(Part 3) El Calafate and Perito Moreno

El Calafate (Argentina)

At the entrance of the city we find the welcome sign with the city's coat of arms and the shape of the white mountains. El Calafate is located in Santa Cruz province in Argentina and is the access to the Glacier National Park where the glaciers such as Perito Moreno, Upsala and Viedma are located. The trip from Puerto Natales by bus is approximately 7 hours.

We continue walking and we will see the welcome sign to the National Capital of the Glaciers, which confirms where we are, which creates a great expectation of everything we can find around this place. In this part of the city the streets are quiet, few people, a good option to walk a while.

On the way to the city centrer there is a wooden bridge a little old, that when crossing we notice that there is something unusual, in this bridge the lovers seal their love through the tradition of placing a padlock with the names or initials of the couple. When I arrived at the main avenue, there is more movement, there are many gastronomic and commercial places where there are many options, from pubs, restaurants, pizzeria, rodizio, at night they have traditional food options too.

Continuing the walk by the lake side, following the main avenue (Avenida del Libertador) you can reach the lake's waterfront, around the "bahía redonda" round bay you can see the large meadows that serve as food for animals, this season at the beginning of the thaw, the water level is still low, but you can see the turquoise colors of the lake in the distance.

National Park the Glaciers

At the entrance to the park you can see the pieces of the glacier floating in the lake. There is a kind of viewpoint, a metal platform, that when walking on it moves because the icebergs hit the lower part of the structure, but everything is fine, just grabbing the railings while walking, the viewpoint is safe and It brings us closer to the icebergs to observe them more closely.

The entire circuit of the park is made up of several authorized paths and it is not allowed to leave it, the paths of walkways with many stairs and viewpoints allow you to admire the glacier, flora and fauna around. Each path has a marked color that serves as a guide for each of the routes of the circuit. At the top there is also a special path for people in wheelchairs.

The Perito Moreno glacier is a large thick mass of ice that continuously move (so it accumulates more ice, breaks and releases), if we stay watching for a while we can hear and see how giant blocks of ice come off. From here appear the numerous fragments of ice that move through the canal, pass through the entrance of the park and continue their course to Argentino Lake.

The birds abound in the park due to its lush forests as well as the water of its lagoons, there are several species, but I only had the opportunity to photograph two while I was walking, a medium sized specie that was able to cross the glacier and return and Another species is a Patagonian thrush that always perches on the railing of the viewpoints.