Some serious trekking round Patagonia...
Trip Start
Jul 14, 2009
1
28
31
Trip End
Feb 18, 2010
Ushuaia, Patagonia, Argentina
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
In this period, I walked in 3 places:
We headed down over the Magellen Straits, spotting dolphins and penguins racing in the ferry bow wave to...
1. Tierra del Fuego National Park: a tiny but idyllic national park next door to Ushuaia, the southernmost city in the world, and bordering the Beagle Channel. The walking is mainly gentle, along well groomed paths, but transports you through an unfolding landscape of little sea coves, vast beds of blooming Patagonian flowers, picture post card mountain scapes and fertile woodland. I spent two lovely days here wandering through the whole national park, picking up my 'end of the world stamp' for my passport (obligatory), picnicing by lakes and returning to our campsite weary at the end of the day for delicious asado and truck BBQs.
Once we had left the Tierra del Fuego (called the land of fire because early explorers, rounding Cape Horn, never landed but saw the lights of the fires by night of the indiginous tribe who inhabited Tierra del Fueho), we journeyed north, back into Chile. Our next stop was...
2. Torres del Paine National Park, home of some of the more famous peaks of Patagonia, the Torres and Cuernos del Paine. Five of us set of, with tents, sleeping equipment and provisions for five days on our backs, to complete the 'W Walk', a walk which marks a 'W' shape around the famous peaks. On our trek we saw glaciers, mountains, forests, lakes...this was one of the most beautiful walks I have ever been on. Every night we camped in one of the designated refuges and competed in a 'pasta-off': who could cook the best pasta out of a freeze dried bag. The results were amusing, would have probably been inedible under most circumstances, but were gobbled appreciatively at the time. The climax of the walk, on the final day, was reaching a view point right underneath the Torres del Paine: a just staggering view. We returned to the truck aching, extremely weary, but very content.
Travelling north once again, we arrived in the tiny town of El Chalten. This town, which lies right on the border between Argentina and Chile, was only built 30 years ago by the Argentinians, in order to stop the Chileans from claiming the land. It is pretty touristy, but is the base for spectacular walking and ice trekking right from the town. I spent two days walking around...
3. Mount Fitzroy and the surrounding mountains. Without doubt, Mount Fitzroy is the most spectacular landscape I have seen. The mountain looks like a theatre set from a fairy tale story, and when blessed with a sunny day, the view is just out of this world. My walks took me through thick Patagonian shrubbery and flowers, across ice cold and potable streams (delicious), along vast and dramatic valleys with gushing rivers, up to high, blue glacial lakes with vast glaciers overhanging them, to view points with impossibly spiky mountains framed in the distance, and finally, right up a steep incline to a view point right below the towering Fitzroy, a truly spine tingling place!
Comments
when clouds encounter Fitz Roy, they are cut like by a knife.
It's a spectacular!