Back to El Chalten

It was time to depart from the Fitzroy region. We were up bright and early because we had a long hike ahead of us. Our trail on this day would take us back the way that we came first by the Rio Electrico. It was sad to not be going farther into the mountains of Patagonia, but by this point it was sure going to be nice to take a shower and sleep in a bed. We were both enjoying being out, but it was time. The weather was still really good and we were having incredible weather on the trip thus far. The wind was not horrible and anyway it was at our back helping push us out of the mountains.

There was not a whole lot new at first just retracing our steps under Cerro Electrico and back up the river valley to Poincenot. Once we were past Poincenot, we were finally on new trail again. This trail was the most popular of all the trails. It came up from El Chalten to Poincenot. It was filled with all those same kind of hikers that charged their way up to Angel's Landing in Zion. There for the day, not prepared to stay overnight, really not quite completely prepared to be out for the entire day, but doing their best to see one of the most beautiful sights that nature has hidden up its sleeve. 

And why not, the views were amazing. Fitzroy was out in all its glory looking like the massive behemoth of granite that it definitely was. We were definitely leaving our wilderness behind as many, many others were coming up the trail. We were also leaving our cool comfortable weather too as the trail kept getting drier and hotter as we went. We could have avoided it by taking a shuttle bus down the valley from the Rio Electrico, but why spend money when hiking is the cheaper way to go. We were very happy when we saw El Chalten come into view. It was a long walk through town to our hostel, but this time we had a room to ourselves and just needed some laundry and some cold beer to complete the day.
The next day we woke up very early with the sunrise, which in Patagonia meant that we were up by 5 AM. Our goal was to get a view of Cerro Torre which we unfortunately were not able to see from Laguna Torre. Dad's idea was just to charge up a hill outside of town until we could get a good sight of the peak. He and I both chose different paths after a while feeling different viewpoints inspired us. I think after it was all over, we both thought that our choice was the better one of course, but regardless we each got excellent shots of Cerro Torre and all the peaks in the Fitzroy region of Los Glacieres. I sat there for a while just looking at the peaks because we had a bus out of there later that morning and I knew that more than likely, I would never be back to this place again. I was happy that my camera battery had lasted long enough for me to get to take pictures on the backpack as the low battery light had come on when we were just getting into Laguna Torre. I had been conservative with my picture taking, but now we were back in civilization and I could take many pictures.
 It was awesome to see Fitzroy sticking out above the others and just how incredibly steep Cerro Torre was. I enjoyed this spot and I had just one more photo to get.

A picture of good ol' sunburned me staring into the rising sun. I snapped my pictures and got prepared for the traveling. We were headed way down south to the end of the world, a town called Ushuaia that was the backdrop of many mountain peaks in Tierra del Fuego, the land of fires. I was excited for this part of the trip as this was going to be the more rugged and less touristy part of the trip. Or at least I hoped.