Argentine Patagonia

I flew from Buenos Aires straight to El Calafate, whcih is in the heart of Argentinian Patagonia and perfectly located for accessing Los Glaciares National Park and all the other major attractions of Patagonia. The flight surprised me, as it took about 3 and a half hours, which seems excessive when you haven´t even travelled the full length of the country - Argentina really is massive! It was clear the second I got off the plane that down here is so different to the areas I´ve been travelling further North. We flew for endles miles over pampas and the steppe, where there´s no vegitation except for a scattering of low bushes that look like they daren´t grow higher than a metre or so as they need to hang on to the ground when the ioncredible winds blow. It was clear and sunny, and about 20 degrees colder then when I got on the plane. But so spectacular and enormous, with snowy mountains in the background that it literally takes your breath away.

On my first full day I went on a trip to see the Perito Moreno glacier, one of the few advancing glaciers in the world. It´s a pretty impressive sight, but its the creaking, groaning and cracking sounds that it makes as it ´flows´along down its valley that impressed me. That and the icebergs the size of buildings that fall from the face into Lago Argentina below.

The next day I went further into the Los Glaciares park, on a boat trip which took me to more than 6 further glaciers, some of which even bigger than Perito Moreno (although receding, not advancing). It was a clear day, and the scenery was stunning - the black mountains, green forests, white of the snow on the mountains and the glaciars, but also the vivid blue of the glacial ice which seemed to shine both in the glaciars themselves and even more so in the huge icebergs we were navigating around.

Took a bus from Calafate to El Chalten, which is a pretty crummy village but set in a spectacular location at the foot of Cerro Torre and Fitz Roy, two spectacular spiky mounatin peaks, and is known as the trekking capital of Argentina. Thought I´d better get involved (when in Rome...) so I armed myself with a bottle of water and a sandwich and set off into the mountains following a series of trails. It was cold, windy and remote, but pretty rewarding walking a long way through such an amazing place with barely another person seen in the whole 7 hours of the day.

After a brief return to Calafate on the Route 40 buses that trundle the 4 hour journey between the two towns I packed up and started a long bus journey up towards Puerto Madryn and the Peninsula Valdez... Patagonia is awesome!