Dents in My Zen

So….After our wanton luxuriating for the last couple of nights in Puerto Natales we jumped on a bus which would take us across the border again back into Argentina to a town called El Calafate. It’s not a particularly pretty town and it’s a little more expensive here than what we’re used to in Argentina. Generally down here when it comes to the towns, less dust means more expensive. El Calafte’s main claim to fame is it’s proximity to the most spectacular glacier in South America (Perito Moreno) , and the second largest glacier in South America (Uppsala). It was very weird being back in Argentina after 2 weeks experiencing the rounder faces and broader smiles of the Chilenos. As we were checking out of the hotel in Natales, the guy at the desk (Juan Thomas I believe he was called) was full of chat and encouragement about the Argentine ladies even as M stood at my shoulder with a bemused look on her face. He had to comically steady himself against the desk a couple of times so enthusiastically was he swooning. Yeah, so Argentina is still here and most of the people, including the fabled Argentinean ladies, are still busy smelling themselves.

Jesper and M - Lago Roca

We got into town pretty late on the Saturday and all the decent hostels were full so, myself, M and Jesper, through no fault of our own, ended up in the hostel from hell. It was the kind of place that when you walked in, there was this smell which made you look to see who’s taken off their shoes. And no one has. Picture a room 2 metres by 2 metres with 2 bunk beds at right angles on adjacent walls leaving approximately1 square metre of floor space in the middle of the room for 3 people to socialise and prepare for bed. When you stood on the bottom bunk, there was about 6 inches of clearance between your head and the ceiling meaning, as a tall man you needed at least a 3 year apprenticeship in the Chinese circus just to manoeuvre yourself into the top bunk. M had night terrors, I had the fear of God on the top bunk, with a dry mouth, a full bladder and an open window at my arse and Jesper had an uncomfortable so-so night’s sleep aswell. We had booked a day trip to the Glacier (Perito Moreno) which left at 8am the following morning. We went for dinner and drinks with Jesper and Betsy a film person from Brooklyn who we’d met on the bus, so it meant we thankfully only had to spend 4 hours in our stifling, malodorous prison cell.

It was a pretty dull day for our daytrip to Perito Moreno. Our minibus took us deep into the badlands of Parque National De Los Glaciares and we were all glad of the slow rocking motion of the bus as it travelled at a snail’s pace over the unsealed gravel road for the first 3 hours. It gave us a chance for some much needed shut eye. Jesper took one nice photo of the 2 of us out on the boat in the rain with the glaciar as a backdrop and that’s really all we have to show for 12 hours round trip. Not a day well spent although Maeve seemed to get a lot more out of the glacier experience than I did.

Perito Moreno Glaciar (last known sighting of M's hat)

We got back into town and hit the Supermercado just before it closed for provisions for our trekking in El Chalten. Jesper bought way too much soup – he blames me for mentioning once in passing that the odd cup a soup may be a pleasant mountainside refreshment.

Hiker's Herald : Packet Soup Sale – Cuppa Soup’s SLASHED!

We were tired and hungry and shopping for food when hungry generally yields very mixed results. But at least we had our provisions and after a night at the El Chalten Hostel (there’s a long and lesson filled story attached to how we extricated ourselves from the apparently binding contract at the hostel from hell) a much nicer log cabin effect monster hostel just up the street, we were on our way on an early morning bus to El Chalten.

Driver Suffocation Prevention on Bakpacker's Bus

El Chalten is a very young town, founded in 1985. They were still paving the main street, or upgrading it at least, during our stay. The town is about 150km from El Calafate but you’re still in the Glaciar National Park. It exists solely to service the hordes of trekkers who descend on the area to do the Fitz Roy hike. Interestingly though there’s no bank in the town, which means there’s no ATM. Which wouldn’t be a show stopper if any of the businesses took credit card payments. Which they don’t – not even the hotels. So you have the bizarre scenario of a town whose existence primarily depends on the dollars of the moneyed North American or European tourist but yet doesn’t provide them with the facility to harvest these dollars from their own bank accounts. So, if you don’t know about the lack of banks in El Chalten, you literally hit town with whatever pesos are in your pocket and hope for the best. A lot of people got caught out and the tips for the waitresses were pretty light as every peso counted in (resounding deep movie trailer voice)….The Town Without A Bank.


We had a quick lunch and gave a quick call home, threw on our packs and we were away again on our second big trek in as many weeks. I stumbled across a supermarket which hired cheap trekking poles and picked up a set to help me avoid any further knee trauma. They proved to be absolutely invaluable and even though they make you look like a geriatric wannabe super hero I’m converted. They take something like 60% of the weight off your knees on downhills and enable you to use your upper body on flats and uphills to propel you along like Seabiscuit, ears pinned behind you in the breeze. One thing we found about the treks in the park were that the times given for each of the stages were cruelly inaccurate – a sign saying “Campsite 2 hours” would be followed 2 and a half hours later by a sign saying “Campsite 1 hour”. Although we cant complain too much because the landscape through which we were sweating was absolutely beautiful.

