Argentina: El Chalten

It took me quite a while and costed morre than I thought to arrive all the way to El Chalten. I had a bus over night to Rio Gallego, then a bus to El Calafate and finally a bus to El Chalten. I had 5 hours to wait in El Calafate and the first impression is that it's a very touristic city; maybe more even than Bariloche. In the bus from El Calafate to El Chalten I met a french girl (Julie) who told me about her trek in Torres del Paine. She was heading to El Chalten to work in a museum. Lots of French people bellow 30 are taking adventage of the 1 year free visa that allows to work in Argentina. When I arrived, I just tagged along with 2 girls from the bus to go to the same hostel (super cheap, only 80 pesos!).

The next day, the weather was not looking great. I went to the information center and they were expecting lots of wind for 3 days and some rain for 2 days. I went on a small hike to mirador de las Aguilas with a nice view on lago Viedma. On the way up I saw 3 more condors. Then I passed quickly to the hostel and met a German girl (Miriam) with whom I went to another small hike to Chorrillo del Salto (waterfall). Not very impressive but still nice. When back at the hostel I didn't do much and went to sleep early because I wanted to get up erly the next day. One thin that surprised me both in El Calafate and El Chalten is the amount of young people from Israel. Because of it, even the signs are writen in hebreu.

The next day, took a bus at 8am (after going in a taxi thinking it was the transport I had pay for) to go to Hosteria El Pilar (17km away) to start my hike. It was really cloudy and raining as well together with some wind. I was quite alone on the way up. The goal was to arrive to Laguna de los tres which is right bellow the Fitz Roy (very impressive mountain). I ate there and met a swiss guy. The clouds went away and I had a great weather for the rest of the day. On the way down, I went to the glacier Piedras Blancas which was really impressive!!! I loved it and stayed an hour there. On the way back to El Chalten, I was stoppin every 5 min to take a look at the view on the Fitz Roy behind me for 10 minutes. It's really imposing!! In the evening I chatted a bit with some people at the hostel and stayed there.

The next day I went to hike to Laguna torre. The weather was bad. Rain and even snow at the top but the hike was cool, going in the trees and arriving to a lake with a nice view on a glacier. But the cerro Torre was always in the clods and I couldn't see it at all. I spent the evening at the hostel once again and met a french couple and an american girl who gave me some more tips for he other countries I plan to visit.

The next day (december 8th), the weather was really good except some cloids on cerro Torre (I didn't manage to see it for the entire 4 days I was here). I left for a hike to Loma del Plegue Tumbado which is a small mountain with a great view on both cerro Torre and Fitz Roy normally. The hike was really nice. A part in the woods and a steep part in the rocks to arrive to the top. From there, here is a magnificent 360 view point. I stayed more than 1 hour there and met a family whih came all the way there to celebrate the father's 40th birthday! Once back in town I took a quick showe and headed to the bus terminal to head to El Calafate.