Days 37-39: El Calafate, Argentina

It Friday evening, we took a flight to El Calafate, a city in the southernmost province of Patagonia. The airport fell a few miles outside the city, and there was absolutely nothing else around the landing site. So as we neared our destination, we strained our eyes to see through the darkness. It wasn't until right before we hit the tarmac that we were able to make out any part of our surroundings. Needless to say, we were a long way from home.

We got a ride through the quiet "city" to our hotel, and settled in for the night. The next morning, we woke up bright and early to go on a boat excursion through Lago Argentino. We boarded a catamaran that seated about 200 people, and took off on the lake. El Calafate has become a tourist destination because of its proximity to Los Glaciares National Park. So as the boat traveled through the chilly air, we soon caught sight of numerous icebergs and a few massive glaciers. 

We spent several hours aboard the catamaran, gaining a distant view of some of the region's largest natural wonders. The air was windy with occasional flurries, so we did most of our sightseeing from the comfort of the ship. Although we did pop outdoors a few times to snap some photos of the landscape:

That afternoon, we walked through El Calafate and stopped in a few of the shops. We discovered that there were only three types of stores in the city: those selling winter gear, those selling souvenirs, and those selling chocolate and ice cream. Suffice it to say this was not exactly the type of shopping my mom had in mind, but she still did not leave empty-handed.

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The following day, Dan and I woke up to a banging on our door and the sound of my mom's voice: "Randi? Dan? Are you up? Our ride is here!" I had incorrectly set up the alarm on my replacement phone, so we were not at all prepared for our departure time. My mom went to grab us some breakfast  items while we scrambled to get ready. To our credit, we were out the door in just over five minutes.

That morning we were heading off to get an up close and personal view of the Perito Moreno glacier. It was a clear and relatively warm morning, which we discovered was a rare treat, as the area sees more than 300 days of snow each year. We took another catamaran to the site, and as soon as we got near, were in awe of the glacier's magnitude; we later learned that it is 3 miles wide and a staggering 19 miles long. 

Once ashore, we walked to a small hut where we were strapped into ice cleats that we would need for our mini-trek on the glacier. We were then broken into groups and given instructions on how to walk in our cleats: uphill with feet out-turned like a penguin, and downhill with a straight back and heavy stomps. We then began our long hike on the glacier. The walk itself was relatively easy and we spent the majority of our journey taking in the details of the ice mass: huge crevasses, bright blue colors where the ice was densest, and natural pools that we could drink from.

Every aspect of the glacier was truly breathtaking, and we needed to restrain ourselves from taking too many repetitive pictures. Our journey ended an hour and a half later when our guides took us to a trolley filled with glasses. They chipped away fresh ice from the glacier and filled our glasses with ice and whiskey. We toasted to an incredible experience and drank down the liquor.

We ate lunch beside the glacier, and then traveled back on the catamaran. In the afternoon, we went to a different location where we had panoramic views of the glacier. Every so often, we heard a loud boom, then saw ice break away from the mass and plummet into the water. The sounds were disproportionately loud to the sizes of the falling pieces; you would have thought giant sheets were falling rather than tiny chunks. Even still, it was exciting to witness. And every time we turned away and then looked back to face the glacier, the site recaptivated us. It is really hard to explain what was so remarkable about a giant mass of ice, but we all shared in this sentiment.

The following day was pretty low-key. We said goodbye to my mom midday as she departed to go back home. We then spent the afternoon taking a bike ride along the lake and hanging out at the hotel. At night, we ate dinner in town, and then returned to the hotel where we lounged around until leaving El Calafate the next day.