Tao 16 – El Chalten

The next morning we got up early and walked the 15 minutes to the bus station in town. The drive north took less than 3 hours. The view when we were approaching El Chalten was incredible.  The snow-covered mountain peaks are knife sharp and stand in stark contrast to the brown and wind-swept Patagonia plains. I learned not to try taking any photos through the bus window though – they never come out good enough.

The bus stopped briefly at a ranger station.  A young park ranger gave us an overview of the trail condition as well as weather forecast in English. There was also a briefing in Spanish but it looks like everyone on our bus speaks English.

We stayed in a small B&B called Latitude 49. After dropping our backpack and changing to a day pack, Tracy and I headed to the Laguna Torre trail.  Most of the trails around El Chalten can be done in a day. Without a 40lb backpack, we can afford to carry lots of water.  The locals would just drink from the mountain streams.  We like to err on the safe side.

Street art in El Chalten

The trail starts directly from the edge of town

Laguna is Spanish for lake. Torre is tower. It helps that both language were from Latin.

Narrow trail lined with flowering dandelion

Bright yellow orchid on the side of the road

I have never seen this many dandelion flowers before.  It’s late spring and they are in full bloom, especially around streams.

Posing in front of a clearing. The lake is around the bend on the far side.

The distance to the lake is 11km one way.  There is not much elevation gain.  In a cool spring day it makes for a pleasant walk. The ice cover on the lake has mostly melted.  There are still pieces of ice from the glacier floating around.  The wind gust coming from the valley ahead was very strong, and cold.

Tracy examining a piece of ice

The larger pieces of floating ice were white, smaller ones were clear like this piece

After about half an hour around the lake, we started heading back. Tomorrow will be a long day.  We wanted to get some rest and shop for lunch in town.  Coming back was faster and we were back in town by 5.

Small wild flowers close to the trail head.

The next day we set out for Laguna De Los Thres.  This is the main trail that will supposedly give us a magnificent view of Mounte Fitz Roy, if we are lucky.  The day started with a flat tire on our hiking shuttle.  Our poor driver tried to change the tire with a full bus load of people inside. We offered to get out but he insisted that he could do it. He did eventually manage it with a couple of locals that happened to pass by, and we are on our way again.  About 3 minuted later we arrive at the trail start.  I would have preferred to walk the final stretch to save the hour or so waiting on the bus if I knew we were that close.

Our first glimpse of Mt Fitz Roy, it peeks out over on the left side

Closing in, the top of the peak is still covered by clouds

The last 3km or so was a bit challenging.  There’s a climb of 400 meters to the view point.  We each had just a day pack so it’s quite manageable. When we finally got up there, for about half an hour, there’s no body around but us.

View of Mt Fitz Roy.

There are some mountain lakes from melted snow.  One of them was still frozen over.  We had lunch on its shores. A few months later we would have been able to get a shot of Mt Fitz Roy mirrored in the lake. However, I prefer the serenity of ice and snow on top of the mountain.

Beautiful pattern on rocks

A few hundred meters to the west was another lake.  The ice cover on half of the lake already melted, likely because its lower elevation.

Lichen on rocks

We saw a small avalanche while we were resting around the second lake. It sounded like rolling thunder. The amount of snow involved was not much though.

Here is a close up picture of Mt Fitz Roy.  The peak went straight up from here.  It can only be tackled by mountain climbers.

Who would have thought she could jump that high

Washing up on our way back

Back in town, what little calories we got from lunch were long gone.  We were keen to get a taste of some local cuisine.

This is Isenbeck, an Argentina brew.  Nothing beats a cold beer a the end of a long hike.

Pumpkin soup

Our favorite food here in town is a kind of thick soup or porridge made of lamb, sausage, corn, carrots and beans. There are still some other stuff I cannot recognize.  It’s cooked in something like a Chinese hotpot, and it’s oh so delicious.

After a happy meal we packed up and took the bus back to El Calafate.  Adrianna and Santiago gave us a warm welcome back in Rukahue.  Next morning we’ll head for Chile.