El Chalten

El Chalten is located in the national park, 250 km away from El Calafate. Admission is free and you can go on several hikes. The mountains here are very similar to the Torres del Paine mountains, but not quite as crowded.

We had perfect weather for 5 days with no clouds and temperatures of 20-25 degrees, which is very unusual for this region. It was so hot that some shops were closed. But with blue skies and good weather, hiking is much more enjoyable! And it offers a beautiful view of the mountains and glaciers that surround them.

Camping was only allowed in a parking lot here. At the campsite, we met people from Holland, Australia, France, Switzerland, Argentina, Chile, and Austria. So far, we have only seen luxury campers with large expedition vehicles, mostly older people. But here, we finally met many young people to have a few beers with in the evenings.

There were many climbers on the mountain who had traveled from far away after hearing about the good weather here. It is actually allowed to climb the 3,405 km high Fitz Roy. Anyone can see how crazy that is when they look at the mountain.

With the heat, the ice on the glaciers begins to melt, making it very difficult for climbers to overcome the ice fields, etc. Almost every day, the rescue helicopter was flying to rescue injured climbers.

At the campsite, we met a group of Argentinians who had climbed Fitz Roy and were celebrating. But then at 5 in the morning, they decided to drive their car around, a fox jumped onto the road, the guys swerved off the road, went down and then up the embankment, and finally quietly arrived at the campsite. There were people lying on the ground next to our bus (you're not allowed to camp there, but sleeping on the ground with a sleeping bag is okay, strange where the boundary is drawn here) and they were sleeping. When they heard the crash, they crawled away with their sleeping bags to save themselves. Crazy things happen. But the guys in the car were fine.

Unfortunately, there is no workshop in El Chalten, which became a problem for two French guys. Their bus wouldn't start, even with a jump-start. After the whole campsite gave their opinion all day long, the car still didn't work. So the car had to be taken to the nearest town, which was 250 km away. After much thought, they decided to have two other French guys tow them for 250 km. We saw them on our way, but we don't know how it turned out, but it looked good.