Hiking in Patagonia

Fran and I just got back from a 3-week trip to Patagonia (mostly Argentina, but a short stay in Chile as well). This has been on the cards for several years now so we were ecstatic that we finally got to go! In this post I'll give a brief summary of some of the main trekking areas as there may be some others on the forum who are keen to go too..

We found that 3 weeks was just the right amount of time to see the famous highlights of the area, but did often find that we were very much on the trekking tourist path and these areas can unfortunately be very crowded. By crowded, I mean there can be over 500 people doing a 20km hike to go see the world-famous view of the Torres del Paine on any given day in mid-summer!! This shouldn't detract you from going to these places, but definitely try to include some lesser-known and wilder areas in your trip to get away from the crowds every now and then.

Thankfully, we experienced this with our very first hike near Bariloche, a 4-day traverse of the Nahuel Huapi range. The highest peaks in this range go up to about 2500m in height, but are still snow-capped in mid-summer, with the tree-line at about 1500m and then a band of loose and unstable scree to be negotiated to reach the higher summits. There is a network of basic (but expensive) refugios in the area, but we took a tent along and were able to camp for free nearby. The route we had planned to follow was Villa Catedral - Refugio Frey - Refugio Jakob - Refugio Laguna Negra - Refugio Lopez and once you get past the popular 10km trail up to Frey, you pretty much have the mountains to yourself! The route was quite a bit more technical than I expected, with large sections being pathless over large sections of extremely loose scree - the kind where everything you touch moves down the slope by about half a meter. We were rewarded with amazing views over the lakes of Bariloche, pristine meadows and snow-covered peaks. The 8km traverse between Jakob and Laguna Negra was still closed due to heavy snow drifts on the technical scrambles (it typically only opens in mid-January), so we were forced to walk the long way around on this section via two forested valleys - luckily we were still able to get into the high mountains for the last section of the traverse anyway.


Descending to Laguna Jakob


Massive view out towards Monte Tronador from Cerro Lopez


Descent from Cerro Lopez (we came down that loose scree gully in the center of the photo

From Bariloche we took a 31-hour (!) bus ride via the vast Argentinian Steppe (flat arid land similar to the Karoo) to reach El Calafate and its famous Perito Moreno glacier. We didn't do any hiking here, but took a bus out to the glacier's edge and spent 4 hours marvelling at the 5km wide glacier and the regular blocks that would come crashing off it into the water. This looks like one of the areas where you should be able to arrange a permit to do your own wild hiking in the mountains surrounding the glacier.


We saw that 60m pillar of ice on the right collapsing just a few hours later




Our next stop was in the tiny climbing village of El Chalten, where we spent 4 days over Christmas, doing day hikes around the towering peaks of Fitz Roy and Cerro Torre. This area was probably my favourite - the village has a nice charm to it and the hiking options are impressive. The main walks to the Laguna de Los Tres (with Fitz Roy view) and Laguna Torre (with Cerro Torre view) are very crowded on good-weather days, but there are also other quiter hikes to get away from it all. We saved the two main hikes for the only properly clear weather day we had on our last day, making for a long 37km day hike - all on very well-maintained and easy paths though!


Fitz Roy showing off on our bus ride into El Chalten




A Christmas-day run to the Laguna Toro viewpoint


BIG views of Fitz Roy on the way up to Laguna de Los Tres


Fitz Roy towering above Laguna de Los Tres

Awesome! I definitely want to visit there. Have been following your journey on Instagram.

One of the main things we had wanted to do was a 4-day hike of the W route at Torres del Paine. Unfortunately, the park is completely overrun with demand for overnight spots in the campsites, refugios and hotels. We had missed the window to get any bookings and everything in the park was fully booked during our time there. It is also strictly enforced that you aren't allowed to wild camp outside of the official campsites and they don't even let you into the park for more than a day if you can't prove accommodation/camping bookings. So if you're planning to go, book long in advance - apparently the free campsites were fully booked 6 months in advance!

So we were forced to stay in Puerto Natales for longer than planned, picked the 2 best-weather days and bussed into the park to do long day hikes instead. We still managed to cover most of the W route this way, but it was unfortunately very rushed as the earliest busses & ferries only get you there by noon and the last bus leaves at 7pm. The park's massive popularity is obviously justified though - turquoise glacial lakes, towering granite spires, hanging glaciers and beautiful forest sections seemed to be around every corner.


Torres del Paine - 1500m of sheer cliffs


I wasn't exaggerating about the crowds!


Views of Los Cuernos on our ferry ride across to Paine Grande




Hanging glaciers in the Valle Frances


Hiking back down Valle Frances


A waterfall coming off Los Cuernos

We ended our trip with 3 days in Ushuaia, which claims to be the "southern-most city in the world". Not really sure about that claim since it's not quite a city and there is the Chilean town of Puerto Williams further south, but either way, you really do feel in a wild place here, and the 55 degree latitude is obvious in the crazy weather and snowline that comes down to 600m, even in mid-summer. The maximum temperature here in January is generally about 10 degrees, but we had one day where it was 3 degrees and snowing hard on our hike to Laguna Esmeralda (just 400masl). The forests are just magic here, with moss-draped trees and fungi everywhere. Many fields are covered in brightly-coloured peat bog and it would probably have been a good idea to bring boots with all the mud we had to wallow through - trail runners made things a little unpleasant! We had a pretty good weather day on our last day there so headed to the Tierra del Fuego National Park where we hiked up Cerro Guanaco - just 973m but feeling very wild and alpine already. Once again, it may be possible to arrange permits to the off-limits Darwin Range, catch a ferry or plane there and spend several days just exploring the place... now that would be properly wild and definitely an experience to come back for.


Tierra del Fuego National Park


On our way up Cerro Guanaco




Nearing the top, heading through a light dusting of snow from the day before

Thanks for sharing - looks awesome!

So many mountains, so little time...

Thanks for the write up and the beautiful photos Stijn - Fantastic that you were able to experience this. The scenery reminds me a lot of South Island, New Zealand

Thanks Elinda - yes we kept saying the same thing! Very similar to NZ, except maybe on a bit of a larger scale... must be the latitude.