Month: November 2023

We’re now twelve weeks in to our trip and leaving Argentina is our fourth flag behind us. We only had 2.5 weeks in this huge beast of a country, and it’s definitely not felt like long enough. Nevertheless, we have places to be and people to see, and so we say a definite “see you soon” to Argentina, as we are sure to come back.

Highlights (Alex) – Walking on the Perito Moreno glacier, cycling the Circuito Chico in Bariloche, getting to hang out with Daniel like no time has passed at all (the spa day coming in a close 4th)

Highlights (James) – Patagonia Brewery and the most perfect view, amazing steak at El Boliche de Alberto, the Fitz Roy hike

Lowlights (Alex) – Sube card stresses on multiple days in multiple locations, missing out on our day with Daniel and his family in La Plata, taking the bike for a walk

Lowlights (James) – money complexities, not making it to La Plata, carrying the bike up stairs and hills

Takeaways (Alex) – Developing a new technique for managing myself better when the trip doesn’t go to plan. Argentina has been the most European of the countries we’ve been to so far, and whilst that provides some comfort and less cultural dissonance, having to remind ourselves we’re not actually in Europe, it does feel like we’re missing that extra cultural element we’ve loved experiencing in other countries. Knowing you can get something at over half price will mean you’ll move heaven and earth to not pay full price, no matter what that full price actually is.

Takeaways (James) – What they say about the wine and steak here is completely true. It’s nice (and maybe even necessary) to do things that aren’t on blogs or about touristing, such as an escape room, spa or cinema. It’s possible to have too much of a good thing, I don’t think I could live off the amount of wine, meat and cheese as Argentinians.

How to Describe Argentina (Alex) – gorgeous, generous (the people and nature), a killer for healthy living

How to Describe Argentina (James) – Messi-mad, the beauty of Patagonia without the Chilean prices (for now), take dollars at all costs or be prepared for wasting time getting cash

Entertainment

TV & Film: Good Luck to you Leo Grande, The Deepest Breath, Race to the Summit, Final Space, Nausicaa and the Valley of the wind

Books: Motorcycle Diaries

Podcasts: A Short History Of…, Off-Menu, Today Explained

The Bits In Between

• Our accommodation in El Chalten was like a squat house, with the rooms partitioned out with chipboard, and no-one but other guests around, adding to the feeling. Which was fine, just an odd setup and reminiscent of the abandoned pubs in London occupied by “Guardians”
• 26 hours on a bus actually wasn’t that bad
• The driver managed to get a fat steak with fried egg on top in the petrol station! Definitely should have just bought food on the way
• A tiny pro-biotic yoghurt cost £2 in El Chalten, nowhere near that price anywhere else. Weird.
• As in Peru, selling alcohol is restricted for 24 hours before an election. Someone once told me in Peru that this made the day before the day before an election the day that stores sell the most alcohol as everyone just has house parties instead, more so than new years because no-one can go out. I would love to know how true this is. If so, it shows that restricting the sale of something doesn’t stop people doing it!
• From the chocolate museum: Churros with chocolate is a really old Spanish tradition,
• Unlike the Incans, the Mayans wrote stuff down with hieroglyphs, and there’s even something akin to the Bayeaux Tapestry,
• It was the English (Fry & Sons in Bristol) who found a way to make chocolate bars, instead of just drinking the chocolate,
• It was the Dutch (Conrad Van Houten) who found a way to make it into a powder,
• It was Richard Cadbury who presented the first chocolate box for Valentine’s Day,
• It was a Swiss (Rudolphe Lindt) who invented the “conching machine” that improved quality,
• It was two other Swiss (Daniel Peter and Henri Nestle) that added milk powder,
• It was a North American (Milton Hershey) who developed chocolate with milk and almonds,
• Obviously many of these names will still be synonymous with chocolate today.
• Getting a massage from a masseuse who kept audibly yawning. Then, just as I started to get riled up, she said my energy had changed. Panicking she could sense my annoyance, I tried to slow my breathing and heart rate like being on some aura-lie-detector-test to cover my tracks. She kept yawning though, so either she sensed completely wrong, or she sensed right but didn’t care.
• There’s no equivalent European regulations protecting flight passengers from issues not caused by the airline. We were left completely stranded and out of pocket (as I’m sure the airline was too), but it was really quite shocking.
• If you get evacuated from an airport, go straight back to the check-in desk to be first in line for rescheduling. Even better, divide and conquer and send the other to security to see if it’s possible to get through whilst the other saves a spot in line.
• The odd nose snorting thing was still prevalent here, including by our American carpark companion. Still can’t figure it out.
• I find out it’s incredibly rude to blow your nose in public in Brazil… but not to loudly snort back your snot into your skull… maybe that’s why they do it, to stop the need to blow your nose. Random cultural differences of what’s socially acceptable and what isn’t based on I’m not sure what.
• James in Spanish is Iago. Santiago is Saint Iago. Maybe we’ll start introducing James as Iago to avoid calls for Ham-es.
• Being on the buses in Bariloche is like a workout, the driver not only flings you left and right, but they brake suddenly like an emergency stop to just slow down, leaving you clinging onto the handrails like monkey-bars.
• You need to show your passport to board a bus to Villa La Angostura, one hour away (it’s in the same country?!)
• We were far from the only lunatics on the 24 hour bus, there were still a few seats empty, but it was pretty full of gringos from across the world all trying to save a buck.
• Bife de chorizo = fillet steak. Ojo de bife = Rib eye.
• On the scale of how cooked you want your steak, the rarest is called “a la inglesa”, which literally means, “to the English”.
• The waiter with the odd sense of humour in Cero5, couldn’t tell if he was jibing us or joking with us. Meant we went to extra lengths to get money for a tip incase he turned on us for not giving enough.
• It’s tradition to spend a day of the weekend with friends/family grilling, drinking mate, drinking wine/beer, eating and grazing food with friends all day. It’s an art to cook it right. This sounds like a really nice tradition of just hanging out, not like a quick roast before everyone goes their separate ways.
• The Sube card from Bariloche works in Buenos Aires too, so we were well charged up for BA.
• You don’t have to charge your Sube here with cash only, shame Bariloche hasn’t the same setup.
• The first bus driver we had in BA was super friendly in helping us figure out where to get off.
• Bus routes in BA are by number (e.g. 33), but they have sub-routes that, technically, are denoted by a letter (e.g. 33C) on google and BA transport map services, except the signs on the actual buses seem unable to show alphabetical characters, so instead show a teeny tiny number in the corner that you can only see after you’ve flagged down the bus.
• Our taxi driver from BA airport was super friendly and chatty in welcoming us to BA
• On the one outing I make without James in BA, within one block a random man tries talking to me. I haven’t missed this attention and am grateful for the barrier James inadvertently provides just by being present. Not all women are so lucky (in many ways)
• BA is the first place on this trip that I’ve seen two men holding hands together 🏳️‍🌈🥰

Photos From the Cutting Room Floor

Next door to our hostel in El Chalten… awkward (Las Malvinas are The Falklands):

The amazing estimates of time to do incredibly short journeys for the Perito Moreno glacier paths:

The glacier (obsessed):

Our longest ever bus ride tickets:

The many photos of the El Chalten hikes, glorious flowers blooming everywhere:

Views:

This weird boulder with a gap underneath it next to this huge wall of rock that acted like a dam, but seemed impossible to have been created artificially considering the location:

