A W E S O M E .
I guess I will start chronologically because I don't know how else to dive in.
We went for our honeymoon, which I would do again and again, though in most respects it's not a great place for a honeymoon. There is too much to do and the newlyweds need a location that offers far less temptation for activity.
It's an 11 1/2 hour flight to get there, 10 1/2 back. At least it's a direct flight to Buenos Aires. We flew to B.A. on Monday night and got there about mid-day. It's 3 hours ahead. We spent the night in B.A. but I will come back to that. We flew economy because I wouldn't let Jeff buy business class seats. It's an absurd waste of money and I have Ambien, so what do I care?
The next day we took a 3 1/2 hour flight to El Calafate, in southern Patagonia. Our destination was Los Notros, the only hotel in Parque Nacional Los Glaciares. It was a horrible flight. I hate flying and this was up there with the bad ones. We were crammed in like lemmings. We bought business class seats only to find out that there is no business class on regional jets so we got the ones that were picked over by economy fliers. The absolute suckiest seats on the plane, way in the back where they added in extra seats and the middle aisle got really skinny.
The only good part of the flight was the view. I had my face plastered to the window the whole time. I watched the terrain change from gigantic metropolis to the pampa (their agricultural heartland), to way under-populated countryside, to steppes. I felt like an astronaut. It was marvelous.
We finally land at El Calafate. Truly a frontier town. The airport had a single runway, ending in Lago Argentino, that largest lake in Argentina. Apparently Lake Titicaca in Bolivia/Peru is bigger. But it must be like an ocean to be bigger because Lago Argentina is gigantic. Like Great Lakes gigantic, easily. Here it is from space: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Lago_Argentina_from_space.jpg
So, we get off the plane on this single airstrip and I really feel like I am at the end of the earth. This place is so desolate. But magnetic.
The airport at El Calafate
The hotel has a driver that meets us. An older couple from London, Ben and Ruth, were getting a ride, too. I was pooped. We hadn't started the relaxing part of the honeymoon yet. We had been travelling a lot. Los Notros is going to be the big relaxation. Nothing to do but stare at the glacier. I asked how far the drive to the hotel was. Jeff said it wasn't in El Calafate but in the park, it was a ways. Like 45 minutes? Yeah, at least that. So, I asked the driver. Two hours. Two hours!? I was so tired! When does my vacation start?! I was horrified.
But again, I spent the ride with my face plastered to the window. I felt like I was on the moon. The terrain was so different. The countryside was all hills and valleys and vast. We were driving due west, toward the Andes, and began seeing mountains. The landscape is indescribable - everything is enormous. I felt miniature, like I was visiting a land of giants. Coming from a girl from New York City, surrounded by huge buildings, I think that says something.
Once we drive into the park, we were more than half way there. About five minutes from the hotel our driver told us we were going to stop and look at the glacier.
Our first glimpse of the Perito Moreno Glacier
Perito Moreno glacier is special for many reasons. The first is that it's the only - yes ONLY - glacier left on the planet that is not receding. It's not advancing, it's stable. It's also the largest glacier in the world that you can get to by land. This area is the most temperate area of any major glacial site in the world. In fact, it's an ice cap, and the only other ice caps are in Antarctica and Greenland. The latitude is the southern hemisphere equivalent of London. The ice cap can exist this far north because of the weather. The warm humid air from the south Pacific blows over Chile and bumps into the Andes, meets the super dry air of the Patagonian desert, the temperature of the air lowers and then the humidity turns into precipitation which in turn becomes crazy amounts of snow. Ergo, glacier HQ.
Our driver spoke no English. When we stopped, I asked him how much the glacier advances every year. His response: six feet per day. Give it a minute.
That's nuts! Everyone thought my Spanish was crappy and my translation sucked. But I asked again and that's the answer. But it's not advancing because so much calves off every day.
I think I could talk about the glacier forever. More on the park and Los Notros later.
