El Chalten – incredbile.
Simply unparalleled beauty. Sculpted by time and climate, and home to only a very small, very seasonal town. The allure of this section of Patagonia is as clear as the skies above it and the water running through it.
The thing to do here is hike. Everywhere. There are around seven or eight trails of mixed length and difficulty, each with its own final viewpoint, and every one is spectacular. All you need for a wondrous day in this rugged nirvana is a pair of walking boots and a packed lunch (extra EXTRA sugar if your a Type 1 diabetic, altitude hypos are not recommended!) A camera helps too if you really want to show the folks at home what they’re missing, but a phone will suffice if not. Even just your eyes and your eyes alone will be enough to mentally photograph the wonders of this place. It’s important to know how something can be or look or sound without having to digitally document it.
This is a good place to shut the f**k up and enjoy the sounds of silence, with the occasional gust of wind and crash of water making it sound like a textbook YouTube go-to-sleep video. El Chalten is also a place to look around and feel quite lucky. If you manage to look beyond what’s immediately in front of you then you may see something that not many others get to see; a wild horse grazing alone before whipping off into the wilderness, a tumbling rock reforming the already perfect landscape, a desperate walker squatting in the distant bushes…
T’is a fantastic place down in south, South America. Time it right and you’ll get to see the very best of the very best of what the world has to offer.
"So, Gandalf, you try to lead them over Caradhras. And if that fails, where then will you go?"
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