Giant Glaciers and Patagonian Plains
Trip Start
Oct 13, 2007
1
9
14
Trip End
Jan 10, 2008
El Calafate,
Argentina
Wednesday, November 28, 2007
After a heavy trek, it was nice to catch buses around to some key spots and ride chairlifts to stunning peaks, dining on tasty cake at the top of Cerro Campanario, overlooking beautiful snow-capped mountains hugged by blue lakes.
With just two nights in Bariloche, we swiftly moved on down the narrowing tail of the South American coast into the heart of Patagonia and El Chalten, a very small town set up inside the Parque Nacional de Fitz Roy, the home of Cerro Fitz Roy and Cerro Torre, an incredibly jagged peak slicing the thinning air at its zenith. Although not at very high altitude, it is one of the most difficult mountains in the world to climb, with only 3-5 ascents a year, considerably less than Everest and K2.
Here, we left early heading towards Cerro Torre, and after 6 hours and a river crossing via harnesses and cables, we reached the glacier, a huge expanse of ice beneath the mountains.
There, we attached our crampons and trekked forth up onto the glacier.
Unfortunately, there was limited time to return to the town before the weather came in, and not long after, we retreated to the dry land which was becoming less dry with every drop of rain flicked into our faces by the increasingly forceful gusts of wind.
Our depression at the worsening conditions was exacerbated as we saw our tents buckling under the pressure of their wind-exposed position, just two minutes after passing the warm, dry, decidedly still condtions inside the hostel near our ´campsite´.
Nevertheless, we braved the swirling, gusty night after having to move most of the tents behind what little shelter was available.
Shaken and stirred after the night before, we swiftly packed up and moved on further into Patagonia, to El Calafate.
Another quite touristy town, El Calafate´s main street reveals a plethora of pricey outdoor adventure stores and yet more appetising meat restaurants with crucified lambs adorning every other shop window.
The first night was spent at an all-you-can-eat restaurant (35 pesos, about $12), where, after stuffing ourselves at the salad bar, plate after plate of delicious Patagonian lamb, beef, surprisingly good chicken and fat sausages were dropped onto our table. Needless to say, everyone was quickly full (after dessert of course..).
The main purpose of everyone´s (except those who have a bizarre fetish for freezing winds and overpriced outdoors equipment) stay in El Calafate is to visit the famous Perito Merino Glacier, a massive chunk of ice dwarfing the ones we had previously hiked upon.
Towering up to 60m above Lago Argentino, 250 square km in area, it is one of the few glaciers in the world that is not retreating. It was simply an awesome sight, to sail up close in a ferry and see huge chunks of ice the size of cars breaking off, the noise splitting the air like debris from an explosion, as condors swooped down over the white expanse out across the blue lake into the dense forest and beyond the snow capped mountains.
The second and last night was spent at a more upmarket but still very reasonably priced Patagonian lamb restaurant, where the lamb fell off the bone in the direction of our salivating tongues. And after some calafate (the local berry) ice-cream, we pushed through the thronging crowds out into the windy street, ready to depart the next morning for Chile and further into the depths of this surprisingly lengthy continent.
