So leaving the hot and humid city of BuenOs Aires behind, the three musketeers/amigos/tenors went south to Patagonia. The region is as different to the Pampas we've just left behind as you can get. We had gone from the lush, hot cattle loving fields of Central Argentina to Patagonia's endless golden plains surrounded by imposing mountains, devoid of trees and interspersed with lakes the colour of raspberry flavoured ice-pops (electric blue not red!). Down south, we had landed squarely into Autumn, the layers went on but still the sun shone. Having by-passed the epic bus ride in favour of a plane, we touched down in El Calafate late morning and headed into town for feeding.
After having a fight with an overly territorial local pooch (that's why I got my rabies jab isn't it?) we hit the centre which gave us a feel of an alpine town in between snow seasons with outdoor cafes, pine trees and very tasty hot chocolate. Argentina is the first place I've seen the infamous submarinos, a hot chocolate drink with a twist you'll have to wait for until I get back home to use the Peruvian chocolate I hope has arrived back in the UK by now.
Back at the world's friendliest B&B, the Casa de Grillos run by Alejandro and his wife Marta, we were off to the Puerto Marino Glacier with our own taxi driver (at a cheaper rate than the tour groups and with our own freedom too boot!). The glacier, for the sophisticated, is a marvel to behold, a gargantuan sheet of ice creaking, cracking and exploding into the lake. The glacier for the chav's who's Mums went to Iceland, will probably reflect that it looks like a massive viennetta.
Silly analogies aside, the glacier was spectacular, and can hold your attention for hours as every few minutes, small chunks of ice shear off into the lake, but every 20 minutes or so, giant slabs part company from the glacier making a noise like an avalanche. The area around the glacier is full of Andean Condors, enormous birds, that I think live so locally because of the high density of Chinese tourists. They taste of chicken apparently. Right now I'm in Hong Kong, and I love Chinese, but I couldn't eat a whole one.
Back in town, and out for food, we decided to by-pass the street with the angry mutt and pass the house that is apparently the President's weekend retreat, tried to give her a wave, but not sure the countless numbers of security guards found this amusing. She's up for re election soon, and its strange that hardly anyone in the country offers their opinion. Lips are kept tight about politics in Argentina, and it's hard to find anyone with a word about any politician let alone a good one. The history of Argentina is sad and complex one, and one not corruption free nor as romantic as Madonna (or the Evita museum) would have you believe.
Back on the road the next day we were off to the Torres Del Paine National Park just over the border in Chile. After some long bus rides and a very bumpy boat ride we were in the park. The translation means Towers of Pain, and is extremely beautiful and yet foreboding at the same time. Trampers tend to walk a long through the park over 5 days, but for those with a little less time but more common sense, we opted to take a boat into the centre of the park to do a day hike instead. Staying over night in the country's most over priced crappy hostel (Paine Grande Mountain Lodge), we struck out the next day to see the towers up close and we thankfully were blessed with some very clear weather, as we were expecting heavy rain which the park was famous for. The wind however did not let us down, and made the day a chilly one, but none the less we covered about 12.5 miles in just one day.
The views we took in, were inspiring, and at the mid point of our trail at the French Valley the scenery was some of the best I've seen in months. Every 20 minutes or so the ice up the mountain ahead would come tumbling down creating some epic avalanches. Thankfully well out of range it was impressive to witness, but made us realise that off the trails, this area was incredibly remote and treacherous. How anyone managed to climb the actual towers I'll never quite fathom.
After our jaunt in the park we moved on further south to Ushuaia, the world's most southerly city in the heart of the Tierra Del Fuego (Land of Fire). The city is famous for being relatively close to Antarctica, playing up it's history of the reputable names that have passed through such as Darwin, and playing host to a national park (Parque Tierra del Fuego) reputedly to be one of the world's most spectacular. Arriving after the 45 minute flight (buses take 21 hours!) we checked in to our French hosts B&B in the middle of town. We were thankful to have a few days here and not need to rush around like we had since leaving BA.
Ushuaia is a city split between tourism and industry, as it's the place to see penguins, seals, whales, but also seems to be bursting with shipping containers and fish stocks, being one of the few places in the world to distribute tasty King Crab. Winter was beginning to take hold and despite not being able to see the mountains on a mornings walk on the local slopes due to falling snow, our spirits did not dampen, or at least mine didn't
Ushuaia is a city split between tourism and industry, as it's the place to see penguins, seals, whales, but also seems to be bursting with shipping containers and fish stocks, being one of the few places in the world to distribute tasty King Crab. Winter was beginning to take hold and despite not being able to see the mountains on a mornings walk on the local slopes due to falling snow, our spirits did not dampen, or at least mine didn't
Cue snowball fight.
I was honestly aiming for my good-for-nothing ugly brother, but my snowballs seemed to find Sarah more often than Alex. Whoops! Back in from the cold and back down nearer the sea, we took a trip to see some penguins on the very tip of Argentina. The weather had returned with a vengeance, as we not only had fierce winds, but freezing rain as well. The penguins undeterred, shot towards the beaches like flying-fish torpedoes and provided much entertainment, despite most of us having frozen noses and fingers. I'm quite glad these penguins had the island to themselves, as they made a fair mess of the place; penguin poop everywhere and nests appearing anywhere. Despite the Penguin's lack of a sewage system or system of managing planning applications, they're great fun to watch and well worth going to see.
Our final taste of Tierra del fuego, was the national park itself. We were lucky to be in town in Autumn, as its easy to see how the park got it's firey name. The thousands of trees of the park at the end of the world were a brilliant colour palette of reds, oranges, yellows and golden browns. Photos do more justice than I can so see the link below, plus I'm typing in Hong Kong, and I'm flying home tomorrow, so I'm heading out on a Dim Sung bender and can't be bothered to write any more. Suffice to say, my two weeks with Alex and Sarah were fantastic, and we headed back to BA, they were off to Blighty and I to NZ.
Maybe I'll get around to writing about New Zealand at some point, or maybe in a few days or weeks, I'll bore you with my stories face to face, so you can't ignore them...
I hope you've found these blogs readable and not too dull, as the time I've had, has been so good at times, it's been tricky to put into words. Words are all well and good, but they never do an adventure justice.
There are a lot of photos here, testament to how beautiful all the places were (that doesn't include the ones of Alex behaving like a 5 year old)
Puerto Morino Glacier
Torres del Paine National Park
El Calafate
Ushuaia
Tierra del fuego
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