Calafate
I had a rough start to Calafate. My flight was delayed and arrived at 1am in the morning, the guy who was supposed to pick me up at the airport, never showed up. So I had to take a shuttle bus instead. As usual, these shuttle buses don’t leave till they are full. In my case, this took at least another hour. So I arrived at my hostel some time between 2 and 3am. I was getting picked up to see the glacier Perito Moreno at 7am. Needless to say I was crazy exhausted.
I had signed up for the Big Ice Tour which I can highly recommend. We first went to the tourist viewpoint of the glacier. I don’t think I ever saw a glacier at this scale, it was really impressive. Perito Moreno is all the more impressive in that it belongs to the Southern Patagonian Ice Field (shared between Chile and Argentina) that feeds into a total of 48 glaciers and makes the world’s largest fresh water reserve. After spending some time at the viewpoint, we took a boat to the glacier itself to get a closer look. The big ice tour was quite remarkable and a really well organized operation. Although they limit the people who can take part in it and strongly encourage only very fit people to sign up, about 70 people participated that day. So the group got split into smaller groups of 10 people and they provided two guides for each group.
Each person got equipped with crampons and we then left to walk on the ice. It was an adventure of a lifetime. I had no idea how beautiful glaciers were and my guide, Pablo was absolutely wonderful. He brought us to many lakes and rivers within the glacier. The blueness of those lakes was arresting. They get their color from “rock flour”, sediment that has been transported through the rivers to the lakes. This sediment comes from rocks grinding together underneath the glacier. The fine powder is then suspended in the water and absorbs and scatters varying colors of sunlight, giving it a turquoise appearance. I had never seen anything like it really, and it came totally unexpected. I must say that excursion was perhaps one of the best days in my life, simply because I was taken aback by the stunning beauty of it all.
Pablo, our guide was also a fun guy who spent his whole life as an adventure guide. He really did challenge us and helped us along the way. Multiple times he made us jump over cracks that were about 50m deep. There was no way we could have fallen in because they were too small, but it still felt thrilling. He also made us jump over rivers. One time in particular, I was sure I would land into the water. I’m usually always up for challenges, but this was one of the rare cases where I was just shaking my head and thinking to myself no way I’m going to do this. But Pablo was very convincing and seemed absolutely certain I would not fall into the water. Turns out he was right. I also met two lovely Americans, Sarah and Ryan, on the hike who happened to have just moved to Palo Alto. Small world!
At the end of the day, we were exhausted. Walking on the glacier was challenging, but the whole day we were also subjected to really strong wind. Strong enough that at times, we had to kneel down so as not to be blown away. However, the tour ended in the best way it could possibly end. We were served glasses of 20 year old whiskey with 400 year old glacier ice cubes :). Some of the guides had hacked fresh glacier ice cubes for our whiskey. It was a really nice touch to an already unforgettable day.
In the evening Sarah, Ryan and I met up in the town of Calafate. Calafate is a strange town, yet I’ve somehow gotten really fond of it. Its simplicity reminded me of my own little village in Switzerland. Although Calafate seems like a big place, most of it are hotels that are for some reason very spread out. But the core of Calafate itself is tiny and as soon as you get away from the one main street, there are only dirt roads. That one main street has a few outdoor shops, a handful of restaurants and exactly one bar/bookstore where everyone meets up in the evening. It was simple, yet charming. I was hanging out with the guides in the evening. They were a fun group with so many adventure stories. I must admit, even though their job has a million disadvantages, I envy them. Wouldn’t it be nice to be outdoors every day and jump around stunningly beautiful glaciers all day :).
There are several others hikes one can do around Calafate. In particular, Chalten is not far away. However, the weather was so windy that hiking was impossible and the trek was closed. I’ll have to visit again! So instead of going to El Chalten, I went to Torres del Paine in Chile.
For more pictures, go here.
