PATAGONIA part 1

Hi everybody, At last I found a computer that wasn't very expensive or very slow. Two days ago i had the slowest computer ever to be found. It was that slow, that when i hit a key on the keyboard, I saw a little man running out of it towards the postoffice to send that abroad. in the mean time i wasn't able to do much, so i stopped. No i'm back on line and i'm trying to show you through my eyes some things of PATAGONIA. Believe me PATAGONIA is incredible.


PATAGONIA

I'm still in Argentina but not for long. I'm in the border town los Antiquos and tomorrow i'll be going to Chili, to travel further up north into the direction of Chiloe, a big island, but later i'll go back to Argentinia, still in Patagonia by the way, because Patagonia is big, really big, and i mean BIG.

During the last few weeks my plans already have changed quite a few times, mainly for the following reasons, - Chili is much more expensive than Arg, and nature here is nature there, so that doesn't make a difference, - one of the main attractions in south chili is Torres del Peine, the park is/was on fire, so it wasn't worth going there (many tourist however heard that the park was on fire and closed after they had bought their bus and entrance tickets, and sorry no refund possible!) -the third reason is that i'm travelling since Ushuaia with Christiana, a lovely italian girl, and she already had been there (I thank the fate) , so instead of going to Torres del Peine, we went to El Chalten, that should be as pretty as TdP. (see for yourself later on). - finally we decided that travelling route 40 (the road che guevara did 50 years ago) would be a little more adventurous because lesser tourists are travelling this way. Well you'll see.

The biggest attraction in this part of PATAGONIA is PARQUE NACIONAL LOS GLACIARES, and there's no word french in that.



Perito Moreno Glacier1


Park Nacional Los Glaciares1


Perito Moreno Glacier2


Perito Moreno Glacier3


Perito Moreno Glacier4


Perito Moreno Glacier5


It's the second park in largeness of Argentina (660000 ha), 40% of it is covered with ice, a great number of glaciers are tumbling down into lakes with all sorts of different shapes and colours, there are an incredible amount of lakes here, one of them the Lago Argentina is the biggest of Argentina. The lakes have many different colours, from azure to turqoise to emerald, but also milkywhite with a little blue. The latter possibly because the water is too could for some minerals to dissolve. It is even possible that to lakes that that are adjacent have different colours. I saw this near the Perito Moreno glacier. Don't think this is all PATAGONIA has to offer, despite all the water, PATAGONIA looks like a desert. We now have been travelling more than 2000 kms, and what you most of the time will see are mountains, rocks, sand and some times some small bushes (20 cm high maximum), sometimes grass, and very few trees and small forests. The forest are not in good shape, many dead and half dead trees, probably because life is harsh here. One day the temperature is nice 20 degrees C, the other day it can be cold (5 degrees C), and the wind can be furious. Probably this is a result of the glaciars that are never far away and function as instant freezers, and if the wind starts blowing you better take care because it can blow you from a mountain, which almost happened to us in Ushuaia. I left you in Ushuaia where we took to plain to El Calafate. El Calafate is situated on the shore of the Lago Argentina, which is beautifully coloured turqoise, and the city is rapidly developing into a mecca for tourists (unfortunately it is therefore the most expensive place of argentina), although still cheap if you're carrying euros. F.i. it costs around 8 euros for a decent dinner. The main attractions here are the perito moreno glacier, and a boat trip along the lago argentina, i'll come to that in a minute. First we have been camping 3 days in the park that's near the Perito Moreno in a primitive campsite. The hot showers here however were the best we had until that far!!! The Perito Moreno Glaciers is one of the many miracles in this area (i think you can agree on that isn't it Johan Schuitemaker???). Until recent it was one of the few glaciers that was still growing but since 98 this glaciar is also starting to retreat. The glaciers feeds two arms of a lake (the brazo rico and the canal de los tempanos), and they finally stream into the lago argentino. Both arms by the way have different colours! On the second day of our stay we made a walk to the glacier, where we will be staying until sunset. One of the special attractions here are the sounds of creacking(?) and ice breaking away from the glaciar and falling with a lott of noise into the lake. We even feared for a little tsunami, when a big icepiece broke off the glacier. At night we weren't very lucky, first a few fellow country men and some israeli's stole our wood, next our gasstove falls into the campfire, without however causing an explosion (a same accident set torres del peine on fire!). this results in a lousy dinner, and because of the cold we go to bed very early.



Boat Journey to Uppsala

Back in Calafate we decide to take a very expensive boat trip along the lago argentina. main target for this trip is the glaciar Upsala, the biggest glaciar of argentina (60 km in lenght, 4 km wide). This is an incredible boat trip in the valley of the glaciers. I thought i had some unforgettable expericiences allready, but this boattrip was ........ WOWOWOWOWOW. I'm still emotionally unstable after this. The colors during this trip are so diverse. Ocre, turqoise, phtalocianine blue, are the most outstanding colors, but there is much more.


Boat Journey to Uppsala, just another glacier

The landscape is rougher than rough, enormous glaciers are exiting into the water (f.i. the glaciar SPEGAZZINI), and especially the colours of the ice that has broken loose is breathtaking. (Many times during this boat trip we hear people shouting OOOOOOOH and AAAAAAAAH, as if you are watching fireworks). But not only that, the combination with glaciers that are situated higher upon the mountains, from where fierce cascades are streaming down into the lakes, sometimes cascades that are situated higher than the iceformations, gives you the impression of being a tiny creature amongst fierce creations of nature.


