I am back! It has been a very busy two weeks, especially the past week. This past week I went to the area of Patagonia to the cities of El Calafate and El Chalten. The week before the trip wasn't anything exciting, honestly I can't think of anything that happened out of the ordinary last week. I had school, went to another open air market, and of course danced my way through the weekend! You all have heard the typical story of all of that so let me get to the good stuff- my trip to Patagonia! I left for Patagonia on Thursday (May 15) and got back yesterday (May 20). I went with my friend Arianah and we spent three days in Chalten and three days in Calafate. It was an absolutely amazing trip. We flew to Calafate on Thursday morning and got there in the afternoon. Our bus tickets to Chalten that we bought online said our bus left at 6:30 so we had time to wander the town and get something to eat. Around 5:30 we headed back to the train station because it was cold and we didn't have much else to do. We went up to the counter to ask the woman if there was an earlier bus to Chalten that we could get on since we were there so early. She just looks at me confused and says "um, the last bus left at 5:00... there is no more buses tonight, I don't know why your bus ticket says 6:30. We can change your ticket to the next bus which is 8:00am tomorrow morning!" So there we are in Calafate with the incorrect bus ticket, now its dark out and we have no hotel booked for that night. We asked the other two companies if they had any trips tonight and they all said no. We had no other choice but to just find a hotel for the night and leave tomorrow morning instead. We went back into town and wandered until we found a nice looking hotel for us to stay in for the night. The next morning comes and we make it to the bus station and get on our bus and we are on our way to Chalten! It is only about a three hour bus ride, and oh my goodness is it gorgeous! Surrounded by snow covered mountains and winding rivers. We made a stop at a hotel and restaurant for those we needed to get something to eat or use a bathroom. As we sat on the bus a puppy and a cat came on the bus and wanted to stay. We didn't notice them until we were about to leave! Almost left with two extra passengers! We continued on and we made it to the tiny town of Chalten, it probably takes about 15-20 minutes to walk from one end of town to the other. This town is down as the "trekking capital of the nation" and that is what we did! We found our hotel, dropped our stuff, layered up and went out to go on our first hike! The first hike was called "Lago de Torre" It was about a 6 hour hike there and back. It was a cold day but you didn't notice because all you could focus on was the beauty surrounding you. This hike wasn't too challenging, especially when comparing it to the hike we did the next day! Our first hike was a beautiful one, surrounded by mountains, lakes, rivers, trees. The end of the hike was the best part, absolutely breath taking! It was a lake with a glacier behind it. If it wasn't so cold I could have stood there for hours. It was beautiful. We then had to head back, did't want to get caught in the dark while hiking through the mountains! We made it back to town frozen to the bone and hungry! We went to a cafe and ordered some "submarinos" A very common drink here in Argentina, it's their version of a hot chocolate. They steam milk and give you a bar of chocolate with it, so you put the chocolate in on your own! After we thawed out at the cafe we headed back to our hotel to relax until dinner time. When it came to be time for dinner we bundled up and went to find a place... well that was where another problem came in. Since it is becoming winter here in Argentina, the towns we were in were having their "off season" therefore not many places were open; some hotels and restaurants were closed until September! We wandered the tiny town and just couldn't find a place to eat. Nowhere was open, we found a place with some snack so that was our dinner! We then went back to our hotel and just went to bed............................
The next morning came, we got up early, ate breakfast, bought some sandwiches for a lunch and headed out on hike number two! This hike is a little over 8 hours long and a difficult one! We weren't cold during this hike! The first hour or so was all uphill and was very tiring! It leveled out for most of the middle of the hike. The beauty of this hike was amazing, no words or pictures can begin to explain! (the picture I have attached to this blog is a picture taken on this hike) In this hike we got to see the mountain of Fitz Roy (tallest mountain in the picture) and it is beautiful- breath taking. The viewpoint of Fitz Roy is about 2 hours into the hike and we had about 2 more until we reached the end of the hike before turning around. When we neared the end we approached a sign that said "Good physical condition required." It was an hour hike literally straight up the mountain! Arianah and I looked at each other and just said "you ready?" and up we went! About 20 minutes up the hill we started to notice some snow and ice, and that was just be beginning. As we went up the ice and snow started getting worse and worse. The amount of times we slipped and had to crawl up the trail was crazy, yes extremely dangerous and now looking back don't know how smart it was to complete that but we had to get to the top, we had only heard absolutely amazing things! After a very long, difficult, and scary hike up we made it to Lago de los Tres. It was a lake with Fitz Roy right behind it; definitely worth the hike! We sat up there and ate our lunch and just relaxed because our legs were like jell-o. We met some other hikers who made it to the top. One dad and son looked at us and asked "how on earth did you get up here in those shoes?" all we had was running shoes, neither of us own hiking boots! We took our time relaxing up there because we didn't even want to think about how were were