We were wowed from the moment we drove into El Chalten. The first image you see as you arrive into the tiny town are the towering pinnacles of Mount Fitz Roy. The view from our hostel was equally spectacular and on our first night we were treated to the Patagonian skies we had heard so much about. Crazy clouds that were forever changing and creating new shapes and shadows across the landscape and an array of pinks and blues scattered in between. It truly was like nothing we had ever seen before.

We had planned four nights and three full days in El Chalten. On our first day, we got ourselves organised and set off toward a trail, but it was blowing a gale and we made the executive decision to turn back and make this our rest day. We headed for the supermarket and had to sieve through a fresh food section that looked more like a compost heap. Somehow we managed to make some delicious chicken soup for lunch and pasta sauce for dinner and were loving not having to go out to find a reasonably priced restaurant. The bottles of Argentinian wine at the supermarket were a grand total of AU$4.30 so we got into the spirit and tried a few Malbec’s while creating in the kitchen.

The next two days consisted of full day hikes where we covered a total of around 43km. Fair to say we were wrecked afterwards.

The first day was the stand out with a hike to Laguna de los Tres and the Fitz Roy Cerro. On the recommendation of our hostel, we took a transfer north of the park, so we could walk in one direction all the way back to our accommodation. Unlike the east arm of The W trek in Puerto Natales, we were amazed right from the beginning of this hike and we remembered similarities between it and the Laguna 69 hike in Peru all those weeks before. To begin, there were huge rocky-mountains, splashed with markings of brown, red and black coloured stone. Around the next bend, we stumbled across the flowing river bed of the Rio Blanco, beautiful in its own right with multicoloured speckled pebbles clearly visible through its crystal clear glacial waters. Only a short distance further on, we were slightly higher and stood astounded as in front of us was a jagged, icy blue and white glacier, with the Fitz Roy peaks sitting proudly behind it and amongst the surrounding green mountains was a distant bright blue lake. We were pinching ourselves.

After around two hours of hiking we reached the turn off to the viewing point of Mount Fitz Roy. We had been warned this would be the toughest part and it was! We hiked straight up the rocky path for a good 50 minutes, dodging and weaving through loose boulders and erratic tourists! Post climbing up the slippery gravel hill, we reached the top and were blown away. The view was not too dissimilar to the Torres pinnacles and was just as spectacular. Again, we had a picturesque picnic and hung out gazing at the scenery and the people! The hiking community is so vast! Along each walk so far, we have always been intrigued by someone or something. I find myself continually thinking... what are they carrying in their giant bag?, how did she get up here in that skirt or those shoes?, why didn’t I think to bring my thermos?!

After carefully making our way down the path and through the thick forest, we emerged at the turn off and headed towards home. We made sure we continued to stop and glance back every few minutes as the view of the surrounding river, lakes, greenery and Fitz Roy continued to transform and take on new perspectives. This was one of the greatest parts about this walk, walking solely in one direction exposed views and landscape that we hadn’t seen earlier and that constantly evolved for the entire 21 km journey. Having crammed in so many hikes in the past months, this concept was quite the rarity and greatly appreciated.

The second walk was 22km according to ‘map my run’. A steady up hill in the beginning that soon petered out to a flat stroll which lead us through green forest, with bonsai looking trees, river crossings and eventually to a glacial lake, Laguna Torre, complete with icebergs! The icebergs were quite the sight, scattered randomly over the lake, they were different shapes and sizes and left us wandering how on earth they got to their resting points. We found a tree log to rest against and set up our picnic with yet another miraculous view before us. It wasn’t long however before the wind picked up and we soon became freezing sitting by the water with the glacial wind battering us. We took in one last glance and set off to return to town.

It’s fascinating how quickly you can become over familiar with beauty. This walk was gorgeous and quite different to the previous days walk. Particularly in the beginning, the brown mountains looked almost barren, and the surrounding fields were covered in yellow and granite coloured tufts of wild, wind-swept grasses and shrubs. It really was stunning but we came away thinking, it was beautiful but it wasn’t as great as X, Y, Z.. We were quite aware that there was a huge possibility that this might happen to us prior to travelling to Patagonia. Given all of the insanely stunning mountains and vistas, we began to believe that maybe there really was too much of a good thing. The old recency bias making stunning things seem a bit meh! For this reason from then on we were careful not to overload ourselves with ‘must see’ activities. Looking back I think we gave ourselves a decent balance, we saw so much, and (mostly) appreciated everything!