Sunday 17th September

Today we were picked up from our hostel in El Calafate at 9am, and took a bus to El Chalten that took around three and a half hours. About 1.5 hours into our trip we stopped for a tea and toilet break. The place was like an old farm house with a tiny cafe that sold home made cakes. Lisa and Nikki had a HUGE slice of apple pie each and as I wasn´t that hungry I had an even bigger bit of pie (not sure of the flavour). It was some kind of apple thingy! As I say I wasnt that hungry so I finished what Lisa couldn´t eat which was pretty much the whole thing. I´m glad I wasnt that hungry cos I am trying to watch my figure :o) As we got nearer to El Chalten we saw our first glimpse of Mount Fitzroy which we would be trekking to on the following day. El Chalten in a very small town that is surrounded by snow capped mountains and a pretty river. The town was created purely for people who want to go on the various treks that are available here. We was supposed to be greeted by our tour organiser in El Chalten to show us where we were staying and to tell us what time we would be met the following day to start our first day of our Patagonia tour. However as we wasn´t met by anyone we decided to investiagte ourselves (which would turn out to be the norm for the rest of the Patagonia tour) and find out where our digs would be for the next few nights. After finally finding our hostel, we checked in and was very pleasantly surprised with our accomoation. We had a good sized room, double bed and en suite. I was a little surprised by the light fitting on the ceiling as it was made from a chopped down tree branch..... it was original I suppose!

After settling in we decided we were starving so asked in our fluent spanish where the supermercado was! This town is very small and there was only 1 shop and thankfully it was open, but only for about another hour. Nothing else in the town was open either, it was like a deserted cowboy town! So we happily headed off to buy some lunch, which after walking around the tiny shop for 10 mins ended up consisting of uncooked pizza base, crisps and cereal bars... It was really yummy.... NOT!!! after our nutritious lunch Pepe (our trekking guide for the next 2 days) came to meet us and tell us where we would be going. As he walked up the path all we could see was a walking skeleton with the hugest matted beard and massive long dreadlocks, and he wasnt that old! To mine and nikki's horror he gave us the usual argentinean greeting of a kiss on each cheek, with his beard scratching our face! Anyway, he seemed nice enough, spoke good english (including understanding our slang, and swear words!) and made us excited about the next two days. We were to go on 2 ten mile treks around fitzroy, in different directions. So that afternoon, on pepe`s advice, we took a 30 min trek to a waterfall. This trek though took us about 2 hours as our attention was drawn away from the trail quite often! As we headed along the trail we decided to stop by the river which was beautifully clear. Not content with just skimming stones we then (Tom) decided to make our very own rapid in the river, by throwing huge stones into the middle!!!! All the rivers in this area are so clean you can drink straight from them, without purifying the water, so Tom tried that too!! Anyway we finally made it to the waterfall which was pretty and spent some time messing around by the pool at the bottom of the fall, and the stream which lead down the mountain. We decided to take a more adventurous route home, climbing up the sides of the falls rocks and basically anywhere which wasnt the main path and looked a little risky! Tom even ventured into a trekking toilet, but decided against peeing in it when he saw the hole full of poo!!!! After our afternoon adventures we had 2 hours til dinner so watched 40 year old virgin on Nikki's laptop, as still nothing was open. Dinner was homemade and nice, veg soup, spag bol, steak and yucky flan for desert (flan is creme caramel in Argentina). After we headed off to bed for an early night to be nice and fresh for our 10 mile trek the next day.

