to El Chalten we went back to El
Calafate where we reunited with Ritchie’s BFFs Hans (German) and Karim (French)
before heading off on a 30-hour bus ride to Bariloche.
THE OTHER SIDE OF THE STORY
These places were really nice. I have nothing to add.
It looks amazing! I'm sure the pictures do not do it justice though. Ritch, I thought of another positive for the year long winter, it eliminates the need of having to shave every couple of hours.
ReplyDeleteYour not missing much here, its been raining the last few days and its been freezing at 15 degrees :)
keep the blogs coming...enjoy!