Ice Trek Cerro Torre

 It was a relief to escape the constant tourist buses juggernauting around El Calafate and take a tourist bus up 'mythical' Ruta 40 to El Chalten. We had barely stepped down at Rancho Grande (no terminal in Chalten) when the wind kicked across the mountains and blew me and my pack off the pavement. Wind is a whipping theme in Patagonia - it makes the rain pummel horizontally and renders high tech waterproof gear redundant, every taped seam a meagre challenge.

It took a couple of hours to navigate the trekking agencies surfing the main street but it was worthwhile as prices differ dramatically. Although trekking the mountains requires only a good map - to get on top of the glaciar you need to go with mountain guides.

  Casa de Guias was charging almost half the price of the other agencies to go out to Cerro Torre so we booked with them and staggered into the village at 7am the following morning, a little traumatized in the stomach area from the guiso de lentejas we had loaded up with at dinner the night before. I had images from the Inca Trail and from a Nile felucca, of once again dealing with dysentry behind a very small shrub as the Mountain Guide looked off into the hills pretending deafness.

 

A three hour hike under an almost full moon brought about amnesia as the mountain gradually drew back the curtains on her grandeur. How Gonzalo and Martin must have been amused at the turistas snapping away unaware of how much more impressive a sight was waiting just a short Tirolesa across the river, an hour across the moraine and a strenuous vertical ascent through the tree line and descent aside the glaciar before we put on crampones and stepped onto the ice.

It would be torturous prose to write about mountains and glaciares in Patagonia. Some things simply defeat language.

 

We hiked straight up and down ice pinnacles imagining we were on the ice field of Everest. There is a strange silence on the glaciar apart from when an avalanche comes down the mountain and the light changes constantly causing camera neuroses. I often left mine on auto-focus as it was impossible to tell. The white of the ice is often blue. The water on the glaciar is the clearest and most delicious gift on earth. It brings tears to my eyes remembering how the earth manages to maintain majesty in the face of wanton human destruction.

 

The return was arduous. It was heaven to sit down at base camp and eat a pile of cookies and tough to get up for another three hours of descent - even shallow was agony on the shin splints. The 12 hour trek was delicious torture. It took every fibre in my body as we came in like marathon runners desperate to get across the finish line. That night we gingerly made it up the wind tunnel main street to Mi Viejo and had a huge ensalada completa with Patagonian lamb on the parilla - never had food tasted so good.

 

Comments

[Befcroreved]

det jeg var ute etter, takk

[Alex]

As a young rock climber and mountaineer, I used to dream of hiking and climbing in Patagonia. Perhaps someday. Actually, my next trip to Buenos Aires will have to include pretty much the entire South American continent.

As far as the wanton destruction of mother nature by mankind, I wouldn't worry about it. Mother nature will prevail in the end.

Thanks for sharing...

[Betsey]

"It would be torturous prose to write about mountains and glaciares in Patagonia. Some things simply defeat language."

Maybe the best sentence you've ever written. Less is always more.

[Cate]

awesome place and photo. love the color shift from darker snow to lighter as the edge of the glacier rolls through the frame.