More views:

This incredible bird hanging about at a rest stop and none of the Latinos batting an eyelid at it!:

Having Hector join us for dinner:

The less ‘glamorous’ side to travelling. Strapping my ankle with tape that clearly wasn’t meant to go directly onto skin as I lost chunks of it in the removal process. Helped my ankle though!:

Hiking trails map. We did Laguna de los Tres, Mirador Maistri (Laguna Torre), and two others off the map:

Beer puns for those fans of dad jokes:

Alex having to pick up 16 cards in one go and ending up with a hit of over 200 points in one loss:

Cerro Fitz Roy finally making it out of the clouds as we drive out of town:

Cool bus views on the long road north. There seemed to be a beam of light coming from the sky on the left. The rest was just uninterrupted views of endless pampas:

James sleeping through:

And making friends:

An ice-rink in a coffee shop in Bariloche, just because:

The endless views from Campanario:

The now officially named by me “sad sandwiches” we found all over Argentina. For a country with such good food, especially in the rich towns of Bariloche and Villa La Angostura, these were the main sandwich (and sometimes only sandwich) in any shop. The whitest of bread, with a single slice of the poorest ham and cheese, layered with butter for good measure. The nutritional value of these must be in the negative:

The Villa La Angostura route map, we went to the pointy end of the green bit. Notice no gradient indicators:

URGH:

Entering Jurassic Park:

One of the vibrant orange Arrayanes trees:

Paid a bit more attention to this on the way back. Probably should have checked this before we hired the bikes:

Views from the park:

The snowy lumps on the right looking a bit like those in Toro Toro, but surrounded by a very different scenery:

Learning about chocolate and finding out about the bayeux tapestry of the Mayans:

A bit of data viz for you. Consumption of chocolate around the world, not adjusted for population size!:

The Havana factory part of the museum:

A cherry tree on the bike ride, one for mum!:

Hello again dear Patagonia view:

Don’t Cry For Me Argentina:

Despite our check-in desks having a queue snake cordoned off, we were forced to create our own one outside it going all around the airport, for… reasons:

Nothing like a night at the airport, getting mysteriously eaten by mosquitos more here than in the jungle:

I write most of this section sitting on a beach, listening to the waves of the lake lapping ashore, the sun bearing down on us, the cloudless blue sky above, the wind keeping us cool, and the snow capped peaks enclosing the horizon, waiting for the bus to take us to the airport. What a change to the Bariloche (and us) from just under a week ago!

Spa Day

After spending the last few weeks almost constantly hiking about (save the 26 hours sitting on bus), James had the brilliant idea to go to a spa and recuperate our weary muscles. He’d found a place with a deal for two, at the Huinid Hotel & Spa, and today was that much needed day. We got to the spa eager and early, ensuring we were the only people there. The weather has completely shifted and there’s not a cloud in the sky. The snowy peaks now visible for the first time.

We enjoy a lovely hot soak in the jacuzzi surrounded by cheese plants, a swim in the pool, a relaxing read (me) and gym session (James) looking out onto the fantastic views of the lake and mountains, sweat some of the stress of the last few days away in the sauna, and have our muscles massaged to relaxation in the spa. We saunter around in robes and enjoy a brief stint of luxury and relaxation, no planning, no booking, no researching, just enjoying the moments of calm.

For me, it seems, there’s nothing like a sauna to release mental tension. It’s either this or the stunning cloudless blue sky and beaming sunshine that have helped reset mentally as much as physically. I also take some time to develop a mantra to help me get out of funks when travelling throws its curve balls. Desperate to eke out every last minute of this idyllic location, we decide to stay for a bite of lunch.

The hotel has a huge complex of rooms but also cabins through manicured grounds, each patio with its own grill (only in Argentina!), and pointy beaked birds potter around.

In one corner is a huge mansion with a two-storey grand stone entrance, looking out over the lake and mountains that we figure is the family house of the original owners, no doubt living off the land now making a tidy income. What a life!

We’re going our separate ways briefly today, as James wants to finally go and get a haircut, and I decide to check out the chocolate museum.

The chocolate museum is now run by Havana, a renowned, old confectionary company that started out life making alfajores. The little museum gives me a history of chocolate, along with a lovely small cup of hot chocolate that is 40% chocolate and 100% tasty. I learn that it’s once again thanks to monks that we have chocolate, as they were the ones who invented putting the cacao with hot water and sugar to make hot chocolate, and it’s down to this it spread in Europe, and had many more iterations and inventions to become what it is today.

With the weather delivering the scenery I was expecting, I take the long walk home to soak in the vitamin C, and stunning views. I am now able to appreciate the beauty of town that seemed so cold and desolate before. The streets are alive with people enjoying beers on picnic benches, and tourists milling about deciding how many chocolates is too many. Everyone is out sunbathing, playing on the beach, relaxing on the grass, and soaking up the views. The buildings that, when damp with rain, looked like plastic imitations of a Swiss town, now actually look the age they are.

We spend the evening enjoying the night in with a lovely roast dinner James does a fantastic job making in our typically limited Airbnb kitchen.

Cycle Day

With the weather back on side, we’ve planned to make the most of it by getting back on the bikes. There’s something called the Circuito Chico (small circuit) here, and due to it being 27km long, we can’t really hike this one in a day! Hiring bikes is the way to go, and we’re not the only ones, as the bike rental place is setup like a well-oiled machine. We get given a briefing in English, pick out our helmets and high-vis vests, do a little loop around the test track before signing our lives and the bike’s suitability away. And we’re off!

The ride is a glorious journey through woodland, along a proper road, wide, flat, properly paved with hardly any cars, the sky a deep blue above, and the snow-capped peaks showing themselves every so often.

It’s the definition of undulating, with declines so fast releasing the breaks for even a fraction of a second means reaching almost maximum speed in the next second. The uphills are bad, but thankfully manageable, and taper off just before the point of giving up each time. There are a few viewpoints along the way, but the star of the show is a stop at the Patagonia Brewery, where James confirms it as “the most beautiful view in the world”. The beers are pretty good too!

We debate whether or not we just spend all day there and call in a rescue from the bike rental, but as this stop is only half an hour in, we figure we should really continue on. We drag ourselves from perfection and continue the route. It includes another stop for a picnic lunch in a bay, and a little side-explore to Villa Tacul, another beautiful bay, although we realise too late that it wasn’t worth the long return uphill (where I finally gave up and gave the bike a walk).

The ride reinvigorates us and our appreciation for the beauty that Bariloche holds (and held back from us for the first few days). It’s also been nice to do something other than hiking. We spend the route enjoying the scenes, marveling at the gorgeous array of cabins, deciding which style we would live in. Just as I think the day can’t get any more perfect, little white tufts start to drift down from the sky, as some pollen mimics snowfall, to finish off the journey with a stunning flourish.

Returning to the bike shop with wide smiles, we decide to not end the day just yet, and get off the return bus early to stop at another brewery, Blest KM4. I don’t think anywhere can compare to the views of Patagonia Brewery, but they do have a huge array of beers that we’re eager to try, and all for less than £2 or £3 each. We try Cherry, Honey, NEIPA and a red IPA, as we debate which is more physically challenging, running or cycling. It’s been a fantastic day, that we round off with a bottle of wine and leftovers for dinner.