In front of the SPEGGAZZINE GLACIER


THE SPEGGAZZINE GLACIER


LAGO ONELLI

We set course to Onelli where we walked around a lake into which three glaciers are dropping their icecubes. Yes lago Onelli looks like a big Martini on the Rocks.


ICEBERGS


UPPSALA GLACIER

Finally we set sail to Upsala, which is impressive but because we have seen so much during this day, and because we don't get that near, it's less than SPEGGAZZINI. But sure this was a day not to be forgotten. Cristiana took more than 200 pictures during this trip.


UPPSALA GLACIER2


ICEBERGS2


ICEBERGS3


Fitzroy massive

From El Calafate we travel to El Chalten. The journey to this place is again (it gets to be a little boring I know) breathtaking. it is desolate, but beautiful. The arid areas, the yellow of the grass, the blue lakes, more glaciars, the dirty green and brown, the dust, the rocks etc. Even the clouds are different here, because of the fierce wind you can see clouds that are round and smooth on the top. El Chalten is also in the párk los glaciaros, and is situated near the massive of Fitz Roy. the town itself is little, but also here you see the start of massa tourism, until two years ago there were only a few houses, now in the whole valley people are building houses, trying to make money with a hostel or restaurant, and until now the entrance to the park is FREE. The roads however are still sandy, but that will change in the near future probably.
El Chalten is situated in a valley between big mountains, and like everywhere else in PATAGONIA it can be windy, stormy more a less.


Fitzroy massive2


Fitzroy massive3

On our second day here we hire a guide from NYCA trekking. We climbe to a (again!) a glaciar Huemul, where we walk upon the glaciar and even do some ice climbing. To get into the ice, you have to kick hard, and as a result my boots don't survive this adventure. Well they allready were more than 10 years old. We are lucky with the weather, because when we arrived it was storming but today it is rather calm, and even we sometimes see the sun.


Walking on a glacier


Glacier crevaces


Ice climbing


lakes with different colours

Also here you can see differently coloured lakes. The lake near the glacier is almost white, but the lake in the valley (lago desierto) is intense emerald green. the glaicar itself makes a lott of noise, because of the melting water, and you really can hear that there is a lot of water running under the glaciar. The crevaces are sometimes very deep, and like everywhere else with ice, you see a lot of different blue colours. They resemble the colours i used during my painting period in 2000 and 2001.



Valley near El Chalten

We leave for a 3 day trekking in the park.


Fitzroy near Lago Capri

We first go to Lago Capri, that gives a splendid view of the massive of Fitz Roy, we walk further to the camping ground of Poincenot, which is even more primitive than the camp site near perito moreno (no showers, no water and the bath room is not more than a {stinking} hole in the ground. The site is stuffed with israeli's -you meet a lot of them here- and as always when there are many, there is a lott of noise!! We are again lucky with the weather, because it is beautiful.


Fitzroy near Laguno Los Tres

Next day we climbe to the Laguno the los Tres, with the best vieuw of the massive. It is a climb of ca 420 meter, the path is not too good, because the many tourists enhance the erosion of the path strongly. Above we stay there for the rest of the day, enjoying the view, and the company of Colin, an Englishman living in Barcelona, when he is not travelling.


Fitzroy near Laguno Los Tres2


Fitzroy near Lago Madre sunset


Lago Madre sunset


Fitzroy near Lago Madre next day

On the last day of our trekking we walk for about 20 km with backpacks, along the lakes Madre Y Higa (mother and daughter) -these lakes are situated at different altitudes, some 10 meters difference in altitude)- into forests, and finally to Lago Torre, with a view on Torre, another peak of the massive.


Lago Hija


Torre massive


Laguno Torre

This time the glaciar ends into the lake, and therefor you can see some icebergs floating in the water. We again meet Collin and travel back together to El Chalten. (it is funny by the way that along our journey we often meet people more than once, f.i. I met a guy from Holland in Ushuia, in calafate and in el chalten. Yes everybody has the same guide!


Fitzroy massive again and again and again

We stay another few days in Chalten, but because the weather gets worse we don't do much. One day we try to walk to another viewpoint, but just before we are there after 4 ours walking, the weather turns bad, and there goes the view! In El Chalten we meet Riccard who we earlier met in ushuaia. He is back from Antarctica, had a splendid time, and we, well we didn't pay 3000 dollars, but who knows one day.................


Typical Patagonian Landscape


El Chaperall

Okay!!, now I'm in Los Antiguos, a little border town. Tomorrow we will go to Chili for probably a week. los Antiquos is not very exciting but yesterday we had a splendid day, because we went for a horseride with the owner of the hostel. He is also farmer and he took us to his farm, and from there we went for a ride of more than 3 ours on a horse (yes everything is blue, yes also on that place!!!), but is was a wonderful ride. the horses were very patient, and when I at the end of the ride fell of the horse, because my saddle started gliding to one side, the animal stopped his galope, and looked to me with eyes that expressed something like - you poor thing...... One of the pleasantries of not touristic towns is that people are still glad to meet people from other countries, and to show you the things they are proud of, and after a pleasant day, we were having a big almost dutch meal (STOOFPOT) with the farmer and his help.


Lago Buenos Aires near Los Antiquos


near Los Antiquos


Typical Patagonia part 2


Los Endos