Fitz Roy and Cerro Torre Hike

Travelling to El Chalten - 2/1/16

Our next step in our travels was to take a bus to El Chalten, from El Calafate, which had been arranged by Serac Expeditions for us. The bus turned out to be rather comfortable; we sat in the back, allowing us to fully recline with no toilet nearby! Also, the seats had an interesting feature in that you could pull back a piece in front of you and it would give you a leg rest… just like a lounge chair. I was a fan. I would highly recommend the bus company “Caltur” after that experience. We got lovely views of the mountains along the way, and were able to see Fitz Roy from the road. This was unusual as it tends to be clouded in.

Once we arrived in town, the bus first stopped us off at the National Park Service for a quick presentation on hikes nearby and fire safety. The city is actually located within the national park, so this is why this is done; also, most of the hikes are free and don’t require registration so they want to make sure people have info before they undertake the.

It would have been a quick speech if there wasn’t some random girl protesting about having the wait for the “stupid” speech. Of course this made it all take at least 5 more minutes as the park ranger started to yell back at her in front of a group of 30 people. After the presentation, we had to ask him a question about our hike, and he was actually outside still having an animated discussion with her. Sigh.. I don’t know why people waste their time with stupid people sometimes. Just ignore. Anyway, we got back on the bus and it was just another couple minutes to the bus station.

Once at the bus station, it turned out to be another 15 minute walk to the hotel… it was on completely the other side of town. Town isn’t too big though and it is relatively flat. Once we found the hotel, we went to a local restaurant recommended by the receptionist. They had an interested cooking method of cooking things in skillets called “disc cooking”, but it wasn’t too tasty. After that, we found a supermarket and meat market to buy supplies for our hike. Then it was finally to bed at “Patagonia Hostel”.. A nicely sized and organized, albeit slightly stinky, double-room with no functioning internet (“It will work again perhaps in the evening”). Hey a bed is a bed.

El Chalten Hiking Loop - Day 1 - 2/2/16

We had a lovely breakfast next door to the hotel (included in the price) that had the usual offerings. Then at 10AM, we were off! The nice thing about the hikes near El Chalten is that they start from town. We walked north from the hotel and we reached the beginning of the trail about half a mile later. Then, we immediately began to climb. The trail went steeply up and shortly we were gifted with a nice view of the town below us.

The trail wound through the forest, so while it was steep, it always felt safe and away from edges... that's not to say that it didn't open up to some amazing views of the valley. There was always an opportunity there to get closer to the edge, but I was good from my vantage point. As we got higher up, the trail began to be a little bit of a balcony above the valley with a steep slope next to us for about 10 minutes. There was a forest below the bare hill, so I was fine.

After this, the trail remained relatively flat for the remainder of the day. We took the path to the left towards Laguna Capri (if we stayed right, we would have gotten a view of Fitz Roy from the trail). Laguna Capri is a campsite that has a lovely lake and usually a lovely view of Fitz Roy above it... but it turned out he was being shy today. It was a partly cloudy day that just kept getting cloudier and cloudier as it went on.

As we went past the lake, we got out of the trees and were in a landscape that was more like a barren plain with lots of shrubs and expansive views of the mountains. At this point it began to sprinkle even though it was blue sky directly above us. Welcome to Patagonia. As we got closer to our campsite, the landscape became more beach-like and it appeared that the path had at one point in the past been underwater.

We arrived at Poincenot campground a bit after noon, and had our pick of campsites. We finished setup and then decided to take a side trail to another viewpoint since we had so much time. Neither of us knew what to expect, but it turned out that it was an excellent view of a glacier, waterfall, and tiny lake so it was well worth the extra hour/ 3 miles. When we returned to camp, we took a nice nap.

Cool bird friend at camp

A couple hours later we were awakened by a blitzkrieg. Yes, 4 loud Germans had setup camp next to us and were even using the log bench that was in OUR campsite! I of course went for a reconnaissance mission, during which our neighbors made the mistake of leaving their perch on our bench. I swooped in and reclaimed said bench and read my kindle until we were ready for dinner about an hour later. During dinner the clouds finally lifted and Fitz Roy bid us hello! All was right again... so we went to bed to be ready for an early morning the next day.

FINAL STATS:

El Chalten to Poincenot - 5.7 miles, 2:21:14 moving time, 24:39/mi avg. pace, 1437 ft. elevation gain

Poincenot to Viewpoint - 3.1 miles, 1:08:00 moving time, 21:36/mi avg. pace, 408 ft. elevation gain

El Chalten Hiking Loop - Day 2 - 2/3/16

We awoke at about 4:45AM the next morning and got ready quickly to hike up to the viewpoint of Fitz Roy and Laguna de Las Tres. Unfortunately, we found out pretty quickly that it was a rainy and cloudy morning. We took our time climbing and waited until it got a little lighter since there wouldn't be a good sunrise in any case. I got up about halfway until I decided that it was too rainy and slick on the steep ascent for me to mess with my nerves that morning. Kevin continued on for another half hour to the top while I went back to camp.

