This trip will delight even the most discerning
backpacker. We explore Patagonia's less traveled trails in the
Fitz Roy area.
Day 1: Arrive in Buenos Aires. Hotel night in
Buenos Aires' Palermo neighborhood, one of the most traditional
spots in the city.
Day 2: Flight to El Calafate (4 hours), meet
with our guide and transfer to El Chalten, the portal to the Fitz
Roy area.
Day 3: Trekking to Toro Lagoon, a beautiful
hike that takes us trough the Tunel Valley, and over
the Pliegue Tumbado, a small ridge that overlooks the
Fitz Roy and the Cerro Torre masssifs.
Day 4: Our second day on the trail has many highlights:
a Tyrolean crossing of the Tunel river, followed by a climb to
Paso del Viento, the gateway to the Patagonia Icefield.
From the pass, we will descend onto the edge of the icefield and
hike for an hour to the Viedma hut, a very small shelter maintained
by the National Institute of the Patagonian Continental Ice.
Day 5: Day-hike to Viedma Glacier and the Patagonia
Icefield. From our camp we'll hike 4-5 hours (roundtrip), to get
into this incredible landscape. We'll return to our camp next
to the IHCP shelter.
Day 6: Hike to Huemul Pass, with incredible views
of the icefield and the Viedma Glacier, which calves its icebergs
into the frigid waters of Viedma Lake. It is common in this part
of the trek to see condors.
Day 7: Trekk to Bahia Tunel, crossing some steppe
landscape, and bus tranfer to El Chalten, where we'll
spend the night in a comfortable lodge.
Day 8: Rest day or day-hikes, depending on your
preference. If you join us for a hike, we'll be heading to either
Fitz Roy or Cerro Torre's basecamps, where we can enjoy excellent
views of the mountains. We'll return to our lodge for a second
nigth in El Chalten.
Day 9: A short 20 minute bus transfer will leave
us in the Estancia La Margarita, where our second part of the
trekk begins. We'll hike up a pass and down to the Portones
Valley, where we'll set camp. With clear skies this hike
has excellent views of the El Chalten area.
Day 10: This day we'll be hiking over two passes,
and two different valleys. Cerro Sombrero, an interesting
rock formation will serve as a backdrop for this interesting hike,
where it's common to see condors and guanacos, and where it's
also common tto find marine fossils. We'll set camp in a beautiful
forest.
Day 11: Our shortest day (3 hour hike), takes
us to the Estancia La Maipu, a traditional estancia that still
continues raising sheep. We'll be staying in the esatncia and
meeting the local gauchos.
Day 12: This rest day will provide excellent
opportunities to experience first hand what it means to live in
Patagonia. The gauchos and the estancieros are
very amicable, and we'll enjoy and share a typical asado, or BBQ,
made with the finest lamb. The estancia also has a small museum
that treasures mementos from a century ago, when the first settlers
arrived to these latitudes.
Day 13: On our last day we'll take a bus to El
Calafate International Airport to flight out to Buenos Aires.
|
