Cerro Torre -> El Calafate

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Weather this morning was similar to yesterday, but it quickly cleared up and became really not. On our way to Laguna Torre to see Cerro Torre, we had great views of surrounding peaks – Cerro Solo, Grande, and many others. The trails are more undulating, and not as much steep climb as the ones leading to Fitz Roy. Like Kilimanjaro, time, rather than distance, was given to reach various points along the way. I suppose it makes more sense as 10 km steep uphill climb would take significantly more than flat 10 km.

Again, we were blessed with post-card view of Laguna Torre and Cerro Torre, and we had calm weather until we began to pack up and leave when gale-force wind started. Our guide had a little gadget that measures wind speed. Just a few weeks ago it clocked 162 km/hour at the same spot we were standing. I tried blowing into it and got a puny 25 km /hour. Time to start working on my lung capacity!

We took the bus back to El Calafate to start our long bus journey to Torres del Paine tomorrow.

Total distance hiked = 22 km, time = about 8 hours.

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