El Calafate

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The flight from Buenos Aires to El Calafate took 3 ½ hours with Aerolineas. The flight on 29^thFebruary was at 7am so it was an early start with my Nokia alarm set for 5am. I bumped into quite a few people coming back from their night out on the way to the shared bathroom and I was glad I’d caught an early night and just watched Clint Eastwood’s new film Hoover on DVD. The taxi picked me up at 5.30am and it was starting to get light outside as we headed to the Ezeiza airport. The domestic terminal was quite busy with other flights going to Cordoba, Mendoza and Iguacu. I arrived around 10.30am and the airport is quite small so getting onto the shuttle bus and to the hostel America Del Sur took around 40 minutes. I was quite surprised by the landscape at first it was arid like a desert and quite hot. I immediately liked the hostel it had a great view over the town and surrounding landscape and a very social common area. The dorms were 4 bed ensuite and comfortable. During the evening Holland were playing England at football so everyone was glued to their laptops following the score. There were around 15 Dutch people staying at the hostel so it was good fun!!

El Calafate town is lovely with its main strip, Av del Libertador full of restaurants, souvenir shops, tour offices and outdoor gear shops. The Ice cream is pretty good too!! The main attraction and reason for coming to El Calafate is the Glaciar Perito Moreno, 80km away in Parque Nacional Los Glaciares. I got the local bus to the Glaciar the next day 1^st March and spent the whole day taking a boat trip to one side and walking the ramparts amazed and in awe of the mighty Glaciar which is like nothing I’d seen before. We were also lucky with the timing as many parts of the Glaciar were falling off which only happens once every four years. Enjoy the pictures it was an amazing day!!

In the evening the hostel had an all you can eat barbecue which was good fun and everyone showed their pictures and videos from the day at the Glaciar. Quite a few people were heading in the same direction as me so we would meet up again later at El Chalten and in Chile. I’d only been in Patagonia for two days but it had already captivated me and I couldn’t wait to continue exploring…..

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