Perito Moreno Glacier - Ice Ice Baby

Patagonia is simply breathtakingly beautiful, one highlight after another...

From El Chalten, we took a bus to the small town of El Calafate, just 3 hours away (the name comes from the Calafate berry, which grows in the region and is used to make jam and schnapps). El Calafate is located on Lake Argentino, the largest lake in Argentina, and is the starting point for excursions to the Perito Moreno Glacier. The Perito Moreno Glacier is not the largest glacier in Argentina, but it is one of the few that does not retreat, but rather remains in the same place. The glacier loses about 2 meters of its tongue every day, but also gains about 2 meters through new snow and such (or something like that). The glacier is about the size of Buenos Aires and is part of the Southern Patagonian Icefield, the third largest ice field on Earth. So, enough facts for now...

To prepare ourselves (Lea from France, whom I knew from El Chalten) for the glacier, mentally and physically, we first went to the Yeti Icebar. There, for just under €6 for 25 minutes, you could go into the ice bar and drink as much as you can in 25 minutes. First, we were equipped with a sweet poncho with a hood and gloves, like 'Frozen', a dream 😍. Since it was later in the afternoon, there was not much activity, there were only three of us in the bar. That was great for us, no waiting in line for drinks and plenty of space on the dance floor. After the mentioned Calafate schnapps, we also had some good mixes of vodka-sprite and Captain-Cola. After 25 minutes, we left the bar slightly tipsy...

The next day, we went to do the Minitrekking on the Perito Moreno Glacier, 80 km away. And once again, you could see how small this travel world is, there was actually Alaina from England sitting on the bus to the glacier, with whom I had already spent the worst bus ride of my life from San Pedro de Atacama to Salta. Despite the joy of seeing each other again, I wasn't so sure if that was a good omen for this trip...

First, we went to a remote viewpoint. Even from here, we were all overwhelmed by the glacier. When we stood on the observation platforms right in front of the glacier, we couldn't stop being amazed. After just a few minutes, we were lucky enough to witness a huge ice block falling from the glacier with a loud noise, like a mix of thunder and a cannon shot, hard to describe. For almost an hour, we simply stared at the huge expanse of ice in front of us and listened to all the sounds that the moving ice produced.

We then continued by boat directly to the glacier. Equipped with ice spikes on our shoes, the minitrekking on the ice began. In single file, we followed our funny guides for about 1 1/2 hours on the ice (with some funny singing and dancing on our part, because who can resist and not sing 'Let it go' loudly in this environment?) At the end, we were rewarded with chocolate and a glass of whisky with glacier ice. Salute! It was an incredibly great day on the ice...