El Chalten

On Thursday, we compromised on an early morning and a hike versus a sleep and took the 1pm bus to the next town North, El Chalten. I was still worried that we had made the wrong decision not to go further south to Torres del Paine, but I had heard that El Chalten was just as good and with the amazing weather we had that day it did not disappoint.
The bus took three hours across the Patagonia steppe, so on our left we could see snow topped mountains withe the occasional lake and river and on our right was desert as far as the eye can see, with the occasional alpaca type thing, no doubt James has already eaten one.
El Chalten is even more beautiful that El Calafate, its nestled among beautiful mountains where two glacial rivers meet. We arrived around 4pm and the bus stopped at the national park office for a mandatory briefing of the best hikes for the upcoming weather. We took their advice and dropped our stuff at our hostel and quickly went back out again to walk to the top of a small hill overlooking the town with huge condors swirling overhead. James decided he would write a blog about how much he hates hiking.
We treated ourselves to dinner out and picked the busiest looking place called La Tapera. Turns out its a foodie haven in el Chalten and this restaurant was one of the best. Unfortunately the prices matched. Budget fail, but the meals were incredible, and I got a proper vegetarian meal. A beetroot crepe stuffed with roasted pumpkin, smothered in blue cheese sauce with salad. James ate a dead animal that appeared to still be bleeding and loved it.
The next day we got up early and caught a shuttle a few kilometres up the valley so that we could do one of the best hikes in the area, the Fitz Roy as a circuit. Also to cheat a little as we followed a river up, making it far less steep. So the first 9km passed easily though amazing forest that was turning red with a big glacier on our right. The final climb to the look out point was an almost vertical slog, but so worth it to reach an amazing lake below the Fitzroy spires which are over 3000m. The views were straight out of a national geographic.
On the way down we ran into a British couple and a British/ Australian couple that we'd done our glacier tour with, so the steep part passed quickly while we chatted to them. It still seemed to take a really long time to get back to the village though and my saggy mattress and lumpy pillow felt like heaven. James still hates hiking but was super proud of himself for making it.
The next day I dragged James up early again to do the Cerro Torres. Another amazing hike up to a glacier lake filled with icebergs through red and amber forests with woodpeckers and the such. It was actually a much easier hike and low and behold we ran into the Australian/British couple zo we hiked back with them. We couldn't complete the hike the its final view point as the weather packed in with freezing rain and howling gales while we were on a ridgeline but

as soon as we reached shelter it was warm and sunny again. We didn't see the tippy tops of the mountains, but we saw enough. I think I'm finally breaking James and he’s secretly starting to love hiking
It was a quick trip back as we hurried to keep up. In the pub later they said they liked our slow pace....awkward.
We went to sleep that night to the sound of a howling gale (that and the sound of Brazilians partying) and then awoke to pouring rain. Luckily it cleared up enough to do one final amble to a waterfall. And when I said I was starting to break James, I mean I really broke him and his old man knees gave out so luckily it was a flat stroll to a really nice waterfall. I mean really nice, would have been a ten except for the sign saying not swimming, not that I would have swum I think with wind chill it was about minus 45, I'm not ready for winter.
Once we got back into town we did stumble into another foodie gem and found the best empanadas in Argentina, apparently. They were good they were even better on our 23 hour bus ride late but that’s another story

Stay tuned