Argentina and Chile 2010

5 1/2 weeks

37 busses

over 7500km

10 000 empanadas

enough steak

and a billion cups of coffee.

Full Circle - Back to Buenos Aires

Once again Buenos Aires mesmerized us with it's art and music... La Boca was the suburb of choice this time with it's tango feel and brightly painted houses.

This city is a drug that will forever line out veins.

We will be coming back.

Puerto Madryn

After 34 hours of traveling, 30 of which were on a bus…we made it to our last stop in Patagonia on the west coast of Argentina – Puerto Madryn. It’s here that the Southern Right Whales come with their young to teach them the ways of the wild. This is the “bay of the whales”. And we were not disappointed.

We camped just outside town at the end of a peninsula for two nights and sat drinking wine in the evenings and coffee in the mornings watching the whales (mommies and babies) dance in the waters of the bay. It was a wonderful, peaceful end to a superb five weeks of journeying. It’s a privilege to watch these graceful, powerful, but vulnerable animals in the ocean.

Pics from Laguna de los Tres - Fitz Roy

El Chalten and Fitz Roy

El Chalten is the gateway to the trekking capital of Argentina – Fitz Roy. Generally reserved for the braver lot who can go out for weeks of hiking or who are experienced mountaineers/ ice climbers. But thank goodness for us mountaineering plebbs there are 1 to 3 day treks that are totally manageable with beautiful views on beautiful days…we were lucky enough to have one beautiful weather day.

We headed off for three days in the mountains, free entry, free camping…what travellar could ask for more. The first day was only 4 hours to Poincette campsite at the bottom of the steep climb to the famous Laguna de los Tres, which itself is at the bottom of Fitz Roy. We headed straight there after the bus ride from El Chalten and fell asleep not 30 minutes after the tents were pitched…at 4pm

H and I managed the climb in treacherous weather the next morning, just 2 km up, but a good 500m climb in the wildest wind I have ever experienced. At times we were forced to the ground to take shelter against the gusts. But the view was more than worth it, the entire experience was wild. We were even lucky enough to see our first frozen lake and out of the mountains came a group of 6 crazy mountaineers who had spent the night sleeping on a ledge in the snow up on Fitz Roy's snowy skirt. We raced down in the rain to pack up and head onwards and out, cutting the camping from three nights to one and settled to drinking coffee and catching up on sleep in El Chalten.

Perito Moreno Glacier - Argentina

Perito Moreno is the third biggest glacier in Argentina, it spans over 200km² and is one of the fastest moving glaciers in the world, moving at approximately 2m/day… This means you’re bound to see some ice fall from the 60m ice face that looms above the lake.

What an incredible experience, nothing really prepares you for the enormity of this giant ice animal. Standing next to the glacier you can feel its alive with movement, you can hear the cracks and groans and thunderous cacophony as ice falls to the melting pot below. It was the perfect surreal experience definitely the top of the “wow” moments on this adventure for the three of us African babies who’ve never even seen as ice berg before.

We also decided to splurge out and we took a boat to the bottom of the 60m ice shelf…about 300m away and watched the glacier living life creaking and groaning as it’s done for millennia.
Somehow words just cannot begin to describe the experience!

Hiking in Torres Del Paine

We've had the incredible priveledge of hiking in Torres del Paine. The park is located in the far south of Chilean Patagonia, close to the town of Puerto Natales. The landscape is breathtakingly beautiful with jagged, snow-capped peaks, emerald lakes of different hues and....well, glaciers. Many, many glaciers.

We spent 4 days hiking & camping here - visited Grey's glacier, the French valley and the base of the 3 towers of Torres del Paine. It was not only a visual experience of magnitude (read here many "wow" & "look at that" moments) but also so fullfilling to realize that us, mere mortals could reach these beautiful places - always seem to think they are reserved for the hardened explorers.

The only problem with a park like this is that it is so massive, and that 4 days only wets your appetite and you cannot wait to come back and explore it more fully!!

51* 43' 39' Southern latitude

We are packed and ready to hike the "W" in Torres del Paine after all. We've rearranged our bags, shed some 5-7kg of weight and loaded up with chocolate. Tomorrow is the big day and we head out at 7:30. The flight down from Puerto Montt to Punta Arenas in Chile was mindblowing. The mountains were covered in snow and we could see glaciers from the plane, it was like nothing I have ever dreamed of let alone seen....i don't think David Attenbourgh even covered it in Planet Earth - it is the most beautiful natural mountain spendor i have ever witnessed to date. I can only imagine the mountains themselves to be even more wonderful on foot.

The pictures are of Puerto Varas this morning minus the elusive volcano which has disguised itself as a cloud and Puerto Natales...obviously the blurry plane shots are from the middle seat of the plane passed someones nose of snow and glaciers - i'm sure you can tell right?

Overland Africa - Driving from Cape Town to London

You Tube Video by Nick and Joanne Yu from their trip through Africa and Europe. We met them in Nambia. This video has been made from 400hrs of recording. Really worth a view - what a journey.

More photos from 7 lakes route in the Argentinian lake district

These pics are of our camping grounds along Lago Traful and Lago Falkner and one of a view from a lookout of Lago Traful...enjoy

The 7 Lakes Route

One of the things we read up on so muc before we left was the 7 lakes route (Ruta de los Siete Lagos). This route winds through a series of lakes in the mountains between San Martin and Bariloche. The route is only tarred half way which definately adds to the appeal. We had looked into hiring a small car and was delighted to find out that this would be possible.

With me behind the wheel on the wrong side of the car we set off (in a Corsa... made by Chevrolet...???) on one of the most amazing journeys of my life. I will not bore you with all the times we said "wow" and "this is amazing" - but trust me, it is amazing. This i can say to anyone and everyone i know - Take a journey, come to this place.

We turned of the "main" route and headed to Lago Traful where we found a free campsite. In a setting that would make Cape Union Mart envious we pitched our tents and had a wonderful evening next to this beautiful lake.

The next day we continued on this journey passing many more view points and magical places.

We moved camp further down Lago Traful as we could not get enough of the peace and quiet.

Oh, and for all the fishermen out there - this is a little piece of heaven...!!

On the third day the weather had turned a bit miserable though and we only went as far as the closest coffee shop (was quite hard to find out here!!). At this point i have to be honest and say that we had a wet, cold and unpleasant evening camping but hey, it's all part of the great adventure!

Early the next morning we had to drop off the little car before catching the bus to Bariloche.

This place, this area has been an incredible blessing to see - could spend weeks exploring it with bike / car / hiking or kayaking!! Amazing