El Calafate - And - Perito Moreno Glacier
17 02 06  10  14
-------- From my travel log.
Portions of my travel log from my trip to Argentina and Chile. Specifically into the active glacier area of El Calafate and the Perito Moreno Glacier.
2005-Nov-25 – Perito Moreno Glacier The glacier is impressive to say the least. It is composed of massive blocks of ice leaning one over the other in an enormous field of ice that covers all the way beyond the horizon. It can be an overwhelming sight. It bluish hues are extremely beautiful, and the coldness of the ice it is very contrasting with the temperate climate and the spring blooming vegetation. The glacier keeps producing ice, or getting new ice, due to the snowfall on the Andes Mountains. It expands itself into the lake, forming a natural dam. The lake, stopped by the glacier increases its water levels, and eventually breaks the glacier barrier, starting the glacier growth again. Maybe the lake is the only thing preventing the ice blocks to continue inland. The sight of the blocked lake is impressive in photos, but at the time we visited the glacier it was still allowing just a bit of water to cross. The rupture occurs about every four years. From the observation platforms you can take very interesting pictures (on the picture website – if you don’t know the address, e-mail me and I will send it to you). While you take static pictures of the glacier and all its hues and colors, you will surely see ice falling from the sides of the glacier and crashing into the lake surface. The sound is spectacular, as these blocks of ice surely weight several tons, and when they crash into the lake they create a wave that could extend for almost a mile and last several minutes. Ice fragments extend in an arch from the impact point in a very interesting way. At the park you can also see the icebergs formed by this and other glaciers around the lake floating in the calm waters that are only interrupted by one ice falling or another. Tomorrow we will return to the viewing platforms and take a boat to the glacier. We will walk on top of the a portion of it and appreciate it close and personal. 2005-Nov-25 Downtown ‘El Calafate’ Calafate is a plant and a fruit very common in the area. They make jams with it. This town is the closest to the glacier, and probably the only one with a commercial airport in the area – even if it doesn’t really function due to a pilot strike. It has sprawled in the last couple of years by a book caused by the tourist industry and thousands of Argentineans running away from the economic issues in Buenos Aires and looking for an almost sure job and a better life and fortune in a growing industry. Since the economic crisis a few years ago, the town population has jumped from 4,000 to 16,000 – and growing. A couple of long city/town streets are packed with restaurants, internet/telephone stores, camera stores, souvenirs, outfitters, and tour guides. Most of them open until 22:00 or 23:00, allowing you to enjoy the night after your daily adventures. Apparently the area specialty is roasted lamb. Not a coincidence, considering that the English left a prosperous lamb industry decades ago. They roast it whole, over a hot bed of coals. It must be done very slowly and the animal must be a bit afar from the coals to avoid burning and dryness. Transportation to and from the city is a challenge. Bus operators offer few departures a day to Chile and other Argentinean cities. Aereolineas Argentina is the only alternative the air fore operated LADE. Neither of them is reliable. The later is kind of primitive, and the former was not operating due to pilot strike. The city is pricey. You will notice that it is more expensive than Buenos Aires, in part because everything is ‘imported’ from big cities or across the world, but most importantly because either you buy things there or there isn’t any other town where you can go and buy things. Hotel reservations don’t necessarily mean you got a room. Hotels easily agree to reserve tours to important attractions but forget about their customers once they hang up the phone. Also, the government allows or promotes monopolies to some excursion types in the natural park services. All of these things where discovered during our initial excursion into El Calafate. For some reason, you don’t feel there is a service culture down here. 2005-Nov-26 – Mini Trekking Mini Trekking is a big word for the activity. I would rather call it Ice Walking or Visit to the Glacier Itself. Micro or Nano Trekking could be good options as well. Nonetheless it is a fun and worthy experience, albeit you have to dedicate one day to it even when the trekking part of it lasts for 3 hours. For 250 pesos (about $80) a bus