Argentinians Love Cheese

Our last day in Bariloche means checking out a place called La Fonda del Tio, which we’ve seen queues of people outside each day, and have eyed it up as the perfect place for our last meal here. Their speciality is Milanesa topped with ham and a vat of melted cheese with tomato sauce, Milenesa Napolitana is the name. Due to an early check out, we’re the first in the queue, and get a table looking out the never-tiring gorgeous lake view. James also gets a roquefort empanada to start.

As someone who doesn’t like blue cheese, even I enjoyed the empanada. And then it’s not long before our mammoth milanesa’s arrive.

Now we’re not often beaten by food, but two of these finally did it. It’s good, that’s not the reason why, it’s just so… much… cheese. We power through and whilst James does us proud, I flag at the end. We don’t know if we’ll be hungry ever again… Except, of course, I have a separate dessert stomach, and I am craving a proper farewell Bariloche treat. Which comes in the shape and size of a mountain, of icecream this time, instead of cheese or potato. There’s some fruit in there too, I promise!

More than satiated (and feeling rather unwell), it’s time to head to the airport and say farewell to this town that gave us a real ride, psychologically and physically!

Testing the Mantra

As everyone is queueing to board our plane, we’re due to take off in 10 minutes, I’m dreaming of the empanadas, parilla and general good-time we’re planned to have with my old friend Daniel and his family tomorrow in La Plata, there’s an announcement over the tannoy. “Something in Spanish… something in Spanish… [please remain calm]...” and everyone starts walking towards the exit, calmly. At first I think they’ve just changed our gate, but realise that we wouldn’t need to keep calm for that. Deducing that we’re actually being evacuated (which they never announce in English) we follow the horde towards the exit. We are shepherded down the car-park ramp into the car-park which is thankfully bathed in sun.

We’ve definitely been in worse carparks, and the view here is somehow still beautiful. There’s murmurs of bomb threats, but really nothing is communicated to anyone. There’s no-one around to ask either. Some planes take off so we figure it can’t be a bomb or anything serious, probably just some fire alarm tripped. We’re just a mass of people in a car-park sitting in the sun, but still in the dark.

More and more people file out of the airport, more than we thought would be in there, and we later find out they were people who were on 4 planes that took off and had to return as the threat was also to the planes they were on. There’s children and some incredibly frail people sitting in wheelchairs, looking seriously on the edge of life, as their family try and layer them up to shelter them from the now, very cold, wind. After an hour and a half of making conversation with James The Third, a Californian who is enjoying his gin (maybe too much), but has 3 more flight connections to get after arriving to BA, we are given a false start back to the terminal. The novelty has definitely worn off by the time we’re told we actually can’t go back in and to head back to our car-park.

Some more time passes, and eventually we are let back in the building, but not after having to all funnel through the single stairwell back to departures. We make the wrong call thinking we can just go back through security, as eventually we get to the front and are told our flight is not allowed through. We realise after too many others that we need to go back to the check-in desks, and join the end of an already long queue. There’s one lady fielding individual questions, but no-one to just announce the situation. We hear murmours that the delay to the flight has meant they can’t use the same crew, so they’re figuring out if they have to cancel it or not. Wait in line.

We wait, and eventually the news makes it to us that the flight has indeed been cancelled. American James makes his way further up the queue by joining some other “friends” he made. The gentleman behind us tells a story of this happening in Ushuaia and they wouldn’t put on a new plane, so it took 3 days to get on a flight out as they just filled the empty seats of what was already booked. Oh good. Two older ladies get allowed to the front of the queue, to jeers and shouts from equally older people behind us in the queue. Everyone has been pretty civilised until this point, but there’s only so long you can keep people in the dark before something tips them over the edge. Thankfully the jeers die down, as more a release of frustration at the whole situation, but no-one else attempts the same trick.

We eventually see American James the third, along with some others, rushing through to departures to get on a plane out tonight, there is hope! Unfortunately for us, the queue suddenly stops moving so quickly, and so do the passengers, as they stand at the desks clearly factoring in options. This is confirmed by the time we make it to the front, that all the planes are full until tomorrow evening. It’s time for me to practice my new mantra of accepting the knocks and changes of plan. Our only option is to fly tomorrow on the 19:20, and because it’s not the airline’s fault, they have no responsibility to help us with anything. No accommodation, no food or drink vouchers, not even a way to get back to town.

Having run the Sube card empty getting here, of course, there’s nowhere to charge the Sube in the airport. It is still beyond me how somewhere can enforce a digital card system but have no way to load them up at the bus or plane terminals that tourists will arrive from. Remember our Ubers are also blocking us from using them. Cabify refuses to let me create an account. We don’t have enough cash for a taxi who don’t accept cards. Up to this point, I’ve managed to keep my spirits up, but I’ll be honest that at this point, realising I’m not going to spend the day with Daniel and his family in La Plata, and wondering how on earth we’re going to get out of this airport, I start to break. But that’s not the airline’s problem, our man behind the desk still has people to disappoint.

We glumly go and get our backpacks from the carousel, and I ask a guy under a collectivo sign if we can pay by card. He says something incredibly quickly and all I catch is that there isn’t another one for over an hour, or we can wait an hour and a half for a bus, or something. Sensing some kind of scam, we head outside to see the carpark lit up like a Christmas Market. Sadly, these are the flashing lights of all the emergency vehicles that eventually showed up, and have now blocked the entrance and exit to the airport. No-one is coming in or out of the airport, except by foot.

Now I asked a couple of different people, and I asked them to speak slowly, and they explained to me the situation, and whilst I understood the words, I did not understand the logic behind trapping an airport full (that is closing by the way) of abandoned people in a location being searched for bombs. But there we were. Apparently, what the guy was explaining, was that the collectivos are the only thing being let in, for who knows what reason, but because of the nature of collectivo there’s no way to know when the next one will be back. We’re stumped. We sit. We commiserate with Daniel over whatsapp. And we find online somewhere cheap to spend the night.

The information lady I spoke to earlier comes over to me and quickly says if we want to get on a bus, we need to go. NOW. We follow the crowd that’s now lugging all their gear, on foot, over the unpaved road, out of the airport. We enjoy the ease of our backpacks over suitcases for the first time as we get onto the bus and just hope our card has one paid journey left on it, and an emergency one. Seemingly we only have enough pesos for one person. We look at each other in panic, and speak in English, and feign to not understand that there’s no credit on the card, and just walk on the bus. The driver doesn’t stop us. As we wedge ourselves into some seats with out gear, the hordes arrive. It seems not having cash on your Sube is not a unique situation to be in. But for some reason, we seem to be the only ones to get away with it, as the driver asks others to pay for the journeys of these unfortunate souls. This is common practice it seems, and at 15p (or 45p at official rate) not too much an ask, but for a now bus full of people I think the generous lady is regretting her offer. Again, it’s beyond me how a bus driver can insist a bunch of abandoned people, who have literally no other way of getting anywhere, and no way to top up these cards, should refuse the journey, but here we are. The hordes cram on the bus more and more as this is the only bus back now. A group of older guys are squashed around us, and we find out they were also due to be on our flight, they were behind us in the queue. They’re incredibly jovial still and laugh and joke with the others, and then help us to extricate ourselves at our stop.

We go to our hostel and look blankly at each other as the hostel charges us just £14 instead of £40, but say nothing. We realise that booking.com shows the USD rate at the blue dollar rate, and so instead of paying $49 USD, we pay the actual Argentinian price. This is all the more reassuring when we get to the room and it very much resembles a £14 a night room!

