One of the longest-standing items on my bucket list was Patagonia—a beautiful, vast landscape of fjords, mountains, glaciers, and lakes spanning two countries. It’s undoubtedly the southernmost place on Earth I’ll ever travel to, unless WizzAir decides to launch a route from Eindhoven to Antarctica.
In 2024, a had a fantastic opportunity to visit a friend in Uruguay and we’ve set sails together on an adventure toward the breathtaking landscapes of Patagonia, ready for some awesome hiking. We’re going to visit some of the most famous landmarks and get some views of Fritz Roy, Cerro Paine and of course of the famous Perito Moreno glacier.
El Chaltén
Our journey began in El Chaltén, just about a three-hour drive from FTE airport—perhaps one of the most scenic drives I’ve ever experienced. The landscapes were so stunning that we made multiple stops to take photos and admire the sheer beauty of the Patagonian steppe. At times, it felt like being on Mars, but with a backdrop of majestic mountains and glacier lakes.
Two days in the area was a relatively short stay, but it was enough to recharge and recover from jet lag while hiking through the serene landscape. On the first day, we enjoyed several shorter but equally rewarding hikes and saved the Fitz Roy hike for the second day, as we were promised perfect weather by the “weather god,” who also happens to work part-time as a hostel receptionist. And he delivered! On the second day, we set off on the great hike under clear skies and ideal temperatures.
Unfortunately, due to my broken foot, we didn’t make it to Laguna de los Tres, which offers the best views of Fitz Roy. However, we got pretty close, and the hike was still incredibly rewarding.
El Calafate
The second destination on our quest to conquer Patagonia was El Calafate, a somewhat larger settlement compared to the previous one, yet still maintaining a small community feel, fully geared toward tourism.
The activities here are essentially limited to two options: sitting and gazing into the distance at the stunning landscapes or visiting the Perito Moreno Glacier. We did a bit of both, but I must admit, the glacier exceeded all expectations, delivering spectacular views that will forever remain well engraved in my memory.
Named after a renowned explorer, Perito Moreno is one of the very few glaciers in the world that’s not retrieving, nor stagnating, but instead it’s advancing at a rate of around 2 meters per day. It was a great experience standing on the viewing deck at a safe distance from the falling ice (which apparently has taken many lives in the past), admiring the beauty of the glacier, and listening to the scary sounds that the cracking ice makes.
Torres del Paine National Park
After an icy experience in El Calafate, we embarked on a 5-hour bus ride that was about 2 hours longer than it could have been, to Puerto Natales in Chile, which is the hub for tourists visiting the world-famous Torres del Paine National Park.
This time, the weather was less forgiving, and as soon as we arrived, we got a taste of how the next few days would look: cold, wet, and very windy. This was expected, considering the location is tucked between two oceans, with high mountains, and relatively close to Antarctica. But we didn’t let a few drops of rain and winds of over 100 km/h ruin our trip; we just kept our hikes to shorter ones. Despite being short in length, they were not short of breathtaking scenery, with glacier lakes so blue they seemed unreal and snowy mountain peaks in the background.