Monday 18th September

We head off with Pepe about 9:30am on the start of our trek to the base of fitzroy, after a nutritious breakfast of cold toast. He told us the first hour would be uphill, which it definately was, and the next 2 hours were pretty flat. On the way up we saw a woodpecker in a fallen tree just feet away from us, happily pecking away at the wood. Tom was very excited at this, just like the hummingbird in Ilha Bela (we know he likes burds!). We also saw an Eagle circling above us, and condors etc etc. After the first hour, which made us (apart from tom) a little breathless, we stopped at a nice spot for a bite to eat, and Pepe headed round the rocks to 'relieve' himself! The sky was perfectly clear blue and the sun shining, and Pepe kept reminding us how very lucky we were, as most people dont get clear days to admire the views around here, which are beautiful and peaceful. So we headed off again for another two hours straight ahead and flat, through forests and across plains and swampy areas. I was disappointed at the lack of snow (cos of the unusual warm weather they had in the week prior) so at every opportunity to walk across a random piece of remaining snow or ice we did! Some lakes were still frozen but not enough to walk on. One bridge over a river was so flimsy we could only walk over it one at a time, so we made Tom go last incase he broke it!! Finally we made it to the picnic area at the base of Fitzroy, after 3 hours of trekking, for our much deserved lunch! Nikki doesnt like food packaged up so barely ate a thing, and surprisingly i didnt like the chocolate cake/biscuit things either, so Tom ended up with all 3, fat pig!!! As we were eating we saw some big birds (like eagles) flying closer and closer and landed metres away from us, they apparently hang around to see what left overs they can scavage!!!! Heading back Pepe took us off the beaten track for a special treat, to see a secluded waterfall, some of which was still frozen. As you looked at the falls you could see fitzroys peaks behind, it was really lovely. It took us 3 hours to get back, as we went through the horse trails on the way home, which was more narrow and rugid. We also stopped at a very pretty lake and ate sweets! Coming down the last hour really kills our legs (as anyone who went to snowdon with us would know!). Walking into town from our trek we looked like cowboys coming back home, i wonder if we did the trek everyday we'd end up looking like pepe!!!!! Home again early we watched Father of the Bride (thank god for the laptop) and went down for dinner, which was exactly the same menu again! We headed to bed knackered and aching but

Tuesday 19th September

Now today Pepe had told us the 10 mile trek would be flatter and easier, but maybe this was a translation issue as it clearly wasnt, it was 10 times harder!!! And to top it off i (lisa) had a stinking cold and spent the whole trek with a streaming nose and pockets full of snotty wet tissues!!! It felt like pretty much the whole 3 hours were up hill, but the scenery was amazing and we covered more varied landscapes this time. Pepe told us we were going to a lake near the glacier around the back of Fitzroy. After a tiresome 3 hour trek all we could see was a giant moraine hill which we had to climb to see the lake. This took just about all our energy and as we reached the top unable to do much more, our jaws dropped. The lake was a beautiful frozen lake infront of a glacier, with the snowy mountains in the background. We couldnt walk on the lake but it still looked amazing. We forgave pepe and settled down on the rocks for some lunch and picture taking. In our usual style we found a rock just in the lake and climbed on it for posing for the pictures. We learnt from some foreign scary looking dudes who'd invaded our iced lake space, that if you lay on the ground you can take better pics! By now though we were not looking forward to the journey back, up and down more bloody hills. But it didnt seem to bad at all, and we made good speed (though pepe could have done it in 2 hours, such a legend!). The last half hour sucked though as we literally walked around a cold windy dusty mountain, not descending at all!!!! During the trek though we saw puma prints, which we got very excited about, but wanted to see the puma :o( after finally descending we said goodbye to our legend tour guide and headed home (to our hosteleria!). No we didnt watch a film this time, there's only so many films you can watch!! but we did have the same menu and same food again! This time we really were exhausted, 20 miles in two days, most of it up hill, but some amazing views

Wednesday 20th September

This was our return day to El Calafate, which we were looking forward too, apart from the fact we had to wait til 5 or 6pm for our coach, with nothing to do in the town! As per argentinean transport style, we, nor anyone else seemed to know if the coach was at 5pm or 6pm, but if we missed it we were there for another night! We were also not told we had to check out at 10am (another norm at hostels!) and were still in bed when reception decided to get angry that we werent out of our rooms! She didnt even seem to care that i had spent the whole morning being sick and was still being sick, which carried on a few more hours. In disgust we headed off to another hostel for next few hours, which had a cafe and internet. Basically we spent 5 hours there wasting as much time as possible, and running for our coach when we saw it at 5pm! We got back to the nice hostel in El Calafate late that night, happy to be back in civilization!