Del Fin del Mundo - The End of the World

We left BA early on a Wednesday morning. A cab greeted us at 5am and took Mish and I to the international airport while Cathy went off to the domestic Aeroparque.

Typically with us, there were dramas at the airport. We were rung by Aerolineas Argentinas the day before we flew telling us that we had to pay for the tickets at the airport. The sales desk apparently opened at 6. When we arrived at around 5.45am, there were 4 people in a queue being served by the open sales desk. Being Latin America, the queue was not moving and there was only one open cashier. By the time we got served it was 6am, 1hr 15 minutes before our flight. With the woman at the desk moving slower than a snail, we were beginning to get nervous about the check-in closing. When the lady then told us that we had to proceed to the cashier, to get our ticket printed, it was panic stations. I ran over to the check in counter to announce our predicament and ask when the check-in would close. The lady said “6.30am mas o menas”. Meantime, Mish had managed to push in front of everyone to get our tickets printed off. She arrived to check in at 6.28am.

Our final obstacle at the airport was a huge queue to get through security, which we duly skipped announcing our flight was about to take off. Once into the security section it became apparent that there was only one security screening machine for the queue of over 200 people. Once we were in the gate area, it became apparent that we had pushed in front of people who were flying on the flight before us!

The flight was spectacular, as we flew into Bariloche over the stunning mountain peaks and deep blue lakes. Arriving in El Calafate, the mountains pushed up against a barren and windswept steppe which stretched seemingly forever.

Once on the ground, I was thanking Bev that I had my dorky brazil beany as it was damn cold and damn windy.

Cool

El Calafate town has the feel of a pioneer town. The town sits on Lago Argentina, a huge expanse of water, with ice and snow capped mountains providing an imposing (and chilly) backdrop. In its genesis, the Argentinian government offered plots of lands to Argentinians to move to the south of the country, to help populate it and to fertilise the lands. Most Argentinians wouldn’t have a bar of it, and so, it turned out that mostly migrants from Europe and elsewhere took to the harsh environments. Around the time of the First World War there were around 1 million Italians living in Buenos Aires.

On our first night we went to a local Estancia, which at first glimpse appeared like a tourist trap oasis, transplanted from the country side into the town to gauge us of all our dinero. Once our hippie looking guide started talking, we were told that the Estancia was originally in that position when the town was in its early days, but since the expansion and increase in tourism, the owners were provided a “swap”, where their land was exchanged for land further out of town.

We were greeted at the outdoor fire place, where the weather was getting ever colder. To warm us up we were given mate and coffee and shown a few of the resident sheep. We were shown around the historical building (sheep shearing shed, wool press and original hotel). We were even given a tour of the greenhouse which housed many species of plant and veg and where we had a wine tasting, out of the harsh cold winds outside. Accompanying our wines was an amazing lamb mixture, made from the lamb a la cruce, fried with garlic, onion, sugar, herbs and red wine.

Gaucho sheep herding 

Coffees in the freezing cold

This was the prelude to our main meal, which we enjoyed in the farm house with the others from our tour and another tour group which packed the room with around 50 – 60 people.

We ate Patagonian Lamb or Cordero Patagonica (Cordero a la Cruce). To prepare the meat, a whole lamb carcass is split open and mounted on a cross. A wood fire is lit about a metre from the carcass (far enough not to burn the skin). As the coals form, you place a few of the coals directly under the carcass. You start the cooking rib side facing the flame and cook for one hour. Then turn and cook for 2 hours on the back side. Squirt a water mixture, with salt and garlic over the lamb as it cooks to prevent it drying out. We also saw a gaucho show.

Grey snuck into the kitchen to take these photos

Cordero a la cruce - lamb on a cross

Perito Moreno Glacier

Day 2 in El Calafate was met with great excitement. Today, we would be walking on a glacier!!

After being driven by bus over a pretty non-descript route, we boarded a boat which was to take us across to the opposite bank to begin our trek.

As we turned around the peninsula we caught our first glimpse of the massive glacier, towering around 40 metres high and stretching left and right. To say it was an amazing sight would be a great understatement, as would be the case to say it was cold on the deck of the boat! The face of the glacier extended to the point of the peninsula, where it doglegged out of view. The cragged face jutted up and down, in and out, and the colours ranged from magnificent blue hues, to white to black.

On the boat

Grey and the glacier

After a short walk through wooded forest, we donned our crampons (yes, crampons) and began our incredible walk on the glacier itself. It truly was a surreal experience, walking on endless miles of ice, trudging along, in the cold, digging our studded crampons into the ice for extra traction, it was as if we were walking on the moon. To finish off the walk, we were treated to a shot of Jim Bean poured over the glacial ice. The ice takes 400 years from falling as snow, to ending up near the frontier of the glacier, so it was surreal to imagine that we were consuming 400 year old ice (shame about the quality of the whiskey, for the amount the tour was costing you’d have though they could have treated us to some black label).

Me and Mum

Grey with crampons

Whiskey with 400 year old glacier water

The day was capped off with about an hour at the fantastic viewing platform, which stretches for kilometers out in front of the face of the glacier. Every now and again, huge chunks of ice break off from the glacier and plummet to the lake below. As the ice falls, it makes a tremendous thundering noise, as you try to figure out where it is falling. Then as it plummets to the lake and crashes down, huge waves spread out like ripples, and the noise reverberates through the peninsula. It was a shame we only had an hour there, the entire face of the glacier was mesmerising and we could have stayed watching it for many hours more!