Heading South

Thursday 7th February

Hello everyone... I am here. Sorry for the long gap between updates but has been due to a mixture of adventuring (yey) and "satellite problems" (boo) meaning rubbish internet access. Until now...

Am now in Puerto Natales... hopped across the border into Chile. On Saturday I'm heading into Torres del Paine national park for some trekking and camping, 6 days of it. Should be good and I've hooked up with Jo and Neil who I met in Puerto Madryn so will have company too. Not that I'd struggle with that cos its high season here and everywhere is packed with trekkers and holiday makers!!!

So what have I been up to... well I left Bariloche on Saturday and flew South to El Calafate. From there I got a bus slightly North to El Chalten in the national park Los Glaciares, where I stayed for 2 nights. Did a fairly easy walk to Laguna Torres... which is at the foot of Cerro Torres - one of the big mountains which was cloaked in cloud. Didnt really have enough time in El Chalten as I would have liked to do more walks... loved the village though, it is really quirky. Full of multicoloured houses with corrugated pointy rooves (is that how you spell it, it looks strange!?). Unfortunately it was probably just as well that my time ran out as I have been having serious blister problems... grr. I have a good 2 inch-er on my right heel and 4 smaller ones on my left. Need to sort those out!

Got bus back to El Calafate to meet up with Jo, Neil and Martin who are all good fun. Bought some new insoles to hopefully sort the blister problem. Then on Wednesday (6th) I went ice trekking on the Perito Moreno glaciar, which was BRILLIANT. It was incredibly windy and cold and icy (surprise surprise) but great fun walking up down and around the glaciar looking into all the deep blue pools and cracks. The ice glows blue in places... really cool. Big chucks of ice fall off into the lake at the foot of te glaciar and we saw a few bits crash into the water... makes a heck of a noise!

Its getting colder and colder as I travel south... the neck warmer has been in action and is brilliant!

Today I got the bus with Jo to Puerto Natales, which is another cool little town. Staying in a really cosy new hostel so looking forward to a good nights sleep. Tomorrow we have an easy day getting all our camping stuff ready for Torres del Paine. Looking forward to that muchly.

Thanks for all your comments and messages... its nice to know that people are actually reading this! Hee hee...