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So i got in just after midnight and took a taxi to I Keu Ken hostel where i was the last person to check in for the day and the receptionist was waiting for me. I signed up for the trip to Perito Moreno to see the glacier the next day and got my head down ready for the 8am departure. The bus journey to the Glacial National Park was about an hour. The first sight of the glacier was quite something as this white wall appeared in the distance, at the first decent viewpoint the coach pulled over so we could take a photo and then we all loaded back on ready to get up close and personal with a massive glacier.
As we got off the bus and entered the cafe at the beginning i met Evan (USA), Sam (USA) and Michael (Germany) so the 4 of us entered the park together. There is a total of 4km of walkways to walk down and take in the different angles of the glacier and it is a really good set up. Most people turned right straight away where the widest view of the glacier is but we turned left which takes you right down in front of the glacier and had it almost to ourselves. The glacier itself is 5km deep, 1km wide and 60m from top to bottom and the ice takes some 400 years to get from the back to the front where we can see it.
The glacier was full of different shades of blue and white, and it didn't take long for us to see and hear the first chunk of ice fall off. The glacier itself is growing by up to 2 metres per day, making it one of the only glaciers in the world that is actually growing. Despite it growing massive chucks of ice fall off as the glacier creaks and cracks. The noise is awesome and it sounds like everything in the valley stops whilst this thunderous noise cracks. Some pieces of ice that fell off were only small (maybe the size of a car!!) but every now and then a full fat 60m high chunk would collapse and cause a tidal wave in the lake and create the most deafening noise - it is not something ill forget in a hurry. The scale of everything there was just incomprehensible and i can`t do it justice in words.
After we had walked down all 4km of boardwalk and filled our memory cards with photos we got back in the bus and headed back to town. Once returned we got some lunch in town before returning to our corresponding hostels. I freshened up and then headed back into town at 8pm as arranged to meet them. We were going to watch the Boca Juniors v River Plate (Buenos Aires football derby) in a pub that evening, but i found out kickoff was 10pm so arranged yet another rendez vous and headed back to my hostel for yet another asado! Once full i went back into town and had a beer with the boys infront of a rather bad game of football. It ended 0 - 0 and went to penalties which Boca Juniors rather unjustly won. Next morning I had another early start and caught the 8am bus to El Sheltan.
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