In God's Country

Day 1 was a decent uphill trek approx 3 hours which started by walking up the main street of El Chalten to the trailhead. We ended up at Camp De Agostini (named after an Italian priest who single handedly trekked, photographed and most importantly mapped a lot of these trails in the early part of the twentieth century), a very lovely campsite on the sandy banks of Rio Fitz Roy. We got the tent up, changed and had dinner before it got really cold – when the sun sets here the temperature plummets and its time to scurry into your layered up lair in your tent. These days wherever we pitch our tent, that’s our home (I’m tellin’ you that’s our home). We’re genuinely more comfortable, warm and happy pitched on the side of a mountain with a stove cooked meal in our bellies than we are in some of the hostels we’ve stayed in and we actually look forward to laying down for the night – an experience which Jesper seems to share (he’s got the same stove and same brand of tent as us so we sit and have campfire gear conversations).

Day2 we got up early had some very Ready Brek like porridge and headed up an hour each way trek overlooking Lago Torre and the powerful looking Glaciar Grande and the very imposing Cerro Torre – shrouded as it was in patchy cloud. We spent a very deep half hour contemplating the large block of ice with the wind whipping around our ears. Chocolate and peanuts were our reward. Down we came again, had lunch and headed off towards Poincenot campsite, approx 3 hours away. The first hour and a half was a real killer. It was a real struggle up some of the hills, sweat flowed profusely with the rucksack sitting like a passive overweight jockey on your back waiting for the glory of the home straight.

Pat Eddery At Rest

We got to camp pretty late and it was starting to get cold and dark so I wasn’t in the best of form to join Maeve in rejoicing at the first sighting of the magnificent Fitz Roy peak or Cerro Fitz Roy as it’s formally known. It was slightly overcast anyway and the following couple of days were to prove much more amenable to mountain spotting. We had some really loud, arrogant, ignorant Israelis pitch just beside us and it took them a good 3 hours to shut up and go to bed. That’s the 3rd time we’ve had problems with Israelis (who generally tend to be younger and go travelling in groups after their obligatory 2 year stint in the Israeli army) and anyone you talk to tends to have the same less than flattering opinion about them. Loud, arrogant and generally unfriendly. I would add hirsute to the pot of unflattering adjectives. They eventually got the hint after a cacophony of shhhhs arose from most of the tents on the campsite around midnight and we eventually got to sleep looking forward to the highlight of the hike – trekking up to Lagos los Tres to see Fitz Roy in all its glory the following morning.

Porridge Alchemy

Day 3 – we knew that we had a strenuous 1.5 hour hike up to Lagos Los Tres but we also knew we had the rest of the day to recover as we’d decided to stay another night in Poincenot. The trek up was tough but we didn’t have jockeys weighing us down. I have to say that for both the Torres trip and the whole Fitz Roy trip we were absolutely blessed with the weather. It’s coming into Autumn time down here, so aside from the generally unpredictable Patagonian weather, you’re not guaranteed anything when it comes to clear days providing stunning views. Day 2 was a crisp clear day. Day 3 was a real Summer’s day with the sun splitting the stones and literally not one cloud in the bluescreen sky. They say that the hole in the ozone is far more pronounced down here so any exposure to mid day sun is not just ill advised but actually dangerous. We covered up well and splashed on the factor 60 but I still got some interesting blisters on the backs of my hands just from the sun. Anyways – after much sweating and chocolate breaks we approached the ridge at the lookout point which overlooks Lago des los Tres and gives you a scintillating view of Fitz Roy.



You know those motivational posters on the walls of boardrooms and meeting rooms in most offices around the world which feature peaceful lakes and majestic mountain peaks in morning light with some corny slogan or mantra at the bottom like a health warning on a pack of cigarettes? Well, we had a meeting of the board of S&M inc. at the base of Fitz Roy except the backdrop was real. Real life affirming stuff. This is why we’re here. This is how insignificant it all is in comparison. This is how good a team we’ve become. This is why we’ll both need hip replacements before we’re 40. It’s absolutely incredible the clear headedness which exposure to nature in its purest and most powerful form induces. Not to get too highminded about it but it bent my zen and clicked some fundamental braincogs back into gear. It’s all downhill from here.

The payload - the view of Cerro Fitz Roy across Lagos de los Tres

We got up for 630 am the following morning to see the sunrise over the peaks. So cold. 2 pairs of socks and leather boots, hats and gloves and still all your extremities are numb. But here's what it looked like :

Worth The Numbness

Oh – this just occurred to me. Don’t let the fact that we’re wearing the same clothes in ALL the pictures (both this trip and last) make you think that A) we’re in penury and cant afford a change of clothes or B)that all the photos we’re posed in front of backdrops in some studio all on the same day and we’ve never even seen a trail. The clothes we’re wearing are our wet set. They’re made from the same lightweight but durable material as space ships and microchips and the inside of fridges and they make you 45lbs lighter when you put them on. They’re also the stinkiest outfits at the local launderette right now. Mine even has a special cape which doesn’t interfere with your mullet when you unfurl it at full tilt. Nah they’re not high tech at all. But we DO have other clothes. I suggested we bring clothes for a costume change for the photoshoot but M said we if we did, we wouldn’t be able to carry the chocolate so that was a no brainer……

