El Chaltén + Day 1 of the Huemul Circuit

After visiting the rangers’ station to inquire about current conditions on our intended Huemul Circuit we spent ~3 hours in town to rent harnesses and carabiners which are needed to cross two glacier rivers by zip line. Only in the 4th shop at at the very end of the village we were lucky! How many people are in the same trek? Or is everyone climbing? :-)

Thus, we started a bit later than desired, around 2pm, registered with the rangers and off we went. The hike was a moderate 16km with some 500m ascent and descent into a valley. We had great views on the famous mountains of Fitz Roy and neighbors before descending into our “valley of the wind” (this could be a name for each and every valley as all of Patagonia is incredibly windy).

We arrived at the camp site around 19:30 but with Patagonian summer time and light until 22:00 no problem :-) we found a good, wind-protected spot and set camp. Only in the night should we find out that the winds were still beating the tent and covered the front part of the tent in a fine layer of dust and sand...Read more