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Hola everybody!
Been in Patagonia for a month now so high time for another entry. Acually stuck in a little town called El Bolson at the moment with a rather unhappy stomach so this is a productive way to amused myself for a couple of hours. Good thing about traveling is everyone gets tummy problems. After a while it doesn´t feel weird discussing one´s bowels with complete strangers.
Since the last blog I`ve flown down from Ecuador to Ushiaia, Argentina, the southern most city in the world, and worked my way up here to northern Patagonia. Flight down was a bit of an epic. Thirty six hours all up with a 10 hour wait in Santiago and a night sleeping on the airport floor in Buenos Aires. Flying into Ushuaia over Tierra del Fuego and dropping down over the Beagel Channel was impressive. Stepping out of the plane I could almost image I was back in NZ with the beech-forest cloaked mountains and stiff breeze blowing in off the channel. It was a bit worrying when the taxi driver told me what a beautiful summer's morning it was despite the dashboard thermometer reading just seven degrees. Took some getting used to after the mid thirties heat of the Galapagos!
Ushuaia was a nice little city (barely a city really). Perched on the edge of the Beagel Chanel it´s the main port for cruise ships bound for the Antarctic. For seven thousand US dollars you could get a berth on a ten day trip to the ice, or if you´re willing to wait around maybe pick up a half price spot at the last minute. Not having quite those sorts of funds I decided to amuse myself with less pricy adventures.
I`d decided I was going to devote most of my time in Patagonia to walking and exploring the mountains. After investing in some more gear I was pretty much self sufficient. I was a bit apprehensive about the cheap tent I bought in Ecuador would hold up to the infamous Patagonian wind and rain. With the bizarre slogan Oursky: more healthiness, more vogue blazed across both sides, Tierra del Fuego was going to be a test of whether it was capable of being healthy, vogue and weatherproof all at the same time.
Did a couple of tramps out of Ushuaia and surprisingly the sun shone for most of the time while the wind never got too serious so the I couldn´t yet pass judgement on the tent´s performance. It was undoubtably however both vogue and healthy (or as vogue and healthy as a cheap Chinese tent can be). The walking was really good, very reminiscent of New Zealand with beech forest, open tops and scree bound higher slopes. My second trip, I didn´t come across another soul for three days, having just the occasional beaver, condor and guanaco for company. It´s really the first time I´ve properly been tramping solo. Still sort of undecided but think I enjoyed it, definitely very different to being with others. Didn´t reach the point of having conversations with myself but think I might have after a few more days.
Tierra del Fuego has a huge problem with North Amnerican beavers. They were released to start a fur industry but have since got completely out of control (sound familiar?). It´s incredible what they have done to the valleys. Able to chew through trees up 50cm or more in diameter, some of the dams I came across where over a hundred meters long and a couple of meters high. Big areas of forest along the rivers have been drowned leaving stands of bleached dead trunks up and down the valleys. Makes it a nightmare trying to walk anywhere near them. You can either choose to negociate the tree graveyards and clamber through the three dimensional maze of fallen logs or opt for the boggy swamps that occasionally suck you down to waist deep water and mud. Either way it´s painfully slow going.
So after my warm-up in Tierra del Fuego I was off north, bound for the international walking hotspot of Torres del Paine, Chile. Bused across the Chilian border (getting my honey and sultanas confiscated in the process), then a ferry across the Straights of Magellan to the historic city of Punta Arenas. Couple of days there to check out some museums, buy supplies and continue my Patagonian acclimatization with the help of an unrelenting frigid wind blowing off the Straights. Up to the little gateway town of Puerta Natales for a night and then into Parque Nacional Torres Del Paine.
An enormous volcanic block disconnected from the Andes proper, the mountains of the Paine Massif have been scupted by glaciers into the shapes that have made them some of the recognizable peaks anywhere in the world. The park gets something like 200,000 visitors a year but also its fair share of nasty weather rolling off the vast neightbouring southern patagonia icecap Hence many of those visitors leave having barely seen the mountains through the rain and cloud.
I had ridiculously good luck for my week there, with the sun shining most of the time and the fiercesome winds staying away. With my gear and food for ten days I was soon cursing my pack on the way up the track to see one of the star attractions ´Los Torres´ (The Towers). A couple of hours up a well trodden path and I sweated my way into the campsite and pitched my tent. Wearing shorts, I became something of a curiousity for other walkers. Every second person asked me some variation on the question `you know this is Patagonia?´, while those who didn´t just looked at me strangely. Shorts are definitely not classed as appropriate hiking attire here (and I guess anywhere outside NZ considering the number of nationalities represented among the tourists I came across.