As the dust settles, it’s time to take stock of the situation and practice the new mantra. We’re exhausted, it’s late, we defer figuring out next moves until the morning, and crawl into our creaky, saggy, camp beds, as I note my new approach seems to be doing the trick.

Second Chance Sunday

As per, I’ve slept poorly, and am up early. Attempts to find somewhere to stay in BA tonight are proving complicated, as there’s no way to know if the hostel will charge the blue dollar rate or the official rate. A mediocre hotel can go from being aptly priced to being hugely overpriced, and we thankfully find this out before booking a £90 a night hovel. Airbnb it is! We decide to spend our extra day in Bariloche in the place we enjoyed the most… the Patagonia Brewery! We debate visiting the seemingly renowned Colonia Suiza, but I practice a new approach of not over-complicating a situation when trying to make up for something we’ve missed out on. Today we will just drink beer and enjoy views and eat, and that’s fine.

As is the way now, easier said than done though. To get there, we need to use rhe Sube card. That one we already maxed out yesterday. I try and create an account to top it up online, but you need an Argentine national ID (foreigners can get their support team to work around this, but they only work Monday to Friday).

So, James goes out to try and top it up in person at a kiosco with the few pesos we have left. No dice. It’s Sunday, and so everywhere is shut. We are fast running out of time to get the one bus that runs every two hours, and also check-out. Time is ticking.

I manage to get my Argentinian friend Daniel to create an account with his Argentina details for our Sube card. But I can’t load any cash on because you need to use a separate app to load money on, and none are available to non-Argentinians. Daniel saves the day again as he loads some cash on there… except he can’t verify the topup to apply it to the card in my hand. Something he doesn’t understand either. Time ticks away. We need to check-out.

Daniel calls a friend to figure out how to get the money he’s paid to be recognised by the card in my hand. We check out and decide to try and make it into town where we hope to be more likely to find a kiosco open and hopefully beat the bus there. As we leave we realise the kiosco out front has now opened up. But it doesn’t do top-ups, she points us to the one 2 blocks down. Time ticks away.

As we hop back across the road, Daniel has figured out I need to tap my card to my phone when logged into his account to ‘verify’ the money he’s put on it. I get this message just as James has handed over the card and cash to the kiosco. We now have more than enough money on the damn card. Time slows back down. The bus arrives. The card works. We make it to the Brewery. We revel in the joy of two sheepdogs. And enjoy the absolute peace and tranquility once more of the Patagonia Brewery.

Beers acquired (2 for 1 too!). Views taken in. More beers drunk. Burgers and steaks consumed. (Further stressing over the accommodation problem in BA). Debates over whether there’s any way this view could be any better, and coming up blank. We run off to get the bus back and try this leaving Bariloche lark again. But not before a stop to do one last thing Bariloche is known for… enjoy some ice cream from one of the renowned chocolate shops, Rapa Nui.

The rest of the journey goes as smoothly as it should have all the other times, and I am finally finishing this post on the plane, in the air, now taking in the last glimpses of the gorgeous snowy peaks we won’t be seeing again on this trip.

Bariloche has given us physical and emotional ups and downs, but that’s backpacking! My brother helps me realise that part of my frustration is about these wastes of time feeling like we’re wasting this amazing opportunity we have if we aren’t making the most of every moment. James reminds us that we’re backpacking, we’re not on holiday, the weather can’t always be good, and we can’t do everything. It’s given me the opportunity to really reflect and take stock of how to manage myself better, and really practice doing so! As the saying goes, it’s the failures you learn the most from, and I’ve learnt a lot that I hope will put me in better stead for whatever challenges face us next, because there will be more.

Despite the difficulties this week brought our way, we’ve had the most amazing experiences too, eaten the best steak, drunk the best wine, found probably our most favourite place yet, and for the first time on this trip, found somewhere we would actually want to come to again… but probably with a wedge of USD and pesos in cash!

*************

Adventure: trying to bake brownies in a gas oven with no temperature markings, great success! Almost getting out of an escape room we decided to do at the last minute. Food challenges. Changing Chilean pesos from some dodgy gang of street urchins and their dad. Getting my first haircut of the trip by an adolescent that didn’t speak a word of English and kept asking me questions, then worrying they’d charged me £40 for the experience… it was actually £4! (James)

Excitement: eating the juiciest steak and drinking the smoothest wine. Seeing “snow” fall. Cycling around fairytale landscapes.

Trauma: trying to get a Sube card loaded to travel on public buses, trying to buy a voucher for the spa and getting generic errors, Uber blocking our accounts, being evacuated from and then trapped at the airport. Taking our bikes for a walk.

Day One – Recovery

The 26 hour bus has taken its toll on us physically and mentally. Arriving sapped of energy, we check into our Airbnb for the week. Spacious, modern and clean, it ticks all the boxes. We build up the courage to brave another supermarket. Being a Sunday the stocks are low but we scramble enough ingredients to make a few meals. We note the tape across the alcohol aisles, it turns out that the sale of booze is prohibited due to today being election day! Back at home, we make a basic meal and crash out in front of the TV watching a studio Ghibli film. Checking the voting results before bed which confirm Milei has won the election!

Day Two – The Great Escape

We wake to find the weather is pretty miserable, cloudy, windy and cold. We decide to head into town to get a feel for the area and explore the picturesque Bariloche we’ve been looking forward to. It seems our Airbnb is not in the scenic Alpine-esque area but the built-up edge of town full of graffiti, endless kiosco shops and mechanics! Eventually we reach the center of town and find this beautiful church. The heart of the town is still a built-up concrete jungle. Sure there are fondue restaurants and a ridiculous amount of chocolate shops but it’s not the Swiss village we were expecting.

Wondering what to do having seen most of what the town has to offer, we stumble upon an escape room center. Amused by the fact they have a ‘World Cup’ themed escape room, we figure we’ll be spontaneous and book straight into the next available game. We’re advised to try the ‘Lab’ themed room as apparently it’s their easiest with a 7/10 difficulty rating!

Despite a few technical scientific words in Spanish we make a good start. We struggle in the middle and only open the second main room with 15 minutes remaining. Blitzing through we somehow (with a bit of cheating/luck) make it to the very last puzzle as the time runs out. We’re locked in the lab forever, end of blog…

In reality, we return home and plan the rest of our week. Fortunately for me, the nearest eatery is a take-away pizza place which offers the ‘Fugazzeta’. This is essentially a pizza with an extra middle layer stuffed with cheese! In my poor Spanish I communicate what I want and I’m gutted to hear the Fugazetta machine is out of order 😭. I must settle for a standard pizza and some empanadas, tightly clutching them home through the 70km/h wind. While I’m out foraging for food, Alex is back home cooking up some delicious brownies 😋

Day Three – SUBE or not SUBE, that is the question… The day that goes wrong.

Our plan for the day is to head up to the Campanario viewpoint a few miles out of town. To get there we need to use a SUBE card, similar to an Oyster card in London. The Airbnb host was kind enough to lend us one so we don’t need to buy one ourselves. We try to top it up at the local mini-market, the owner explains it needs to be topped up with cash (which we don’t have) but this one time she’ll do it with a card. Alex rightly points out we’ll probably need cash later so we head back to the flat to pick up some foreign currency to exchange later. Take two, we head down to the bus terminal and wait for our no. 10 bus. As we board, we’re greeted with a big red X and the driver explains the SUBE card has been blocked by the owner… Back to square one.

