Patagonia is so gosh darn purty!!
El Chaltén is known as a wild and wooly Patagonian frontier town and has not even been in existence for all that long. Located within Los Glacieres National Park, it was built in 1985 for the sole purpose of securing the somewhat tenuous border between Argentina and Chile, but these days it's all about trekking/climbing tourism.
I arrived there on a wet and windy Sunday afternoon, and spent the remainder of that first day unchilling my limbs & bones in the toasty comfort of my hostel, Aylen Aike, run by the amiable Sebastian. I met an extremely interesting young German traveller named Miriam there as well as her Aussie walking buddy, Jake (the snake), and we three amigos ended up bonding that night while watching the DVD, "Valkyrie", and mutually poking fun at Señor Cruise's atrocious German accent. By the end of that first evening, we had agreed to team up for a 25k round trip trek the following morning to Laguna de Los Tres which offers spectacular views of the Fitz Roy mountain (on a clear you can see Barbra Streisand forever sort of day that is).
We were fortuitiously blessed with incredibly clear blue skies and manageable winds all the way to the Laguna de Los Tres, and I found the trail fairly easy going until the very last bit, which consisted of a steep ascent along an exposed rocky hillside. Right at the very tipsy top, I became over-the-moon excited when I ran into Luc and Annick, a couple from my Salkantay hiking group. The last time I had seen them was at the rim of the Colca Canyon near Arequipa, Peru, in mid December, and I had figured back then that I would never see them again but lo and behold...there they were in all their Dutch glory! Naturally we hugged and exchanged cheek-to-cheek chaste European kisses, and arranged to meet up for drinks that evening once showered and changed out of our stinky, sweaty trekking apparel. Cool beans!
Meanwhile, Miriam, Jake and I hunkered down at the lookout point of the Laguna de Los Tres and once we'd finished wharfing down our picnic provisions, we took turns playfully posing for photographs with props(essentially a maté cup). After a little more than an hour basking in the glory of the Fitz Roy mountain, we noticed ominous clouds rolling in and I correctly predicted that these clouds signified a downturn in the weather conditions. So we hightailed it out of there pronto, with me taking the lead in the descent. I practically slid down the rocky slope on my ass with my jaw continuously clenched in pain due to the strain being put upon my knees. I truly feared being still up there when the winds significantly picked up and my fears turned out to be fully warranted for no sooner had we all made it down the hill safely, when we were assaulted by practically gale-strength winds (and relentless rain besides). For the next 2.5 hours we trudged onwards, it being us "Against the Wind". I felt a bit like a drunk rag doll for the wind had me stumbling lopsidedly to and fro. When we finally managed to make it back to El Chaltén, we were pleased as punch to discover that it had actually only taken us 7 measly hours to complete the hike (versus the 8.5 suggested in the brochure put out by the National Park Service).
Once back at the Aylen Aike Hostel, we treated ourselves to a few self-congratulatory brewskies and sang robustly along to an AC/DC concert DVD being shown on the TV there. Who knew how popular AC/DC were in Argentina?!!? The 2009 concert had been filmed at the River Plate Stadium in Buenos Aires with around 65,000 screaming attendees. Back in Black 4 Eveh. WOO HOO!!! After the round of head-slamming brew, I reunited with Annick and Luc at a pub and we ended up having a lovely 90-minute catch up session. As they were going to be in town for another two days, we also agreed to meet up one more time before once again going our separate sad ways.
Tuesday´s weather was rather crappy so I opted to forego hiking and instead do some reading and updating on his blog. Plus I had to change hostels as the Aylen Aike Hostel had been fully booked by a large hiking group so I moved down the road into the Pioneros Hostel de Valle. Miriam and Jake departed early that same morning for Bariloche so we speedily said our goodbyes at breakfast time. Oh and because I promised to publicly humiliate Jake in my blog, I would just like to reveal that his email address is...wait for it...jakerulz69@blahblahblah!!! Apparently he has had the same oh-so-mature email moniker since he was 17 and just never bothered to get a new one. Another interesting tidbit Jake and I discovered to our mutually delight was that at the exact time Jake's mother was in labor at the hospital giving birth to him, I was ditching high school in order to meet Paul McCartney (October 18, 1984). Talk about an interesting coinkidink! And, let´s face it, also slightly disturbing for it was an unfortunate reminder of the fact that I am old enough to be the mother of many/most of the travelers I have met while on this trip. Gulp.
On the following day, Wednesday, I went for another lengthy hike - this time a 22k walk to the Laguna Torre, which on a clear day offers views of the Cerro Torres mountain. Unfortunately, the weather was partially cloudy so I never did get a glimpse of the mountain. However, the weather was clear enough for me to see/photograph the glacier which is located on the shore of the laguna. There were only a handful of souls sharing this scenic spot when I was there (which was in direct contrast to my previous Fitz Roy hike), but this was probably because most people set off walking much later in the day for as I was making my way back to El Chaltén, I encountered countless hikers (including Annick and Luc!). All in all, I completed the circuit in 5.5 hours and felt that it was significantly easier than the Fitz Roy one. Just
That Wednesday evening I met up for a few hours more with Annick and Luc for drinks, and I truly loathed having to say goodbye upon the night´s merry conclusion because I'm considerably certain this time around that I will never meet them again. Only time will tell...
My last 2 days in town were fairly low key. I did some blogging, watched videos on my iPad, and did a few shorter hikes around town. Nothing really worth writing about actually. So to sum up my El Chaltén experience...Era muy hermosa, con gente amable! Translation: It was very beautiful with friendly people.
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