Ice Ice Baby

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El Calafate - pleasant enough place with one major attraction - The Perito Moreno Glacier one of the truly memorable sights of Patagonia. This is the highlight of the Parque Nacional los Glaciares which is contained in the Southern Patagonian ice field (which is the 3rd largest ice field in the world after Antartica and Greenland). The Perito Moreno glacier itself measures in at 30km long, 5km wide and 60m high above water. Also this glacier, unlike many in the world, is constantly advancing.

Just watching the glacier has got to be one of the best sights - the jagged blue spikes that form the top of the glacier and the loud creaking and thunderous cracking noise just before the glacier sheers off a large bobbing iceberg which lands with a giant splash. Its mesmorising. Looking at the glacier and waiting for the next calving of an iceberg had us on the edge of our hiking boots.

Later on we took a boat across Lago Argentino to the foot of the glacier for our ice trekking experience. A couple of guides gave an informative talk first before tying crampons to our feet and leading us onto the ice. It took a little bit of time to trust the spikes of the crampons. Once used to the ice walking stylee the walk was a lot of fun with fabulous views. (We were very lucky with the weather - the guides said it was the first day of blue skies in weeks.) Guides kept us entertained by scaring Magnus into thinking he had walked into a cravasse (Magnus gave out a small shriek!). Also later one snuck off to the peak above us and threw snow onto peoples heads shouting "avalanche"...

The glacier is melting and advancing at the same time. We trekked on the melting area so there were a number of small bright ice blue pools of water within the glacier and sometimes these could be seen under our feet too - little bit weird. The whole experience was fab, and the end was a bit cheesy as we rounded a icey corner to find a glasses and a bottle of whiskey- this was so we could have a glass of scotch of the rocks... with the rocks being the ice around us...

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