First afternoon I scrambled up to see the Torres. Initially shrouded in cloud that eventually lifted and then even let in the odd patch of sunlight and blue sky, I got carried away with the camera and now am the proud owner of roughly a million shots of the stunning vertical sided peaks. Not yet satisfied, I, along with twenty or so other hardy souls were up there again at dawn the next morning as the first rays of sun lit the exposed rock slopes with a brilliant golden orange glow. Freezing, even with long pants on this time, but definitely worth it.
Back down the hill after breakfast to start walking the Paine circuit, a loop around the main bulk of the mountains. Took me six days to get around, which was a bit quicker than usual but I was keen to see as much as I could an not sure how long the weather would hold. Most impressive spot was probably being up on Paso John Gardner, the highest point along the track and infamous for being exposed to almost unceasing gales. The morning I was there, there was hardly a breath of wind. From up top you looked down to the Grey Glacier, an enormous river of ice flowing down from the Patagonian icecap and deposited huge chunks of ice into the lake at its tip. The other highlight had to be the Frances Valley underneath the ´Horns of Paine´. Stunning shaped, they look almost unreal with caps of dark rock overlying their main glacier carved bulk.
Did the trip alone but pretty quickly got to know others walking the same route. Really nice to have people to talk to especially in the evening after setting up camp but decided that I did really enjoy walking on my own much of time. Antisocial maybe, but good to be able to move at your own pace and do exactly what you want, when you want. On the final day I was planning on catching a mid afternoon bus back to civilization. Getting away a bit before ten I thought I had given myself plenty of time only to discover that one section I thought was 2kms was actually two hours. Ended up running the last half hour and now with a lighter pack made it just in time, though my feet were in a sorry state by the time I got back to Puerta Natales.
After roughing it I was keen for a few days in civilization so crossed pack into Argentina and up to El Calefate. A unattractive little tourist town, El Calefate exists for the sole reason that it´s close to the Perito Moreno Glacier. The glacier attracts swarms of tourist such as myself who come to gawk a its 5km face that extends into Lago Argentino and, with surprisingly regularlity, breaks into enormous chunks. These then collapse into the lake with impressive chashes and splashes and are met by excited applause and shouts from onlookers. Despite having seen my share of glaciers I couldn´t really not visit so dutifully bought my bus ticket and paid the entrance fee. Actually was very impressive and waiting for bits to fall off became strangely addictive. Sure was busy though.
After that dose of humanity I was ready for more mountains and convienietly just up the road was El Chalten, the self-proclaimed trekking capital of Argenitina. Had four days walking there and this time the weather was not so kind. On all but on of those four days the wind howled, the mountains were cloaked in cloud, and the occasional snow flurry made life difficult though my tent held together better than I´d dared hope. I´ve never experienced wind like that before. It blew and blew to the point where walking in the open was almost impossible. The one fine day however made it all worthwhile. Got a fantasitic look at Chalten´s main drawcard, the dramatic Mount Fitzroy, and now got a million photos of it to go with the million from Torres Del Paine. When the weather closed in again I withdrew to the tent for an whole day before admitting defeat the next morning and dashing back to town.
From there I jumped on bus that brought me to El Bolson. After seven months in South America I´ve spent hundreds of hours on buses, but that one was one of the tougher journeys. From El Chalten it was 26 hours up Route 40, almost entirely on gravel. Route 40 cuts its way north through inland Patagonia and in many places is little more than a dirt track. For pretty much the entire way the landscape consisted entirely of barren rocks interrupted only by the occasional clump of grass or low bush. Got here to El Bolson at midnight, very relieved to get off the bus and into a real bed.
Planning on doing some more walking around here once I´m feeling brave enough to venture more than thirty seconds away from my hostel bathroom. Then it´s probably out to Peninsula Valdez on the coast which is supposed to be crawling with wildlife (it´s where the orcas surf up onto the beaches to catch sea lions, got to see that, though no doubt you have to sit there for weeks to have a chance). Then up to Buenos Aires for my flight home.
See you in a couple of weeks New Zealand!
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