En Patagonia: Chapter Eleven

 

I had one last day planned – one last thing on the list that I had made at the start of my time in El Chaltén. It had all passed by, not in a rush, but with a fullness and a gentle experience of the passing of time. I was not engaged with that most fruitless of pursuits – that of trying to hold back time. The weather had been kind – it was only a matter of weeks before thick clouds descended and covered the higher trails with snow. I saw some photographs that looked unrecognisable to the places that I had been. I had experienced what I craved the most after the white world of Antarctica – a warmth, and a land of abundant green.

Land of abundant green

I hired a bike again – this time it was fleet number 17. The pedals were reassuringly less wobbly than those on the previous steed. I took once more to Ruta 41. But for a shorter distance this time. I cycled to the Reserva Natural Los Huemules – some 16km north of El Chaltén. There are a number of trekking trails within the reserve, and in order to reduce the impact of tourism only a certain number of people are permitted on the trails each day. There was also an entrance fee. As a result, it was perhaps the quietest of all the days I spent out walking. Because of this, because of the scenery, and because of a deep sense of calm, it was possibly my favourite day of the entire trip. This, and the day that I saw the 4,000-year-old cave paintings at Punta Walichu. I took the trail to Laguna del Diablo – the lake of the devil. The path wound its way up through luscious woodland following the course of the Rio Diablo.

Rio Diablo 

Every now and then you would come to a gap in the trees revealing a vista of magnificent peaks, some adorned with patches of snow.

Reserva Natural Los Huemules

The day was delightfully warm, and I spent a while at the viewpoint beyond the Refugio Cagliero – the furthest extent of the trail. There was no one else about and little to disturb my revery. I was utterly mesmerised by the world. 

Viewpoint beyond the Refugio Cagliero

This was essentially an out-and-back trail, but with an option to take a shorter looped trail to Laguna Verde and Laguna Azul as you neared a return to the Ranger’s Station.

Laguna Verde

After having visited the lake of the devil, I questioned the slight lack of imagination in the naming of these two lakes. However, when I caught my first glimpse of Laguna Azul – the blue lake – I laughed at my thoughts. There was nothing else in the world that you could have possibly named that lake. I do not think I have ever seen such a blue. It was as if someone had dumped several tons of food colouring into the water and waited for it to be stirred by the wind.

Laguna Azul 

I returned to the Ranger’s Station and began my cycle back to El Chaltén. A short distance along – where I had hitched a lift from on a previous day – there were three guys with enormous backpacks sitting by the side of the road. They saw me coming, smiled, and stuck out their thumbs. I stopped and apologised that I could only take two. They laughed, and not wanting to leave a man behind they declined my offer, and I cycled on.  

Entrance to the Reserve 

I dropped the bike back into the Patagonia Travellers Hostel – they stored them, unlocked, on a rack outside. There was an American couple stood nearby on the pavement – I sensed that they were wondering about hiring bikes themselves. We got chatting, and I told them how the bike hire worked, and some of the good places to go. After a few minutes, the man said to me, “Do you work here? You speak very good English?” Well, I wasn’t in the mood to turn down a compliment, so I thanked him very much but couldn’t quite resist from telling him that I was from England. He seemed delighted by this. He told me how much he loved my country, and how he used to be an airline pilot and had flown into London Heathrow several times. “London Heathrow is great.” He gave no indication that he had visited anywhere else in England other than Heathrow. While I thought it an odd choice – to base a love of an entire country on a busy airport – I didn’t question it. But I did marvel at it for a while after. Perhaps he genuinely thought that it was an incredibly fine airport, or perhaps it was simply a connection of sorts to a stranger, a sense of familiarity in a land that was a strangeness to us both.

The outflow at Laguna Azul 

I wandered through the streets a while; I wandered down to the river and sat for some time. I was enjoying the moment, and I was reflecting a little on what had been and began to look to what was next. A friend had messaged me – she suggested that Eskdale would seem flat, would seem small in comparison to Patagonia. But to me, Eskdale would seem better than ever. I think size in this instance can only be measured in how big it makes your heart feel. Besides, it was more than a question of landscape alone. These travels in Argentina had been nothing short of fantastical, but rather than throwing everything else into the shade through tedious comparisons, it had increased the wonder of all things. I have been fortunate enough to experience this perspective on a number of occasions – the first of which was when I crossed the Ellsworth Mountains in the co-pilot seat of a Twin Otter plane.

Crossing the Ellsworth Mountains in a Twin Otter plane

That was a three-day trip with legendary pilot Ian Potten - we were inputting Andy and Ed for their deep field science project. 

Andy and Ed with all their field kit 

We saw Mount Vinson – Antarctica’s highest mountain – clear, out of the clouds. We saw the Ellsworths stretched out for hundreds of kilometres, and beyond that we saw an endless, flat, white.

Twin Otter and the endless flat, white.

And yet, when we returned to station, I found that even cleaning toilets had taken on a new enthusiasm. And much the same could be said for this latest adventure – there was a certain beauty to the M25 and the Manchester Ship Canal that I had never appreciated before. And then there was Eskdale. A world entirely set apart in my mind.

Eskdale

It was not quite the end of this South American adventure though – I still had to get back to Punta Arenas to pick up my flight home. I had factored in a few extra days to allow for delays of one sort or another. But the days of cycling and walking out amongst the mountains and the Patagonian Forest had reached their conclusion. It was more than I could have possibly imagined. And not simply in terms of the trails I walked and the sights I saw, but in all that this land had made me think, and had made me feel.