on glacier perito moreno...i look like a snowman, wearing many layers, and a harness (which was quite snug), as well as the godforsaken cramp-ons. these are just some of the beautiful images i got to take in while walking on the glacier. on some parts of the glacier, there were little lakes that formed when the ice melted. the water was so blue because of the reflection of the sky, enhanced by the air bubbles being trapped and compressed underneath the ice. it was a blue that was quite shocking.
this is the glacier that we walked on from a distance...i still can´t get over that i actually walked on a glacier!!!
so after the whole losing annette mishap, we began our adventures in ushuaia. it is so far south in argentina, so it was quite cold. i am not a lover of the cold, but the beauty was enough to keep me happy. so, first, ushuaia...as i mentioned in a previous posting, ushuaia is the southern most city in the world. it is right at the tip of argentina. we were going to bus it down, but it would have taken us something like 60 something hours, so we flew down, which was about a 4 hour flight.
ushuaia is a quaint little town, that definitely caters to older tourists who stop here on their way to antartica...those who are spending about 12, 000 USD to go on a boat to Antartica...a little bit outside my budget...But it was beautiful. We stayed at a hostel that had heated floors, which was my favorite little luxury. While we were there, we hiked up to Glacier Martial, which is a wee little glacier, but I had never seen a glacier before and the hike was beautiful. There was a running river on one side and we were in a little forest, so it was lush and green. The crazy thing about Patagonia is that they say you can go through all 4 seasons in one hour and we definitely experienced that on our hike. when we started in ushuaia it was sunny and a little windy (spring). then as we started hiking, it got colder and windier and began to rain a bit (fall)...then as we got to the top of the glacier, it started snowing (winter) and then as we came down into ushuaia it was warm and sunny (summer)...there was a section on the way up to glacier martial where i had to walk on snow, which is not pretty. for some reason i am terrified of walking on snowy or icy surfaces, especially at an incline. so as i was walking up, i was bent over and crouching low to the ground, trying to grasp on for dear life, even though there was nothing to grasp on to. i looked like a beaten down waddling duck, but i made it.
after spending a few relaxing days in ushuaia, we flew to el calafate, which is a town in central patagonia, known for the most stable glacier in the world, Glacier Perito Moreno. It is ginormous!!! We had a chance to walk on it (despite my incessant fears) for about 3 hours. I felt as if I was in an another world, almost like I was in a sci-fi movie with all the jagged peaks and the whites and crystal blues. i loved the scenery, but i really hated walking on the glacier. we had to put on cramp-ons so we wouldn´t slip on the ice and i swear i thought that every step would be my death. an unrealistic fear, but a fear nonetheless. as we were walking on the glacier, there were times you could see through the ice and i was sure that the ice would crack and that would be it, despite the fact that the glacier is frozen to over 1000 meters deep. plus walking on cramp ons is pretty hard because every step you take, your feet go into the ice to grasp and you have to pull them back out. i just felt very unstable and looked pretty ridiculous. i think i would have been much more appreciative if the walk was a bit shorter because i was just so tired and scared that i kind of stopped paying attentioin to the captivating beauty and just focused on staring at the ground and imagining the end. towards ther end i actually put on my ipod so i could power through and just finish.
1 comment:
Hahaha! You look like an eskimo...it is hard to believe you are there!
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