The John Gardner Pass

Day 4: Los Perros to Grey Camp.
Presented to us as “the worst day” because we will climb the John Garner Pass (1200m) it was the most interesting and beautiful day so far.
We woke up at 4:00 to start walking at 5:30, no, we are not the fastest packers. The mood in the cooking area at breakfast was hectic, everybody was either aiming to survive the day or beat everybody else at the implicit speed contest.
The sun rises at 5:30 so we could start the day in the beautiful sunrise light and the way up reminded us of the Alps with bigger walls and glaciers.
The climb to the pass was pleasant with some snow fields and when we reached the top we could admire the Grey Glacier from above. This ice mass is longer and higher than any glacier we had seen so far and we were blessed with good (fair?) weather with almost no wind.
The hike down was steep and we reached the control spot at 10:10 (we had until 14:00 to get there, otherwise we would be stopped by the rangers). After lunch at 10:30 we continued the beautiful hike going above and along the glacier. It was not a common sight for us from Switzerland to be walking in trees and flowers above such a huge glacier (the altitude of the glacier is around 500 meters).
Arriving in Grey Camp was a bit of a shock after the quiet previous days as the camp is also part of the W trek and therefore much more crowded. The line for check-in goes for ages, at least I can use it to write the missing reports for Findpenguin. Meanwhile Andreas had the brilliant idea to set up the tent while I was waiting, otherwise we might have ended up with a very windy camp spot.
The evening was spent drinking a Patagonia Beer for apero and eating dinner at the Refugio. We met a German couple and British guy doing the W and spent some time after dinner exchanging recommendations for El Calafate, el Chalten, Bariloche and San Pedro de Atacama.Læs mere