El Calafarte

We left Ushuaia and flew to El Calafate which is still in the Argentinian Province of Patagonia but is situated much further north. The town lies on the the shores of Lake Argentino - the largest lake in Argentina at 65km length - and is the gateway to the Los Glaciares National Park. It is filled with blue glacial water and is very popular for kite surfers as it is always windy here being nestled on the eastern side of the Andes.
Today we drove an hour along the lake before boarding a boat to motor up to the western end of the lake which breaks into several fingers of water filled valleys into which flow several glaciers. We first visited a couple of waterfalls before heading to the huge Perito Merino Glacier - even after being in Antarctica it is still awe inspiring. It is 50 km long originating from the Chilean Patagonian ice fields and it's front is 5km wide pushing into the lake.
The drive to the boat is interesting in that the area is a steppe - dry being in the rain shadow of the Andes and as such looks a lot like the saltbush plains of outback Queensland and NSW with scattered herds of sheep and cattle sparsely dotted on the horizons. This whole region has historically been poorly populated despite immigration pushes by successive governments but recently very large reserves of oil and gas have been found here which has brought prosperity to some areas.
The town gets it's name from the Calafate berry bush which is endemic to Patagonia - it's purple, bitter sweet and used for jams, ice cream and wine and beer. Luckily it fruits in February so we have seen it. The local natives said if you eat it you will return to Patagonia so having had the jam and Ice cream who knows!Leia mais