Yes, it did get warmer as we drove north! A long day's drive and a border crossing back into Chile followed by another ferry across the Magellan Straight, got us to a small national park called Pali Aike on the border with Argentina. It is very isolated and not often visited and the warden seemed positively surprised to see us. It is in the heart of the Patagonian Steppe with rock formations, the remains of volcanic eruptions. The walks around the old craters were fascinating, but the lava ripped at our boots and made it hard going.

That night we camped in the park, no one around for miles and complete silence, even the wind dropped away to give us the best nights sleep we have had. It was a lovely experience.

We left the park the next day and continued north and once again crossed into Argentina, no problems again, but we did have a small panic when we thought we had driven through the Chilean immigration and customs only to discover that they share a building on the Argentina side of the border.

After long drive through the vast Patagonian Steppe we arrived at El Calafate, a small pleasant, but touristy town, catering for visitors to the nearby Los Glaciares National Park. This park is famous for its glacier Perito Moreno and Mt Fitz Roy.

The Glacier is one of the few that continues to grow, 7cms a day. It moves down the valley across a lake until it hits a land spit. It is 5km across and 60m high. It groans and cracks and occasionally lumps break off to crash into the lake (Lago Argentino). We didn’t view a 'spectacular’, that's when a blooming great bit gives way, but did see a number of house sized lumps plummet into the lake with almighty cracks and splashes. This was a really good days viewing and the park was well sorted with walkways to the best viewpoints. We also took a boat trip to view the glacier from yet more angles. It was well worthwhile as you get to see the sun shining through the top ridge of ice, the shades of white to blue are quite intriguing.

The weather was much improved and we camped three nights in a little camp site on the edge of town after which we drove north to the northern sector of the park to see Mt Fitzroy and Cerro Torres. These peaks are almost vertical slabs of pink granite, which because of their angle, the snow can't settle on. Whilst not the highest peaks by a long margin, the angle of the rock makes these some of the most technically challenging climbs in the world.

Our first sighting of Mt Fitzroy was spectacular and we took far to many photos. Don't worry we have only included a couple on this entry. We drove to the edge of the park to a beautiful lake (Lago Desierto) and sat on the shore with our coffee, to admire the view.

The next day I left Lesley relaxing in the hotel while I went on an 8 hour hike up to a lake with spectacular views of the mountains. Strangely, on the way up I came across a red headed woodpecker who was totally engrossed in his breakfast which allowed me to get within 1m of him, before he flew off.

Final highlight was the discovery of a small (very) microbrewery in town which hand made two great beers, a light and a dark; both really good, following a couple of sampling sessions.