supposed to get down this icy trail! We finished our lunch and soon didn't have a choice to head back down because if we didn't we might get caught in the dark. We started our journey down the mountain, and well let's just say that the majority of the hike down was on our butts! It was scary but was better than we anticipated; probably because on the way down we knew what to expect. We made it down the steep part of the hike and then had about three more hours into our hike until we made it back into town! We picked up the pace because we need to get back, and more importantly, we were hungry! We made it back into town in almost exactly 8 hours! We went straight to a restaurant and ordered a pizza (we got dinner this night! woot!) Arianah and I split a pizza... and well let's say we were still hungry after that! In just those two days we did 47 kilometers of hiking! (about 30 miles!) After we finished our pizza we went back to our hotel and collapsed onto our beds, feeling like we couldn't move! Not too long after we went to a small grocery store to get snacks- we were hungry! We then went to bed because we had our bus back to Calafate in the morning. The next morning came and we headed to the bus station. We found our bus and got on and then as we are waiting to leave we encounter another problem. The bus driver comes on the bus and calls our names and he proceeds to tell us that the bus tickets we bought online were for last Sunday, not this Sunday. We then had to buy two more tickets for this Sunday. We don't know how we missed this when we bought the tickets- we both remember double checking the dates! We bought more tickets and off to Calafate we went! We arrived in Calafate in the early afternoon and got lunch then went to check into our hostel. It was an amazing hostel, the view was absolutely amazing! You could see mountains and a lake- the whole back side of the hostel was windows. It was beautiful! It was Sunday by this point and didn't have any plans that day because on Monday we planned to go to visit Perito Moreno Glacier and do a mini trekking tour on the glacier. Monday came along and we got picked up at 8:30 (still pitch black out at the time in the morning, the days are very short that far south!) We headed towards the National Glacier Park and as we continued on into the park, in our huge tourist bus, we began to slow down and I noticed we were kinda sliding on the road. All of a sudden the bus stops and the bus driver, along with almost every male on the bus get out to put chains on the back tires to try to help prevent the sliding. We made it to the first view point of the glacier and were told we could get out and take pictures but we had to wait there until we got word from the park officials if we could continue due to the icy roads. We were at this viewpoint for about 45 minutes. The view was beautiful, this glacier is the 3rd largest in Argentina. It was amazing to be able to see this huge glacier in person! We were then given word that we could continue onto the next viewpoint of the glacier, about 10 more minutes up the road. We arrived there and we were told to stay in the bus. After about 15 minutes of sitting there we were told we could get out. We then realized why they wanted us to stay in the bus- the ground was a sheet of ice! Saw someone wipe out, and a couple other close ones! We got to take some pictures, we were closer to the glacier now! We then hopped back on the bus because it was cold out! As we sat in the bus some park rangers in their cars came up and were talking to our tour guides. A little bit later we saw a tow truck with a park ranger car on the back- the front of the park ranger truck was completely smashed in, it crashed. So after seeing that we realized that these roads were not good at all! After being there for awhile longer they told us that we could not continue on and do our mini trekking tour or get any closer, we had to head back into town. It was very upsetting because it was something we were really looking forward to doing but can't do anything about Mother Nature! We made it back into town at about 4:00 pm. It was an extremely long day of doing just about nothing.. We went to get some food because we hadn't eaten all day because we were stuck in a bus! Even though we couldn't get extremely close and weren't able to walk on the glacier, we did get to see it from a distance and that is something I will never forget- it was incredible. We kinda then just hung around town and did a little tourist shopping. We then headed back to our hostel for bed, we left to go back to Buenos Aires the next day. We woke up and had breakfast then had to check out of our room, we then just hung in the common area of the hostel and did our homework because we missed 3 days of classes for the trip. We then got lunch and got picked up for the airport at 2:00. We make it to the airport to find out our flight is delayed for about an hour. We just hung around the airport with nothing to do- but at least the airport had a beautiful view! Definitely helped! We finally boarded the plane and took off for Buenos Aires. We landed at about 8:30 last night, got our luggage. I then had to stand in line for a taxi, which took an hour! There is always a line but it is usually not this long! But hey, I got to meet some people from Canada while standing in line! haha I finally made it back home at 10:30, had dinner, did a little homework, and went to bed! It had been a very long, but amazing, six days! Even though not everything went as planned during our trip it was still absolutely amazing and a trip I will never forget. Today I was back to school and doing homework! Today has been cold and rainy, so a perfect day for me to write my blog! That is all I have for now. I don't have any more trips planned for my time here- I only have 4 more weeks left, only 3 more weekend. I cannot believe how fast time is flying, it's scary! Well I will post on here soon! Besos <3
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