We enter the chaotic bus terminal full of excited children running riot and confused gringos. After queueing up several times at the wrong place, we finally learn we can buy a SUBE card here in the main bus terminal but we can’t top it up here (!?). With our empty card we have no choice but to walk 45 minutes into town.

You may wander why we don’t simply withdraw cash from an ATM. It’s due to the confusing ‘blue dollar rate’ where we can get over 1,000 pesos per £1 (which we get when paying on our debit cards) but if we withdraw from an ATM we’ll get the local rate where £1 only gets us 350/400 pesos. Quite a stark difference.

We try several money exchange shops, being passed from pillar to post. After seeing the massive queue in Western Union, one of the only somewhat reliable ways to exchange USD for pesos, we’re told our best option is to change money on the street. The only legitimate looking people we find refuse to change anything other than $100 bills, oddly stating they don’t have enough pesos to change our $20 bill. We find a man stood next to a group of suspicious looking youths and ask if he can change our Chilean pesos to Argentinan currency. He advises we follow him through the group of youths, up a shopping arcade to a liquor store. Somehow he quotes us a fairly decent rate and in our desperate situation we agree. Money is exchanged in a flurry and it all seems a bit under the counter but we finally have local currency!

Now we simply need to add the cash to our SUBE card in a local shop. Except the only ones we can find are closed. Trying to top it up on a website doesn’t look to be an option either. We walk around town for another 30 minutes until we find an open kiosco that can add cash onto the SUBE. This whole ordeal since we left the flat has taken several hours for the sake of a 160 peso (around 16 pence) journey. Alex attempts a little sob on the pavement while I console her but we can’t even do that right as we’re told by a local to move out of the way of their gate.

We restore some sanity by having a hot chocolate with cognac in a local chocolate shop/cafe which bizarrely has an ice-rink inside!

We finally board a busy bus and by the time we reach our intended destination it’s approaching 3pm. We begin the walk to the viewpoint and find a nice spot in the forest to enjoy our empanadas and snacks.

The walk up has been described as a ‘jaunt’ but it’s a brutal steep uphill for 30 minutes straight. The view at the top is beautiful though and we ponder whether we should have paid to take the chairlift up and save our legs. We take a few photos and seeing the long queue for the chairlift back down, decide to walk it instead.

Another hurdle we’ve had today is to try and book a massage and entry to a stunning spa overlooking the lake. Their phone line was always busy, they didn’t reply on WhatsApp or Facebook and their website won’t accept our debit cards due to more generic error messages… We decide to stop there on our way home, determined we’ll have a relaxing day after the trauma of today. The spa receptionist helpfully explains the website ‘does not work’ and manually books us in for Thursday. Sick of buses and the complexities of the public transport system, I book us an Uber to take us back to the Airbnb. Of course the driver misses the turn on the way home and we end up in the middle of nowhere, down a gravel track, performing endless U-turns while he tries to find his way back. It seems here the buildings get built before the roads. What a day.

Earlier on, while in town, we tried to book a place for dinner tonight to have something to look forward to. The fondue place Alex had found was closed on Tuesdays and the best steak restaurants don’t take bookings, it’s first come, first served. With this in mind, we head into town early to join the queue before the steak restaurant opens at 8pm. There’s already a big queue outside the original El Boliche but luckily its sister restaurant around the corner only had a handful of people waiting. After the day we’ve had we enjoy a fantastic meal of huge slabs of steak, pyramids of fries and a lovely bottle of red wine at £3 a bottle!

Inevitably there’s a sting in the tail as my Uber has been blocked because the payment for our earlier journey cannot be debited. Alex has to book the ride home on her account and as soon as we’re home her account is also blocked. It appears there are common issues with Uber not accepting foreign bank cards out here.

Exhausted and drained we head to bed. I check my phone and see the spa has finally replied ‘Hi James, how can we help?’.

Day Four – Anguish in Angustura

As the weather has improved, we’ve decided to take a day cycling around the town of Villa La Angostura. Booking into a private bus is much easier than the debacle we had yesterday and we’re in Angostura by 10.30am. We stock up on empanadas at a local bakery and find the bike hire shop Alex has picked out. A jolly chap called Ariel greets us and provides an explanation of the route, going into great detail! He states it’s for tourists, not athletes and we’ll have no trouble. In an unexpected twist he then gets a book off his shelf and takes another 10 minutes talking about when a volcano erupted in Chile and the wind blew the ash all the way over here and covered the town in ash. Eventually he takes us outside and provides the equipment we came here for.

We cycle to the national park along the busy road, passing a Gothic church built by the same architect that designed Bariloche, before descending down a huge downhill. The route though the National Park is a 24km out and back. Wanting a change from day-long hikes we’ve made the smart decision to bike it instead. Or so we think. The wardens at the park ticket office suggest it’s harder on bikes and the signs have yellow ‘medium’ difficulty for walkers yet red ‘hard’ difficulty for cyclists… Great.

It soon becomes clear why. For the first 1.5km we more-or-less need to carry our bikes up steps or push them up rocky inclines too steep to cycle up without any momentum. When we finally reach a downhill section it’s too dangerous to cycle down and someone sadly lost their life here, so there are barriers to prevent any cyclists with a death wish. Exhausted from this ordeal we can eventually start cycling around 2km into the trek! The route is narrow and bumpy, the declines are steep and full of tree roots and the inclines are punishing in equal measure.

We find some sort of groove and stop for lunch around what we think is the halfway point. Fueled by empanadas and Gatorade (how we missed you) we power through to the end in what seems like no time at all. We have a wander around the wooden walkway through the forest. Full of Arrayanes trees grown specifically in a sort of one species arboretum.

Alex contemplates the catamaran back to town but that would mean waiting here for a couple more hours in the cold. A fighter as always she decides to cycle back with me come what may.

Surprisingly we find the return a lot easier than we imagined, I dare say we even enjoy it! We take a couple of detours off the main path to marked Miradors. Of course the route ends in the same nonsense of carrying our heavy bikes down steps for nearly a mile but we knew it was coming.

We cycle back to town and Ariel meets us with a rye smile, he knows what we’ve been through but we’re all still smiling regardless. With a bit of time to kill before our bus home we find a local cervecería and reward ourselves with some happy hour beers.

Alex will publish the second half of our week in Bariloche soon (the better half… mostly!)

Day One – Satan’s Supermarket

Our transport from El Calafate to El Chalten is another stifling hot bus. Sure it’s cold outside, but the bus is that warm that several hands go up desperately trying to get the fans to cool them down a bit, all to no avail as they’re switched off. Another passenger opens the window to allow in a cool refreshing blast of air and everyone breathes a sigh of relief. Disembarking the bus, we pick up a map of the local area and head to our hostel.

There was not much choice for cheap backpackers in the small town of El Chalten so we’ve opted for a basic hostel with a shared room. We’re delighted when the hostel worker shows us to our room and it’s just two single beds, we were expecting to be sharing it with a stranger. The downside… it is once again warmer than Hell itself. A large heater downstairs is on full blast 24/7, so much so that we open the window in our room, feeling terrible about the waste of heat.

Out first day here is spent getting our bearings. Somehow I manage to lose Alex in the world’s smallest town, but we eventually find each other and head to a cheap supermarket recommended by the hostel. We’re horrified by the rotting veg, shit covered eggs, broken baskets and worst of all, no prices on anything. We only buy what we consider safe and head to the Pachamama supermarket for a slightly better experience.

