February 4, 2019 – February 8, 2019
El Chaltén is a small village full of outdoor gear shops, hostels, cervecerias, bake shops and restaurants, all focused on servicing the thousands of visitors that come during the short summer season to hike in the surrounding Parque Nacional Los Glaciares. It is a fun and friendly little town, whose existence is completely reliant on tourism.
Very soon after we turned off of Ruta 40, heading for El Chaltén, views of the famous Fitz Roy towers began to emerge.
We were excited to spend a few days in El Chaltén because many of the hiking trails begin just at the edge of town, meaning we could set Piper up for the day in the comfort of our camper and hike in the dog-forbidden park without having to try and sneak her in.
One day we hiked to Laguna Torre.
We spent the next day wandering around town with Piper. We visited the Parks office on the edge of town to get a hiking trail map, and were told that officially Piper was not allowed in the parking lot outside of the building….she was only allowed on the streets in town and had to be on a leash the whole time. This, even though there were street dogs all over the place….Piper is getting pretty tired of pet dog discrimination down here.
The next day we hiked up to the base of Fitz Roy. The first kilometre of the 20 km return hike had us climbing up and onto a bench, then the trail levelled out for about the next 8 kilometres. We were in the trees for the first hour or so, and then broke out to the Fitz Roy Mirador for an amazing view of the spires.
You gain 400 metres of elevation in the last kilometre of the hike to the lakes.
There were a few more hikes we could have done, but we felt the urge to keep moving. We were still hoping to get to Ushuaia, and their summer season is even shorter, so we packed up and moved on, really happy to have visited El Chaltén and to have had nice weather on our hikes.
OMG! National Geographic worthy. Really appreciated your composition as my eye was attracted by the tree trunks, twisted spiky shapes and the way the light illuminates and softens them with shadows and then by the wind swept tree and over to the softness of the forest canopy rising towards the sharpness of the spires surrounded by those pure white clouds blending in with the snow and others softly framing that sky… I do not have the words but I hope you get the idea that your reports written and photographic besides informing of us of places we dream of also touch our souls… Adele
Thank you Adele! I’m thinking that we need to get you writing some of our posts for us!