Lago del Desierto

Lago del Desierto

Today we ventured outside of El Chalten, driving about 22 miles along a gravel road until it ended at Lago del Desierto (Lago = Lake).  The road was actually the continuation of the main road into the town, but the pavement ends at the parking area for the Fitzroy trail.  The road generally follows the Rio de las Vueltas until we reached the lake.  We started out with Fitzroy in front of us, but with all the twists and turns, we ended up past Fitzroy until we were looking at the back of it.  It was cool to see it from so many different angles.

Lago Huemul in front of Glacier Huemul

Once we reached the lake, we decided to hike the Glacier Huemul trail,  It's  relatively short (less than 2 miles) and generally uphill from the trailhead,   The trail ends at Lago Huemul, a small lake in front of the glacier that feeds a large stream.  The stream runs the length of the trail with several beautiful cascades back into the Rio de las Vueltas.  Just like many of the lakes and streams in Patagonia, this one was a striking shade of blue.

1/2 marghereta 1/2 pepperoni

We drove back to town and ate at the local pizzeria recommended by our host. Argentina has excellent pizza, having been influenced by an influx of Italian immigrants in the 19th and early 20th centuries.  We discovered this in Buenos Aires during our Antarctica trip.  The restaurant is a small shop that serves a set number of pizzas each evening, and then they close.  We tried going last night, but they were too crowded with a line out the door.  Today we arrived a few minutes before they opened which worked out great.  A delicious end to another great day.

Patagonian Wildlife

We love seeing wildlife, especially ones we don't have at home.  Here are some of the animals we've been able to capture with photos:

Rhea

Carpentiera Negra

Guanaco

Upland Geese

Crested Caracara

Hiking Capital of Argentina

El Chalten has earned the moniker "Hiking Capital of Argentina" and it's easy to see why. The mountains here are gorgeous, and there are a number of trails of varying difficulties.  We see a constant stream of hikers with their packs and trekking poles walking through town and at the restaurants after having finished a hike.  I think this may be the most hikers I've seen concentrated in a single place.

Rio de las Vueltas

Our original plan was to hike to Laguna de los Tres (The Three Lakes) and see the base of Fitzroy.  It's a long hike with a very steep finish, much like the hike we did to the Towers in Torres del Paine.  However, given the phenomenal views of Fitzroy that we've already encountered, we decided to give our legs a break and do a shorter hike to Laguna Capri that still gave us fantastic views.  This was a beautiful hike through wooded areas with great views of the aptly named valley Rio de las Vueltas (River of Turns).

Laguna Capri did not disappoint.  We still had our clear blue skies that provided a beautiful backdrop to Fitzroy. We later learned from our AirBnB host that the gorgeous weather we're having is a bit of an anomaly.  We're very thankful for that and hope it continues the rest of our stay.

Now it's Argentina's turn

We've had a termendous three days in Torres del Paine, but it's time to visit the Argentinian portion of Patagonia.  Our hotel stay in Cerro Castillo, Chile was excellent, but the bonus to staying there was that we were practically next door to the border crossing. 

Crossing the border required parking at the Chilean border station and going inside to get passports stamped.  We also had paperwork that had to be stamped as well -- a cross-border permit -- that allowed us to take our rental car from Chile into Argentina. Once we completed that, we drove about 5 miles to the Argentinan station, actually crossing the border about halfway there.  It was the same process.  All told, we completed both stations in under 45 minutes which was great.

Guanaco

The road to the border in Chile was practically brand new with concrete lanes and a nice wide shoulder.  Once we crossed the border, it was a different story. Argentina's road to the border station was gravel and let's say not quite as smooth.  Given the remote nature of this region in both countries, it is very common to have gravel roads. We drove on many in Chile, and Argentina has a lot of catching up to do in terms of how well they are maintained.

Crested Caracara

Once we left the border station, we drove Ruta 40 (Route 40) which is the historic road that travels the length of Argentinian Patagonia at over 3,100 miles. Even better, it's paved 😀. There was a "shortcut" along the way that took us on a gravel road that cut the corner and shaved an hour off the trip according to Google maps.  Let's just say we would have been better driving the extra hour to remain on pavement.  Did I mention that Chile's gravel roads are much better maintained?  Argentina really needs to get some pointers.  The one silver lining was beautiful scenery, and we saw a Gaucho and his dogs as well as guanacos and Patagonian birds.

The best part of the drive was the arrival in El Chalten.  We were greeted with stunning views of snow-capped peaks and the famous outline of Mount Fitzroy.  The logo for clothing company Patagonia is based on Fitzroy.  While we had some clouds during our arrival, it was still an awesome site to see.  I went out early today and captured this photo with clear blue skies.  Awesome indeed.

Wait....wasn't this last year's trip?

Last year at Christmas we had the good fortune to take our ultimate bucket list trip to Antarctica.  That trip was phenonemal, and on Christmas Day we went kayaking inside a calderra surrounded by Antarctic beauty.  I guess we didn't get our fix of ice and glaciers because this year's Christmas Day adventure was taking a three-hour catamaran cruise across Grey Lake to see Grey Glacier up close and personal.