My Cape Malfunctioning Painfully At 30,000 Feet

Also I’m conscious of the fact that suddenly out of nowhere this has become like some kind of a trekking blog. But that’s more a side effect of where we are and the opportunities for crazy hikes on your door step. We’ve decided we absolutely love the whole walking thing and are grabbing with both hands and one leg each while we’re here. We’re even thinking of extending our stay in Bariloche to take in some more trek-tastic National Parks but we haven’t really considered the knock on effects of that on our time in places like Bolivia and Peru yet. M says that trekking is like a religion in these parts with trekkers undertaking punishing pilgrimages to big rocks, mountain peaks or just the perfect view to seek some kind of spiritual connection or redemption. It’s definitely big business in Patagonia and rightly so. Everyone you meet is on a mission to complete the next trek, swapping tips and pointers and experience. It’s kind of addictive though. The amount of times you get the feeling you’re literally wandering through a postcard, a heavily photoshopped postcard at that, as all around you in every direction as far as the eye can see you have these wonders of nature towering above you, eerie dead forests surrounding you, valleys with complex systems of criss crossing rivers below you and always the bracing Patagonian winds to prevent your mind wandering further than your legs can carry it . It’s powerful stuff.

The final day trek downhill was pretty hardcore on the knees with one and a half and two feet steps down the mountain for over an hour. We stumbled back in to the town, dust lining the inside of our eyelids, dropped our stuff and headed straight for a piping hot home made pizza and a dinna doke making sure we had enough pesos cobbled together to get a bottle of water for our crackers and cheese dinner – leftovers from the hike. All good.

Sunrise on the bus out of El Chalten

Peadar you were asking where we get the time to write such verbose postcards. When your sitting on a bus for 5 or 10 hours or sitting around a hostel waiting for a flight you get plenty of time to act as a stenographer for the twiddling thumbs of your brain. Watch…
Early morning bus trip Chalten to Calafate with the ipod on shuffle hence the interjection of random italicised lyrics: Here She Comes Now. B Fleischmann rocking the desert sunrise as he rocked the airborne sunrise on our flight down to SA. Soft touch down throw. Bumpy roads through dusty sunlight. The upholstery’s primary colours radiant, drawing the bleary eyed passengers into their own souls. HGV drivers shouted directions window to window. Dreads, meat farts, trigger finger sunsets. Ear plugs for teary eyes. Nearly 3 months in. The dirt is on fire again. A wash, a self administered haircut, a leatherman pedicure and the world is a different place. The opportunities for silent discos on moving buses which an headphone splitter provides. Fags in the jacks. Pretty fonts for dire warnings. Puma runners. Handmade breakfasts by misconstrued ne’er do wells. Hotels by bus stops. We are in Patagonia forever. Unwashed beauty queens. Alex’s Diarrhea – Gick Fever. Shmaeve, spork, foon, spfork. When it rains it pours in Yuma Arizona. Sand in your mouth as you board the pre dawn bus. Disappearing into the sunrise. Deerhoof. Betsy Brooklyn. Pookey-Ookey. Mountain Goats in Patagonia. You can even get used to postcard landscapes. Spas in Natales. Broken-in boots albeit with scars. A real page turner. A real page downer. Germans air their Thermarests daily. Glass and wood bathroom doors with lace curtains to preserve your modesty. Vacuum packing. Recharging batteries from sockets in the ceiling. No No No MistaBond! Dirt road diversions from dirt roads. Don’t go back to Calafate. De strapping the chimera. Drooling on my hat which I’d used as a pillow. Ruta 40 is out – too long, too bumpy, too expensive – no space on the buses anyways. Maybe if you were driving it yourself you could hammer out an interesting trip but when you’re on someone else’s timetable it becomes difficult. Bulky comfort. In icy Argentine they say now I’ve seen it all. Double tracked vocals. Meltwater from mountain streams to quench the thirst. Another town. Anti virus, bad skin, fascist Polskis. The origin of Dominic and Moira. Mechanical arms with oil in their veins. Got dirt, got air, got water and I know you can carry on. Measuring the passing of time by the battery charge monitor. Meeting previous acquaintances in the strangest of places. You’re an embarrassment. The sex lives of street dogs. The rights and wrongs of Internet reviews. Reverb. Echoey electronica in the desert. God hates techno – he doesn’t mind electronica. Beatific thoughts per minute. The slower the better. Conflict is futile. Conflict is an expensive path to resolution. It is divine my child and it only lasts a second. Black is black and bliss is bliss. Follow the yellow sticks, the red dots, the footprints of other bipeds. Beat your own path. The big steps, the vertical drop. Waking up tireder than you went to sleep in a strange smelling strange bed in granny patterned bed clothes. I’d like to marry all of my close friends live in a big house together by an angry sea. Gra-Syas. A Massawje?? Sound separation. Indigo Keogh. The Hilux is king. The economy of expression, supply and demand. Booked for the crooked, a torrent of thick. I hope we have the time of our lives.

Conflict Resoloution - Bending Your Zen