In the evening we cook up a meal of pasta, tomato sauce and minced beef. Eyes bigger than bellies we’ve once again made far too much. In a hostel with very limited supplies we’ve no choice but to put the leftovers in a carrier bag. Our shame knows no depths.

Day Two – Off-piste then getting Piste

I’m trying to give Alex a break from all the planning she has done. To ease us in I’ve chosen two simple out and back hikes, in the morning we’ll head South of town and in the afternoon North.

The morning hike is easy, considering what we’ve already done on this trip. Within 40 minutes we’re up at the Mirador Cóndores and take a few piccies.

Next we continue on to Mirador Aguilas. It’s another simple hike without much elevation gain. We’re floored by the stunning views of the large flat valley that opens up before us. In the distance we can make out Lago Veidma with it’s crystal blue water and floating icebergs.

We turn to head back the way we came, this should be a simple out and back walk after all. As we turn, Alex spots a giant rock she wants her picture taken on, I oblige. While over there she spots a path heading in the direction we need to go. Both of us prefer a different path rather than retracing our steps so we go for it.

After walking for around 15 minutes we hit a fork in the road, one way leads up a steep cliff and the other towards a forest. We opt for the forest route but soon realise there’s no way through the dense woodland. Determined not to turn back we follow the edge of the forest, ducking and diving under branches and gorse. We notice large cow pats on the ground and some look very recent. Fearing we’ll run head first into a bull we pick up the pace. Luckily it’s already been turned into a steak and we reach the other side of the forest and eventually pick up the path again!

Slightly traumatised, we head back to the hostel for a lunch break and shamefully empty our ‘bag pasta’ out onto our plates.

For our afternoon hike, we head down the main street of town, lined with bars, hiking shops and restaurants. Alex has a great idea of stopping for a beer after we’ve completed our hike. Our hiking destination is a waterfall, one hour outside of town. We make it there in good time following another easy route.

We return to town and the beer option is looking good. We enquire about some deals at La Zorra bar and kill a bit of time until 5pm when Happy Hour starts. With a limited choice of beers, Alex opts for a 7% stout and I am a proud boyfriend. I try the Scottish Red Ale then the American IPA, both are tasty with a stunning view. We make a note of the delicious looking burgers and head back to our hostel to get changed.

I’ve been craving a Parilla (essentially grilled meat) since we missed out on Mendoza. I can’t resist any more so tonight we head out for a mixed grill at a nearby restaurant. It isn’t the best quality meat I’ve ever had but there is that much of it, it doesn’t really matter. Though we do opt out of the blood sausage and fried small intestines… We enjoy sides of chips and mixed salad. The best part of the meal is a delicious bottle of Malbec. As Ignacio recommended back in Toro Toro, “when in Argentina, order a Malbec”, he wasn’t wrong.

Day Three – Cerro Torre

For the next couple of days we’ll take on the longer, full-day hikes. Today’s goal is to reach the Cerro Torre, a giant spike of rock towering 3100 meters above the town.

To begin, we head West out of El Chaltén. It’s a strange place, peaceful and quiet but the roads are full of ruined scrap cars and, as usual in South America, lots of street dogs. Also, there are these odd make-shift domes outside of several houses that look like a child’s DIY project (or Flint Lockwood’s lab from Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs). Our best guess is that they are a way to dodge tax for extra structural space or perhaps they are ‘glamping’ Airbnbs.

Today will be a long hike, there are markers along the route indicating how far along the one-way 9km trail we are. However, that will only take us to the lake, from there is an optional climb for better views, adding a further 1.8km. Our total distance today will easily be over 21km by the time we are back in town. We will cover a similar distance tomorrow. I helpfully tell Alex we’ll be walking the distance of a marathon over the next two days. It does not motivate her quite as I’d intended. Nor does the huge cloud cover we’re heading towards.

There isn’t much to report about our walk up to the glacial lake. It’s a fairly flat route and the terrain is mostly decent. On the way, a sign explains how giant lumps of ice or a rock slide could fall into the lake ahead, triggering a flash flood. The advice is to get to higher ground ASAP, though we’re walking through a flat plain with the nearest hill a few hundred meters away at times.

After over 3 hours of walking, the route becomes steep and the terrain changes to loose rocks and scree. We are essentially climbing up a giant natural (we think) dam at the edge of the glacial lake. The lake is not a picturesque colour but there are some piercing blue coloured icebergs floating near the coast.

The weather is not good and we’re battered by a freezing wind blowing off the glacier, caught in a rainstorm and in bright sun all at the same time. Not sure whether we are hot or cold and feeling rather tired we debate our next move. After a verbal game of chess, we decide to push ahead on to the final Mirador, a daunting climb for another 30 minutes or so.

Thankfully, on the way up, the skies clear a bit and we reach our destination marked with a reassuring ‘End of the trail’ sign. Relieved and enthused with a sense of achievement we find a spot next to a boulder to shelter for lunch. Our go to ‘trail meal’ of ham and cheese wraps is not much of a treat but it provides the sustenance we need. For dessert we tuck into a Nestle chocolate bar, probably the most reliable brand in South America for good choccy! Alex is especially happy to finally see the start of a glacier and confirm we actually aren’t at the end of the world.

Heading back the way we came, we distract ourselves with games of 20 questions. The first time we’ve played it on our travels, it helps pass the time even if we do both despair when we can’t think of the answer!

We get back to town around 5pm, after walking for over eight hours we’re both pretty tired. I head to the supermarket to get supplies while Alex goes back to the hostel to rest. Her ankles have been giving her some jip so she’ll need to recover before doing this all again tomorrow.

We were going to have fajitas for dinner but as we’re both a bit sick of tortilla wraps, we just have the filling with some rice. It actually turns out quite nicely despite the hostel’s gas hob’s lowest setting still super hot compared to what we’re used to. We enjoy a couple of well earned cans of beer and head to bed.

Day Four – Cerro Fitz Roy

Why is this peak named Fitz Roy? Bit of an odd name compared to the others.

Also why is it sometimes referred to as logo mountain? All will be revealed…

---

There isn’t enough porridge to go around this morning so I volunteer to eat the breakfast of champions that is bag pasta and frozen corn. To be fair it makes a nice change from all the similar breakfasts we’ve had so far on this journey.

Today the distance is the same as yesterday, 10.8km, however this climb will be steeper. We’ll climb up from 400m to 1200m. Towards the end there is a 400m elevation gain within a 1km distance! As we head through town to begin the walk I can see Alex walking gingerly and being unusually quiet. Her left ankle is painful and her right achilles is also unhappy… I remind her of the long and difficult hike ahead of us but she vows to give it a go. As we leave town, we pass La Zorra bar where we’ve agreed to celebrate with beers and burgers in a few hours time.

At the start of the trail we stretch and try to warm up our muscles a bit. The first section of the hike is a climb but it will flatten out just before the 4km mark. Some condors and a big rabbit see us off. To kill time we’ve both brought headphones today and tune in around 2km.

A teetering glacier:

The curious woodlands of El Chaltén with fallen trees amongst the living ones:

A few podcasts and albums later and we’ve already reached the 8/10km mark just before a campsite. Both needing the loo, we brave the sights and smells of a long-drop toilet. It is not pleasant but it seems fairer to the environment (and other walkers) than going in a nearby bush.

