El Chalten

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…

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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!).

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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.