Drive from El Calafate to Puerto Natales

Annoyingly, I was awake a couple of hours before I needed to be! We had breakfast of coffee and toast before leaving at 8am. Just before we left, we had a group photo (without Nikki as she was still arguing with hostel staff about the bill!). The photo was because Camille was leaving the group this morning and going off to do the W trek in Torres del Paine with her Dad.

On the road, we continued to head south. The landscape was pretty flat and featureless with occasional glimpses of spectacular snow-capped mountains.

We had a toilet stop at a service station and then stopped on the roadside for a truck lunch intended to use up all the fresh stuff before we crossed the border back into Chile.

There are lots of references to Las Malvinas in this part of southern Argentina - on posters, on signs, and on memorials. Of course, these are the Falkland Islands that the UK went to war with Argentina over back in 1982. I remember it well. We were living in Paris at the time, so we didn't get as much news about it as we would if it happened today, but it became real to me when I heard that one of my classmates from England, who had joined the army a few months before at the age of 16, had been sent there. It obviously still resonates with people here. The conflict lasted 74 days and ended with an Argentine surrender on 14 June, returning the islands to British control. In total, 649 Argentine military personnel, 255 British military personnel, and three Falkland Islanders were killed during the hostilities.

We crossed at a very quiet border post in the middle of nowhere. I think we were the biggest group they had seen all year! They went through the motions, but we were through pretty quickly. From the border, it was only 13 kilometres to our campsite in Puerto Natales.

We arrived there at about 4.30pm, only to find out that we couldn't stay! Apparently, our booking had never been confirmed and they didn't have enough room for us! We sat on the truck outside the campsite for about 40 minutes while Nikki searched for a solution. The answer eventually came that we would stay in a hotel in town! We were all very happy that we wouldn't have to put up our tents tonight!

By the time we had driven to the hotel and got our rooms (the first one we were allocated was recently vacated and hadn't been cleaned), it was almost 6pm. Those doing the W trek starting tomorrow had to get to an office in town for a briefing. The rest of us were heading to a supermarket to buy something for lunch for tomorrow and drinks and snacks for the next three days in the national park.

With this accomplished, we didn't bother going out for dinner. Instead, we went back to the hotel and made cream cheese and ham sandwiches. We ate some tonight and kept the rest for tomorrow.

We went to bed by 9pm with the alarm set for 4.45am!Read more