picks you up at y our hotel in El Calafate and drives you to the Glacier Viewing Platforms where you spend a couple of hours taking beautiful and impressive snapshots of the glacier and the ice fallings. Later the bus takes you to the dock where you take a boat to the other side of the lake: where the glacier is coming from. The trip up the glacier is fun and simple enough. After a glaciology small talk you don crampons on your boots and start the climb. It feels very nice to enter the massive extension of ice you view from the Viewing Platforms. You walk on the ice with a guide that points you to the interesting ice features like sinkholes, caves, and cracks. Being inside the glacier feels like being in a world of ice. It looks even more majestic than from the outside. 2005-Nov-26 -- Downtown ‘El Calafate’ -- Again Upon returning from our int-the-glacier adventure we stopped by main street (Avenida El Libertador) in El Calafate to buy souvienirs, download photos, and eat. Soon we discovered that El Calafate may resemble man other tourist destinations. Same kind of souvenirs, same streetr markets, and same overprices. Some of the souvenirs are probably mass produced in China and shipped all over the world to many tourist destinations on different countries where they mark them with the name of the place. Some types of souvenirs that may be worth considering are: mate cups, Calafate fruit jam, wool and leather goods, and some pretty silver pendants with indigenous designs. Adriana is still missing a pair of boots she decided not to buy. As for the photo downloading, I learned that if you must pay someone to do it is better to have them do it in front of you and verify it in a second computer. We found such place with a modern Kodak Kiosk machine for such purposed downtown. We tried to eat again at “Mi Viejo” Restaurant, but it was extremely full. It is a place where we ate a night before a good portion of lamb, side, and beer for two for less than $20 USD. The lamb they prepare is ultra-tender as it is slowly cooked over the hot coals for a really long time. They have a display in the front of the store with the lamb being cooked – I have only seen this kind of cooking before in Monterrey, but there they do goats instead of lambs – similar thing. It was packed, however, we didn’t had the time to wait and had to o to some other place of dubious quality of food, flavor, décor, and cleanliness. Lesson learned: good food comes to those who wait, or arrive early. 2005-Nov-27 – Long Road We where lucky to do the trip from Punta Arenas to Puerto Natales in the evening, and lucky again to do the trip from Puerto Natales in the morning and still have time to see the Perito Moreno Glacier. On the way back it is not so easy. We had reserved the 8am bus to Puerto Natales. There where not too many choices: bus, an airline with an overextended pilot strike, an extremely expensive taxi, or an equally expensive rental car through unsafe, paved roads (some of them with mine field signs on the sides of the road). At least the bus was called ‘Regular’, which made us hope it would depart and arrive some time during the day. (40 pesos, or about $13 dollars). So far buses have been close to being on time. The main issue with busses is their schedule. The latest bus departs at 6pm because they must cross the border before 10pm, when it closes until the next day. Eventually we did departed on the packed buss, crossed the Argentinean emigration and crossed the Chilean immigration as well as numerous security posts along the way. These countries love to make people feel the presence of a trusty police that inspects buses, checks papers, and stamps passports as many times as is needed to make people feel safe. Or maybe it is just to create more employment. Being realistic I think they are the remnants of previous dictatorships where people always had the state police harassing them and keeping them in fear. Maybe it is just a mixture of all of the above. All I know is that this trip has caused about a page and a half of passport stamps so far, and by the time the trip finishes it would be close to three pages and about one stamp per day of the trip. We did arrived at Puerto Natales at about 1pm and where able to get bus tickets for Punta Arenas for 4,000 Chilean pesos ($8 USD). Had just one hour to run to the other company’s bus office, grab a couple of Empanadas and get into the bus. I can’t say it was a bad thing. A transportation transfer of an hour is fairly good – better than at most airports. Less wasted time. After passing again through interminable cattle fields we did arrived to Punta Arenas with enough light to see the town. Interesting websites for website attraction information: | 
