El Calafate and Perito Moreno Glaciar

The lake of the Glacier
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Got into El Calafate and went straight to our hostel we had booked in advance.  Calafate was much more to our liking, similar to Bariloche in that it is situated on a blue lake with the accompanying snow capped mountains but the town is smaller than Bariloche and better for it, people seemed nicer and although prices were similar didn't bother us as much for some reason.

Spent an hour with one of the hostel staff sorting out our plans for the next week or so, they were a great help and for the first time in a while we had a clue about what we were going to do next.  If you ever end up in El Calafate stay at Hostel America Del Sur, but book ahead.

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That night partook of the Mixed Grill (Parrillada) that the hostel put on, 30 pesos for pretty much all the meat you can eat and then some, as well as beer and wine.  Sat up chatting to some Israeli girls over a few glasses of Argentinean red then hit the hay in anticipation of out trip to the Perito Moreno Glacier the next day.

Got up around 7am a little bit rusty and got our first view of the Glacier around 9:30am.  It was absolutely spectacular especially as the previous record for most ice I've seen in one place was the chilly billy ice freezer at the Strath servo.  It was quite a lot bigger than that, it had a sheer face of ice around 60m high and according to wikpedia around five km wide (I would have said less than that, but who am I to argue with wikpedia) and stretches back into the distance 30km.

A splash generated from a big bit of ice breaking away
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Got off the bus and walked around the lake shore to approach the glacier from a different direction (assume this is why it was called the alternative tour).  The lake itself was very impressive a colour blue that is very hard to describe....just a very light blue...almost seemed unnatural, wouldn't be surprised if it glows in the dark.   This according to our guide is something to do with particles of glacier dust? permanently suspended in the water...Not really sure if that's right as we weren't really paying attention and were lagging behind the rest of the group a fair way.

The boat we went on later
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Then just to make the whole experience even better not only do you have an amazingly blue lake and a monstrous chunk of ice it just happens to be ringed by more snow capped mountains...anyway enough....better to look at the pictures.

Walked up to the Glacier face...well not right up to it as there was still a substantial bit of lake between us and the face.  Probably a good thing as we were fortunate enough to see the Glacier Calve quite a few times which is spectacular and usually involves a crack like a rifle shot as a piece of ice the size of a volkswagon breaks away then a huge boom and splash as it hits the lake.

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After that we went up to the viewing platforms where all the people who aren't mavericks and don't do the walk go to straight away.  The platforms were pretty good and got to see the Glacier from a heap of different angles and even managed to get a few photos in between the hordes of tourists.

Finally took the boat out which sails across the face of the glacier, from memory that was just after Jo did another pretty good stack down the bus steps.  The boat goes as close as 300m to the face which believe me is close enough with big chunks of ice dropping every now and again and was another good perspective but by the end we were a bit glaciered out and Jo was getting grumpy.

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Will finish by saying that the Glacier was probably one of the most spectacular things we have ever seen.  Personally for me it is probably second behind Jo's stack in Quito.