Glaciers
Trip Start
Jan 06, 2008
1
14
28
Trip End
Mar 31, 2008
El Calafate, Argentina
Sunday, February 10, 2008
We flew from Trelew to El Calafate, the furthest south we are to go on this trip. It is at latitude 50 degrees south, which is equivalent to the latitude of London in the north but over a thousand kilometers south of Tasmania at latitude 40 degrees south. The weather while we were there was mostly warm and sunny with wind. It is a semi arid region, with immense treeless plains on which grasses and the calafate bush grows. As you near the mountains the rainfall increases and there are trees, mostly beech, in large forests.
El Calafate is booming, but the evidence of what appears to be uncontrolled growth is dismaying, there is much ugliness in a spot which could be lovely. We were not there to see El Calafate, however, but to see the famous glaciers in the area.
Glacier face
Perito Moreno Glacier - Feb 11, 2008.
The Perito Moreno glacier is unique in that it crosses a narrow channel connecting an arm of Lake Argentina to the main lake. When it reaches the other side of the channel it completely dams the channel and prevents the flow out of the arm into the lake. This occurs every few years. It is presently blocking the channel and the level in the arm is some 20 feet higher than the main lake. When the pressure of the water is sufficient the ice dam collapses, to spectacular effect. It last did this in March 2006 and, of course, everyone is waiting for the next collapse. The last one was on national TV.
The other reason this glacier is a favorite is that it is accessible by road. One turns the corner and there it is - a vision in dazzling white. The other remarkable thing about Argentine glaciers is that they can be seen at very low altitude. They descend from about 15,000 feet but are still intact at 600 feet. Most of them are receding but Perito Moreno is not.
We took a boat to within 300 yards of the glacier face, any closer and you are in danger from falling ice and the waves they produce
Boat and glacier
. We landed and put on crampons for a carefully guided two hour walk on the glacier itself. This was a challenging and exhilarating scramble over 'hill and dale' with two fit guides to catch us when we slipped.Not content with that, we returned to the land and viewed the glacier from 'balconies', constructed overlooking the point where the glacier crosses the channel.
Exhausted we returned to our hotel with Joan's camera overflowing with pictures of ice, many of which can be seen here.
Feb 12, 2008
Upsala, Spegazzini, et al, Glaciers.
Unlike the previous day which was a private guided tour, we took the bus load/boat load to view the other glaciers within the Parque Nacional Los Glaciares. You take a bus 45 km to pick up a catamaran which moves swiftly through Lake Argentina to the face of the glaciers. The views of the glaciers amid the surrounding snow capped, cloud wrapped mountains were thrilling - hopefully Joan's photos will convey some of this
Lonely steppe
. This compensated somewhat for the elbowing contests involved in getting good views of the glaciers. We took a walk through a beech forest to view the icebergs in Lake Onelli and ate lunch in tranquility except for the presence of numerous French, Germans, English, Scots, Australians, and many Argentinians (Argentines?). Incidentally, we have seen very few Americans (or Canadians) on this leg of our trip. I find this odd, as the effort involved in getting here from Europe is much greater than from the US.Feb 13th. Our final day in El Calafate was cool and wet, emphasising how lucky we had been with the warm and sunny days we had when viewing the glaciers. Another miserable flight back to Buenos Aires on Aerolineas Argentina arriving near midnight, only to have a baggage delay caused, it seems, by a police baggage search of every bag before releasing them to the carousel. We finally got to our apartment around 2 am.
Comments
Argentina looks cool
Wow! stunning photos again Joan. I'm going to have to download a few favs and create a slideshow for my pc screen saver.
And it's nice to see at least one with you actually in it!