Kevin's view of the lake

Back at camp, I relaxed for a bit and read my book until Kevin returned. The news was that it was so clouded at the top that Kevin couldn't even see to the other side of the lake, but at least he had checked off doing it. The trail became slightly exposed at the very end, but he said that it never felt dangerous since the trail continued to climb in switchbacks above itself. It was 400 meters over 2 kilometers at the end.. so no joke.

We had breakfast and then decided to get a move on since the clouds and rain did not appear to want to let up. Our path would take us through a nice cut through next to 2 lakes that would eventually take us to the end of the other popular day hike in the area. I could tell that normally this section would be quite scenic, but instead, we were even more clouded in than we were the day before. That's hiking sometimes.. you just have to appreciate when you do get views. The trail was very flat, then downhill for about half a mile to a mile where it met with the other main trail. Then, it was mainly uphill though nothing too strenuous.

We finally arrived at Camp Agostino around noon or 1pm and strategically setup at a spot near the river. This would (1) drown out the noise of other campers, (2) allow for minimal other camping spots next to us, (3) be a very flat campsite, and (4) allow easy access to water. Then we had lunch which consisted of this sausage that we bought at a local butcher shop... it was very chewy... and Kevin pondered whether it was cooked. I'm sure it was, but after that comment, I was done with the sausage and had to concentrate on not regurgitating it. Kevin was not a fan either. Moral of the story - don't buy questionable meat from butchers.

So, there were no side trails this time, so we just took a long time to relax, read, nap, and even played a board game. We took a quick look at Lago Torre and were happy to see icebergs in the water and the glacier across the way... but everything was still clouded in. Time for dinner, sleep, and the hope that things will be better in the morning.

P.S. Kevin made me untie that string and there was a caterpillar near me! It could have eaten me! Just kidding, but seriously there were caterpillars EVERYWHERE.

FINAL STATS:

(Does not include stats for Laguna de las Tres - halfway up was 2.6 miles)

Poincenot to Agostini - 6.5 miles, 2:20:43 total moving time, 533 ft. elevation gain

El Chalten Hiking Loop - Day 3 - 2/4/16

We woke up at about 5:45AM the next morning and were happy to see a sky with little to no clouds. After a short walk to Lago Torre, we were greeted by an amazing sunrise.. pink light slowly bringing all of the nooks and crannies of each mountain in view all while reflecting the craggy peaks in the lake.

After watching this for a while, we decided to walk up to the viewpoint above the lake that allows for a nicer view of the glacier. I was fine for a bit, but it was sort of a ridge walk.. after a while I decided I'd gone far enough for my comfort (notice a recurring theme?) and Kevin went on to the upper end of the trail. It actually took a bit of time because it was a rough trail and he said it got a bit exposed towards the end, but there was a nice clearing at the very end of the trail. Kevin took a few nice pictures of the glacier from there and then he came back. We realized we ended up spending at least 2 hours enjoying the sunrise at the lake, but it was well worth it.

Kevin's view at the scary ridge viewpoint

We had breakfast back at camp, trying to avoid the deluge of caterpillars falling from the trees (there were at least 10 we could see in the tree above us).. then leisurely began to pack up camp. There was no rush since we weren't sure when we would actually be able to to check into our hotel. Just as we were finishing removed stakes from the tent, Kevin noticed that a huemul deer was 5 feet away from us!! He was trying to use the "steps" down to the watering hole, but was having a little trouble and probably felt nervous as people began to notice his existence. We both very slowly tried to take our cameras out, but then he walked by riiiight by us and began a slow stroll to the other side of the campsite.

Huemul are very rare... there's something like 450-600 in the entire country; they are endangered and the camp rangers actually asked us to come back to the ranger station if we happen to see one on our hike so that they can catalogue and track their activity. Well you can imagine the surprise and excitement in the campsite then. After something like 20-30 minutes, the deer finally decided to try for a different entry point to the river. We finished breaking down camp and were just about to put up the tarp when we saw the deer trying to ford the river.

This was a pretty cool thing to watch... he picked his steps carefully and as he got to the deeper part of the river, he got rather nervous. He made a couple attempts to wade across but then came back over to his little island in the middle of the river. Then, suddenly, he decided that was going to go for it and hopped/ sprinted across the remaining portion of the river all while getting battered by the strong current. But he made it! We all cheered at the shore and felt really lucky to get to watch our huemul friend in action.

Not long after this we set off for our hike down the valley and back to El Chalten. Most of the day was hiking among shrubs and low trees with cliffs and rocky faces surrounding us... all while we could see Cerro Torre behind us. Finally, towards the end as we neared town, the landscape had a few more trees but also we discovered the trail was now sort of next to a cliff! Hurray I love cliffs (yes you do detect sarcasm). I was able to stay away from edges and the scarier part was only 5-10 minutes... but I wasn't a fan. After a steep descent back to town, we were back!

A truly lovely final day to make up for the cloudy/ rainy weather.

FINAL STATS:

(Does not include mileage around lake since our stats differ, but it was a little over half a mile one-way and a gradual uphill to the lake from the campsite. The additional viewpoint was 2-2.5 miles round trip.)

Agostini to El Chalten - 6 miles, 2:14:59 total moving time, 22:30/mi avg. pace, 508 ft. elevation gain