Burning the Inheritance

From Buenos Aires, we travelled south to (literally?) the end of the world. We travelled from Ushuaia, Argentina to El Calafate and El Chalten passing through Punta Arenas and and Puerto Natales, Chile along the way. All of these places share being gateways to the great outdoors of Patagonia, but each also had its own history, culture, and sense of place.

Ushuaia, Argentina – We started our Patagonian adventure by flying to Ushuaia which is the southernmost city in the world and therefore generally known as La Fin du Monde (the End of the World). We visited at the height of summer with balmy temperatures in the low to mid fifties (before wind chill). Sent postcards from the Post Office at the End of the World and had a great hike along the Beagle Channel, the senda costera (coastal hike).

Punta Arenas, Chile -Punta Arenas is located on the Straits of Magellan and is the capital city of Chile’s southernmost region of Magallanes and Antarctica. With a population of about 130,000, it also by far the largest city in the region. Our stay in Punta Arenas was unfortunately abbreviated due to a bus scheduling issue. Our gracious host Cristian helped make up for it by driving us to the to visit the beautiful Sara Braun Cemetery (which had been at the top of our list of sites to see) before driving us to the bus station to continue our trip to El Calafate.

El Calafate, Argentina – El Calafate, with a population of about 30,000 sits on Lake Argentina with awesome views everywhere (top left below is view from the deck of our apartment there). El Calafate functions as the gateway to the Argentinian Los Glacieres National Park including the Perito Moreno Glacier and El Chalten. Similar to other Patagonian gateway cities, it has tons of restaurants with great food as well as some very nice shops. As luck would have it, we visited during their annual Lake Festival with free live shows every night including Lali and Tini, two top South American pop stars. Consistent with the Patagonia theme great food and great beer!

Perito Moreno Glacier – The Perito Moreno Glacier is only about a one and one-half hour bus ride from El Calafate. It is part of the third largest ice sheet in the world (behind Antarctica and Greenland) and is the only glacier in Patagonia accessible by means other than boat or days of hiking. Truly spectacular and awesome, it advances about 2 meters a day and you hear the cracks of ice calving every five to ten minutes (sounds like dynamite!). After lots of hiking around, finished our day trip with cocktails made from million years old ice (bottom left below).

El Chalten, Argentina – El Chalten, which is considered to be the trekking capital of Argentina, is the nexus for access to the Argentinean Glacier National Park and, in particular, the famous Fitz Roy/El Chalten mountain range. It is a very small town which is almost exclusively hostels and restaurants serving the many hikers and backpackers who pass through here. Unbelievably amazing scenery, including Fitz Roy, waterfalls, and Andean condors (so big!).

Puerto Natales, Chile – We passed through Puerto Natales on our way from Punta Arenas to El Calafate and then again as a point of departure from Patagonia due to their airport and cheap flights to Santiago. It is a nice little gateway town to the Torres del Paine National Park in Chile which has built a reputation for good food as well as hospitality to travellers.

Travelling by Bus – Although we had flirted with it prior, Patagonia was our first real effort at travelling from place to place exclusively by bus. The length of these journeys varied from five to ten hours a leg and, while the buses are reasonably comfortable, scheduling is a real challenge (especially multi-leg trips).

Probably most memorable were the frontier border crossings between Argentina and Chile – we ended up making three of these along the way!

At this point, we are starting to feel like we have mastered the art, but (perhaps because of these experiences), we have opted to fly from Patagonia to Santiago rather than take the 40+ hour bus journey we had originally planned.

PS – Unfortunately, nothing happens when you push the “Cocktails” button!