Grey Glacier is part of the Southern Patagonian Ice Field, which is the second-largest ice field after Antarctica.  About 85% of this ice is in Chile and the remainder in Argentina. Unfortunately, like most of the other glaciers we have had the good fortune to see around the world, it has retreated significantly due to global warming.

After two long days of hiking, we knew we needed a break so no hiking today.  We did have a full day of adventure and gorgeous scenery driving from the east side of the park to the west side and back again.  Some of our Christmas Day adventures:

• Coming across a Chilean gaucho and three of his herding dogs trying to corral a lone sheep that had gotten outside the fence.  They were next to the road, and we had to stop the car to avoid hitting them.  The dogs then used our car to trap the sheep at the back as we heard a soft thud from the trunk. The sheep just laid down cowering as we drove away, and the gaucho scooped it up and put it on the other side of the fence.

• Giving a hiker from Switzerland a ride back to his car.  He did the "W" circuit with some friends and he drew the short straw to go back and get their car. He figured he would have lots of opportunity to hitch a ride, but soon realized there really weren't many people driving through the park.  We saved him at least 10 miles.

• Having a scavenger hunt photographing all of the unique "Deer Crossing" signs, except they weren't for deer.  They were for guanacos, armadillos, and my personal favorite -- the ostrich.  That's right,
  
  we saw signs along the road warning us to look out for giant running birds.  The South American ostrich is called a Rhea. We also saw a sign for pumas.  Mona's take -- since they're telling us to watch out for pumas, we should at least be able to see one.  We did not.  There was also a sign featuring a wind sock, which I guess is a universal sign for high winds and not that one might cross the road in front of you.

• Taking an unplanned detour to catch a waterfall with the Towers in the background.  Made us late for our lunch reservation, but totally worth it.

• Winning Mona a free cocktail on the boat for correctly answering a trivia question on the journey back from the glacier.  How deep is Grey Lake??  480 meters.

Probably the best stop of today's driving adventure was capturing this photo.  Awesome.

Torres del Paine National Park

Merry Christmas from Torres del Paine National Park!  This National Park is arguably the most well-known in Chile and is a very popular hiking destination.  We've been here two days now and have hiked over 25 miles.

Torres is the spanish word for Towers, and our first day we hiked to the Towers for which the park gets its name.  The last kilometer is very steep, and is referred to as a rock scramble in hiking parlance.  

We made it to the base of the Towers

As the name implies, it's very rocky -- but it also has its fair share of boulders and large rocks to climb over.  It's not uncommon to see people sit and slide down one of them on the way down due to the steepness.  One of us may have done this as well 😀.  Not including stops, this was about a 10.5 hour hike for us.

The trail to the Towers is part of a larger multi-day hike called the "W" circuit because it is in the shape of a W.  Most people who come here come with the intention of doing this circuit in about 5 days and camping along the way.  We didn't have enough time to do the entire circuit, plus we're not campers. You have to hike with all of the extra gear, and we'd rather spend the day hiking and then go back to a comfy bed and shower.  There's an even longer 10-day hike doing what's referred to as the "O" circuit because you're circling the entire section with the Towers.

Lake Pehoe -- yes it's really that blue!

Yesterday was our second day here, and we drove to a different section of the W circuit to hike in an area called the French Valley.  We had to catch a 30-minute catamaran across Lake Pehoe to an area called Paine Grande. Unfortunately, they overbooked the first ferry.  Even though we had already bought our tickets ahead of time, they wouldn't let about a dozen of us board.  We had to wait two hours for the next one.  Because we lost two hours, we didn't get as far into the French Valley as we were hoping. It was still nice hiking with beautiful views.  We've had several people tell us the French Valley is their favorite section.

We've had great weather so far, with lots of sunshine and no rain.  Hope that continues today.  It is very windy here which we knew ahead of time. While not a constant strong wind, when it gets going, it's hard to keep a hat on unless it's a stocking cap.

The landscape and the views are glorious.  Seeing places like this reaffirm my love of the mountains.

Our Christmas Patagonian Adventure

Because of Mona's work, we have to travel during school holidays.  With her being off for two full weeks this year, we've hit the road again....this time to Patagonia for a 10-day hiking and outdoor adventures in the southern Andean mountain range.  The Patagonia region spans both Chile and Argentina and we're visiting both on this trip.

We actually had this trip planned for Spring Break 2020, but then COVID happened and all travel ceased for the year.  It may have been a blessing in disguise as we're able to spend more time here than we would with just a week.  It took over 24 hours of planes, trains (at the airport 😆), and automobiles, to travel over 6,200 miles from Dulles Airport to our hotel in Cerro Castillo, Chile on the outskirts of Torres Del Paine National Park.  This included over 15 hours of actual flight time and 3.5 hours driving fron our arrival airport in Punta Arenas.

Given our limited amount of sleep, we are in bed early.  We had a delicious dinner at our hotel, and now with our full bellies, we hope to reset our internal clocks and adjust to the new time zone. We begin our hiking adventures bright and early tomorrow.  First up, the namesake Torres de Paine trail to see the Towers for which the park is named.