One more km ahead and we’re at another campsite. There are groups of tired looking hikers having lunch. A sign warns us of a steep incline gain and suggests you need to be in “good physical condition”.

I take one look at Alex’s grimacing face and wonder if it’s a good idea to continue. She’s done well to make it 90% of the way but sadly there hasn’t been much to see up to this point. There is a fire and determination in her though and she has the willpower to continue.

The final climb is brutal. It’s narrow and slippery, it’s easy to lose your footing and we see at least a couple of hikers take a bit of a tumble (they were fine). To add to the trauma, the route is busy and a constant stream of hikers are coming downhill towards us. The path is not wide enough to pass at the same time and by this point no one has much patience so we have to be a bit forceful to make any progress. The top of this photo is where we are heading, straight up, try and spot the people!

Eventually, we reach a sort of summit, at the top of a pile of rocks and scree, similar to yesterday. I thought we’d made it but there is another lump of scree ahead for us to ascend for the best view. Scrambling up with Alex behind me I’m relieved to reach the top and finally sit down for some lunch, it’s nearly 3pm. The view is good but not fantastic. The large lake we expected to see is frozen over and covered in snow. The Fitzroy peak is cheekily hiding amongst a mass of cloud, oh well. I congratulate Alex on her heroic effort to push herself up here. As I do this, we notice a herd of tourists gathered on a rock over yonder… a British couple resting behind us ensure us it’s “only another 10-15 minutes and it’s worth it”.

Well, we’ve come this far.

As we near the final, final, final viewpoint I wait for Alex so we can see the big reveal together. This time, the view is fantastic, a mesmerising deep blue lake sits in a bowl of rock below Fitzroy. At last we can have lunch! We find another boulder to shelter from the glacial wind. Today we’ve the added bonus of egg mayo in our wraps with the ham and cheese, it makes a big difference and tastes much nicer than the wraps did yesterday. I surprise Alex with a cold can of beer I’ve hidden at the bottom of the heavy backpack I’ve carried all day. We crack it open and guzzle it down, I dare say we both deserve it.

After our feast, we take a few photos. Alex tries to recreate one of her favourite paintings (can anyone recognise it?) but gets the pose wrong (d’oh), and we again need to retrace our steps all the way home. La Zorra’s Happy Hour finishes at 8pm. It’s well past 3 o’clock and it’s taken us 5 hours to get up here… motivation.

We storm back down the mountain, only stopping properly once to enjoy some chocolate around 4km from the end, next to a beautiful lake.

We arrive exhausted but in good spirits at La Zorra just before 7pm, perfect. I quickly order our first round and we proudly toast to our achievements. Alex tricks me into ordering a side portion of BBQ fries with our burgers. I didn’t realise our burgers also came with chips but what the heck, we needed the carbs. We enjoy another round of drinks and wander home. Even past 9pm the sky is still a vivid blue, we notice a new cresent moon has appeared, nestled between the clouds.

For those curious, Fitzroy was the captain of Charles Darwin’s ship ‘The Beagle’. This is the ship he used to travel the world on his quest to prove his theory of evolution and the basis for his Origin of the Species book. The mountain we saw today is named after the captain. It was not named by the indigenous people as they referred to these mountains as ‘Chalten’ which translates to smoky mountains. We can see what inspired the naming!

As for the ‘logo mountain’, well it’s hard to tell from our pictures but this is what it should have looked like…

Day Five – Northward bound

That’s it, we’ve been as far South as we will go on our visit to South America. Today we’ll board a 24h bus(!) destined for Bariloche, a cool 1367km North of El Chaltén.

On our final morning here we pack up our ever growing bags of belongings and supplies and aim to spend some time in the hostel. However, despite our room being clear and clean on time, the hostel owner grumpily bemoans us still being sat around in the communal kitchen half an hour after check-out. She makes it clear we’re not welcome to sit here minding our own business and must leave the premises as soon as we’ve checked out. Slightly wounded by this interaction we head to a nearby cafe. Luckily the owner here is the complete opposite and gives us great service with a smile while we wait four hours for our bus.

I venture out for supplies from the nearby bakery and supermarket and we play several games of Uno. For lunch we have a ‘meat roll’, mixed salad and a really tasty chicken and leek quiche.

We board our bus just after 2pm and begin our long and slow journey up to Bariloche. As I write this now we’re 4 hours into the day long journey, see you on the other side (hopefully!).

***********

Adventure – Being able to hop about the rocks and enjoy short half-day hikes again. Shopping without prices. Walking without really knowing what to expect. Being in the hiking capital of Argentina.

Excitement – Getting happy hour beers with a view. Seeing spring has sprung with dandelions, beautiful flowers and bumble bees hard at work. Whenever the sky cleared and we could admire the views. The view opening up to see the teetering glacier. Our first parrilla.

Trauma (quite a bit, but still an amazing leg) – A constantly running nose on day 4 (Alex). Spiders coming to enjoy the heat of our hostel. Feeling like we’re in a squat (I guess this is what being a Property Guardian is like). The worst supermarket experience yet. Removing hair and even skin when undoing the ankle strapping to support my achillis (Alex). Sitting next to someone in a Hoodrich hoodie… in Patagonia! Popping the spongy blood sausage and what came out. Paying £2 for a tiny drinkable yoghurt.

We make it across the border from Chile to Argentina with no problems, even managing to hop onto the border office wi-fi to download some content for the road. Surprisingly, there are no flags or big “welcome to Argentina” signs, so our entry to our fourth country feels somewhat anti-climactic.

We walk to our next accommodation, a lovely Airbnb James found, that is invitingly warm after the freezing cold wind that has buffeted us all the way here. We wish we were resting up here longer, but unfortunately we have places to be, so it’s just two nights here. Still, it’s nice to have our own space again and not be in an overpriced shoebox. After a quick trip to a shop and testing my mental maths with the prices yet again, I enjoy my first jacket potatoes since England, and James enjoys a freshly made sandwich for 90p.

He’s feeling rather worse for wear from some cold he’s picked up, so it’s bed and rest for him, whilst I do some washing, research, and try and make sure everything is set for tomorrow, our glacier trek on Perito Moreno!

Thankfully the agency is responsive and confirms our booking, but says we need $24,000 in cash to pay for the park entrance. This is new to us and, once again, we’re in a new country on a Sunday, and of course, everything is shut. We don’t have a single Argentine peso to our name. Western Union is shut. Reviews of the one cashpoint 20 min walk into town say it charges $10 US per withdrawal, and it charges the official exchange rate (350 pesos to 1 GBP), compared to the ‘blue dollar rate (900 pesos to 1 GBP). Getting the latest currency in a country is probably one of the biggest pains with travelling, but in Argentina, it’s a whole different ball-game. I find out that we can pay for our entry online instead. Except neither Monzo card works, I just get an “error” message. I briefly wonder if it’s because I have to declare that we’re British and consider putting a different nationality. Flashbacks to money woes of Santiago and Copacabana. We’ve paid a lot for this trip to be thwarted by a £24 entry fee. My last ditch attempt is to use my emergency Visa card (all our other cards are Mastercard), and it goes through. We can get in the park, phew!

Our first evening in El Calafate involves a late evening dinner at a restaurant called Morrison (!) where James has a pumpkin soup and pasta with lamb stew to help warm away his cold, and I have a lamb roulade with potatoes. Both are really tasty and the servers are clearly loving their jobs and life.

