We decided to quickly head south before the weather changed and winter set in so we booked our flights to El Calafate which is near the bottom of argentinan patagonia. It is one of the newest towns in argentina built to capitalise on the popularity of tourism in the area and most importantly to provide better lins to the glaciers. Being so far south we thought we were going to be needing our thermals but were surprised when we landed that the weather was a fairly pleasant 18C. Landing at the airport was pretty spectacular as you land next to argentinas biggest lake, the same one which houses the perito moreno glacier a few hundred kilometers away. El Calafate is positioned a bit further down the lake and on some days we were lucky enough to see a few icebergs swim by. We aquainted ourselves with the town and booked ourselves on an ice trek at the glacier the next morning which meant an early start so we hurried off to bed.

We put on our layers and headed off early to the glacier. The perito moreno glacier is pretty unique as it is one of the only glaciers which is not receeding and due to its low position just above sea level is one of the most accessible glaciers in the world. As you wind through the valley next to the lake you get your first impressive glimpse of the glacier sprawling down the mountain into the pale blue water below. The glacier is blue due to the minerals from the rocks that it shears off as it moves down the mountain. Due to its position you are able to get very close to the face of the glacier on land and everyone stands in awe as ice calves off the glacier crashing into the lake below. After an hour of being spell bound we headed off on a boat to start our ice trek. The boat brought us closer to the other face of the glacier and allowed us to see more ice crashing off. We met our guides and got our crampons before our first lesson in ice hiking. Because the glacier is so low down it was actually really hot with most of us in t-shirts walkiing on the ice. Walking with crampons takes a little getting used to as you have to trust them to hold you secured to the ice. As we stomped over the curves that the glacier forms we got to see all the waterfalls and pools that form as the ice near the bottom begins to melt. We had to follow our guides footsteps carefully to make sure we didnt go over any fragile crevises and fall through into the caverns below. We walked to a ridge on the glacier which gave us an amazing few of the undulating ice around. We started to walk back to the edge when the guides surprised us with some whiskey on glacial ice washed down with some glacial water. Not a bad way to celebrate st patricks day! After a hard day on the ice we treated ourselves to a good old argentinian steak and wine with some guys from our hostel. This was definitely going to be a day to beat!

The next day we had booked ourselves on another glacier tour, this one was going through the lakes to visit some of the less accessible glaciers. The boat we boarded was really nice with good outside and inside viewing. We started heading down the iceberg channels to the first glacier, which is the tallest one in the park. The boats have to navigate the small icebergs to get to the face of the glacier but we were able to get really close up. As we sailed down to the different glaciers the boats move pretty fast and the wind was freezing. We nearly lost our cameras a few times as we rounded the corner to go to the front of the boat and were nearly knocked off our feet by the wind. We had to be more and more inventive with our clothing to cover our faces and keep warm. Next of was the Upsala glacier which is the biggest in the park and creates the biggest icebergs. Unfortunately both these glaciers are receeding along with other ones we could see higher up in the mountains where you could actually see the old outline of the glacier and the level it was at now. The journey through the lake to the next glacier was amazing, as we got closer the icebergs were getting bigger and bigger and the ship was weaving though some even bigger than our boat. Each iceberg was a beautiful blue colour of amazing shapes some with masive holes, each one more stunning and different than the next. Because of the icebergs we were not able to get to close to the front of the glacier and had to look from afar. Next we headed back upstream and docked to go and see a lake where 3 glaciers come down different mountains to meet at the lake. Although by the end of the day we were thoroughly frozen it was another day that was going to be hard to beat and harder to forget.

We decided to spend our last day catching up on a few chores and deciding where to go to next. There are lots of amazing places in southern patagonia and it was hard to chose, but we had heard it was orca season so we headed north to Puerto Madryn.