Our short encounter with ARGENTINA- El Calafate and El Chalten

The crossing into Argentina was fairly smooth, and after 7 hours we arrived in the town of el calafate. The accommodation prices meant that we had to suck it up and go for dorm rooms in a hostel- something we had managed to avoid so far. It wasnt the worst place by far but we were not used to being woken up by people entering and leaving the room late at night or early in the morning.

The tourists that visit Patagonia seem to be mainly either hardcore hikers with their tents and powdered mashed potato, or older people, most likely retired and able to spend money on nice hotels, tours and being fully kitted out with the best hiking attire, including hiking poles which are not actually needed for the short hikes their tours take them on. All the shops and restaurants were similar to UK prices if not higher, which meant we mainly resorted to cooking pasta with slight variations of vegetables at the hostel, which got boring fairly quickly. On the plus side, the wine was still extremely cheap- £1.50 a bottle. Shaaame.

Crazy birds doing crazy neck stretches 

Walking by the lake in El Calafate

Very Important Pup

The main place to visit in el calafate is the perrito morener glacier- about an hours drive from the town. We had seen glaciers before in New Zealand and glimpsed one in Chile, and from what we had seen they were just a big block of grey ice in the distance, so our expectations were not high. 

This glacier was definitely not the same. If you want your mind blown by a massive icy beast this is definitely the place to come. 

They said there would be ice, we paid to see ice....where is it?

Ah that might be it

The glacier and Jonno's hair, both competing for the title of Most Jagged and Unruly

Even the clouds are showing off

Metal walkways let you walk around the glacier, which is actually growing in size compared to all the others we have seen that are shrinking. It is 5km wide, and 74 metres tall. And as you watch it, you can hear the ice groaning and cracking, even seeing parts of it crumble and crash into the water. Seriously nature, you have done well here. We were also entertained by some of the other tourists and their attempts to get the perfect shot or video- one older lady wouldn't let her husband get a cereal bar out of her bag as she was so fixated on getting a video of the glacier breaking. We saw the same couple a few more times over the next few days, and were concerned that he was wasting away after the abuse we witnessed.

Ice ice baby

Videos of the ice breaking- we were not the only ones who were impressed! We hope Jerry got it too!

We also visited a museum of the history of Patagonia, starting from the dinosaurs who lived in the area including the Mylodon and Giganotosaurus, to the first civilisations and how they survived in the harsh and bleak area. At the beginning we were basically given a photocopied textbook of all the information, then had to sit and study it in front of a replica dinosaur.

Wouldn't trust this with a china tea set

We knew from our research that Argentina wasn't going to be a cheap place, but it was only when we had a free afternoon and sat down to plan out route that we realised that our original plan might drain our bank accounts more than we hoped. In the last few years, the economy has been very unstable and the prices of things have been massively inflated. We had wanted to travel back up the continent on the Argentina side, and visiting San Carlos De bariloche, Mendoza, Puerto madryn and Buenos Aires. However, after looking at the bus options, we discovered that each bus journey was going to be around £100 each (totaling around £1,000 for us both for the whole country), for what are apparently awful buses and would involve multiple journeys of 24 hours or more. We also checked flights, but the government puts a tourist tax on these and were also expensive. We spoke to people who had hitchhiked through the country, but we didn't feel this was something we wanted to do. After a frustrating few hours of trying to work a way around it, we came to the reluctant decision that maybe it was better for us to miss out the majority of Argentina for this trip, and to come back when either the exchange rate is more in our favour or when we can do it as a nice holiday rather than trying to work it on a backpacker budget. 

We checked flights and it was far cheaper for us to backtrack to Chile and then take a flight back up to Bolivia, so this is what we decided on. Before then, we could get the bus a little further to El Chalten and spend a few days here, making the most of our short time in Argentina.

Overlooking El Chalten

El Chalten was a 3 hour bus ride away, and is in a national park, which meant that the main activity was hiking.  Amazingly, they didn't charge an entry fee to the area, and also the hikes all started from the town, meaning we didn't have to stick to bus timetables to decide when we started our hikes. Again, we stayed in a dorm room in a hostel, which was overrun by earwig looking bugs, Jonno found one in his coffee and I found one in my bra as I was about to put it on. 

Seeing as we arrived at 11am, we decided to try 2 of the short easy hikes that day- one to a waterfall and the other to some viewpoints with some great views. As we had finished the second hike, I turned the corner and saw people taking pictures of something. Before I knew it an armadillo was heading straight for me- it bumped into my foot, hesitated apologetically for a second and then waddled away before I had a chance to introduce myself.

AHMAGAWD

Please stay and chat!

We had 2 days left and 2 hikes we wanted to do- an 18km 6 hour one to Laguna des Torres and a 20km 8 hour one to Laguna de Los Tres. We decided to start with the shorter one, and even though it was forecast for rain in the middle of the day, there was no clouds in the sky when we started, just a strong wind. After about 5km, we started feeling a few drops of rain but still there were hardly any clouds. By the time we had reached the Lagoon, the weather was do horrific we were struggling to stand upright and had to hide behind a rock with a guy who had been waiting an hour for the weather to improve. The clouds were so thick we couldn't really see the lagoon much. Defeated, we started heading back towards the town, and the further away from the lagoon we got the better the weather, and it was perfect sunshine for the last few kilometres. 

Looks allright..

...Okay maybe a little grey...

#Nofilter, a sight worth a 9km hike

The next day we decided to tackle the long hike. The first 9km were not so bad, until the last kilometre to get to the viewpoint of the Laguna de Los tres, which was a steep scramble up rocks but the views were pretty rewarding at the top.

Hello lagoon

To get back to Punto arenas for our flight to Bolivia, we had to go back the same route, bear hunt style. El chalten to el calafate, same hostel in el calafate, then back to Puerto Natales then back to Punto arenas. We stayed at the same lovely Airbnb for the 24 hours we had in Punto arenas, where the son of the family offered to take us and their other guest on a tour of the city.

Even though we only spent 9 days in Argentina, it seemed like a country worth exploring and we will definitely be planning a return trip to see more in the future!