We get packed up and head to bed for our next early start. Unfortunately, I have an even earlier start as I wake up with my stomach angry and feeling nauseated. This is our most expensive day trip we’ve booked, and it’s sold out all week, so we’re going “sí o sí”, as they say here. Thankfully, we still have some of the pills we got from Valparaiso when James was still suffering, and I take that and we head out into the rain to our pick-up point.

We’re first on the bus so get prime seats to help avoid travel-sickness on top of my latest bug, and the pill is already doing the trick. After going around the houses to pick up the rest of our 52-strong group, we’re off to the national park, and our guide tells us some facts about the area. Firstly, we’re driving through a lot of ranches around here, and the cows have 4/5 hectares per animal. No factory farming here!

We also spot a couple of condor gliding around on the hunt. Our guide tells us about Lago Argentina, the largest lake in the country. Its source is the glaciers, and so it’s pretty darn cold, but people bathe in it in summer just like any beach resort. The glaciers also give it its amazing blue-green colour. We’re told the weather in Patagonia is often described as providing all four seasons in one day, having experienced the grey rain of the morning, we’re hoping our next season will be Summer…

It’s a 1.5 hour ride to our first stop, to get park entry tickets. Our guide now tells us that we can pay on card at the office. Absolute face-palm. Even though we have ours already, I need to convert our digital ticket to a real one, and in the process find out the issue I was having yesterday… they don’t take Mastercard, nor Maestro or two other card types. I guess they didn’t want to pay the developers to update the website error message. We usually only travel with our Mastercard, so I thank the stars I gave Visa a go and it worked out, otherwise I wouldn’t have had it with me and we would have been stuck.

We drive on to the National Park walkways. These are some raised platforms that wind around the land facing the Perito Moreno glacier, providing amazing views. We’re given 2.5 hours to explore and eat lunch. We’re firmly told that we should only do the yellow route, maaaaybe the first two balconies of the blue route, but no further. Challenge accepted.

We hop off the bus and make our way to blue first. The walkways and balconies provide absolutely stunning scenes of the glacier. It’s humongous.

As with Glacier Grey, Perito Moreno disappears into the mist of the background, we’re back at the end of the world. The wind is strong and (unsurprisingly) freezing, we think we might lose our noses if we stay here too long! A boat cruise comes up from the side and looks like a tiny micro machine next to it, really showing the scale.

A sign tells us the height of the visible part of the glacier goes from 40m to up to 70m in some sections. It’s brilliant to get a closer look after the teasing we got of Glacier Grey on the W. You can really see the cuts, lines, lumps, chunks and gradients of the glacier edge here. As much as we would love to keep staring into the vibrant blue of the deepest cuts, we think of our noses and the challenge we’ve given ourselves with our 2.5 hour limit.

We head back to do the yellow route as instructed, enjoying some views slightly more sheltered from the wind, and find it takes no time at all! We still have an hour and a half to go. Looking at the map, and the relative times it will take us to do the other “difficult” red route, we can’t resist trying for an actual challenge, and decide to go for it, we can always turn back. We really are glutons for punishment eh. The weather is clearing up and it seems like Summer may be gracing us with her presence.

As expected, the route is not in any way difficult, and again we’re still done with an hour to go. We really wonder who comes up with these maps, but it’s nice to feel like gazelles again after feeling like snails on the W. We find a sheltered seat to have our lunch, and then head inside for a yummy hot chocolate, before heading back on the bus to our next stop, the boat.

The boat is going to not just take us near the glacier, but will take us to the spot where we will get our equipment to do our hike. On the boat we get, what seems like, pretty close, although we’ve learnt just how huge the walls are and what seems near is actually still quite far away.

Back on land, we’re introduced to our new guide who gives us a bit of a history/geography lesson. The Perito Moreno glacier is 250sq km, the same size as Buenos Aires, 120m deep under the water, and almost 5km across. It is one of 2400 glaciers, but we spot it’s actually a neighbour to Glacier Grey that we saw at the end of the W.

The glaciers form from the humid air blowing in from the Pacific, rising up the mountains of the Andes where they cool and freeze. In fact, up in the mountains, they have 10,000mm of rain/snow a year, and just 35km east in El Calafate, they get only 300mm. It’s actually incredibly dry in El Calafate. Joaquin points out that the sky above the glacier is thick and white, but behind us now it is clear. This is how it always is, because the weather mostly dumps in the mountains before ever reaching the lakes of El Calafate. The face of the glacier is the oldest part, as newer ice forms up in the mountains and pushes down from the top. What we can see and are about to walk on is around 400 years old.

In Antartica, the glaciers move 1m in a year, but Perito Moreno moves 2m every day. It’s “fast” by glacier terms. Unfortunately, as with all glaciers now, Perito Moreno is receding faster than ever. Back in the last ice age, the glacier went out 200km and has been retreating ever since, as it should. But sadly in the last two decades, that retreat has sped up.

With that reminder of how privileged we are in multiple ways in this moment, we are given over to another couple of guides Santiago (Santi) and Ezequiel, and kitted out with helmets and crampons. Winter has arrived and the snow really starts coming down in a blizzard.

The crampons are really heavy, and it’s a weird sensation to walk with heavy feet. Ezequiel teaches us how to walk with them and not break our ankles, fall over or impale ourselves, much appreciated as I’ve already had a few stumbles lol. To walk uphill, we should walk like penguins or ducks. To descend, we should walk with our feet parallel, knees bent to lower our centre of gravity, and leaning back. It’s time to get on the ice, and show our guides if we’ve been listening. Ezequiel praises our form and himself “good teacher!”.

Santi and especially Ezequiel clearly love life and their time on the ice, with the latter throwing snow balls at the other tour guides and hopping about the ice like a playground. He tells us that they get to explore the ice in their free time, it’s the best part of the job, I can imagine. I’m in awe from the off. It’s just like nothing else being on the glacier, seeing the shapes and formations up close, the meandering blue trails carved by icey water that are naturally the same colour as blue powerade/gatorade, I’m so happy just taking it all in.

Our route takes us up, down and around some peaks and troughs of the formations. We refill our water bottle with Glacier water and it’s like nothing else, so crisp, cold and pure.

Thankfully, the blizzard and ice-cold wind of Winter have subsided so we won’t lose our noses just yet.

Under the surface you can see the icey forms in the water, murkeying the vibrant blue channels.

The deeper into the glacier you can see, the deeper the blue. It’s unreal and I can’t express how happy it makes me.

We turn the final corner and see a tray table with glasses and a whisky bottle, as Santi hops over to a glacier wall to chip off some ice. The day is topped off by some whisky over glacier ice (that even I can stomach and enjoy) and a chocolate.

Sadly, it’s time to get our boat back and say goodbye to the glacier that has given huge joy to my soul.

Winter is returning again with another dump of snow (we’re getting four seasons in two hours, let alone four seasons in one day!) as we huddle by the fire waiting for our ride back.

This was a hugely expensive day, and we’re just so grateful to have the means, opportunity and enough health to do it.

***********

Adventure – completing most loops of the walkways, walking like an Egyptian/penguin, clambering about a glacier!!!

Excitement – whisky on glacier rocks with chocolate, the sky clearing, the snow falling, the whole thing

Trauma – “computer says no” Internet payments, more tales of fires caused by idiot tourists, the bitterest winds