Patagonia

Fitz Roy

Patagonia was nothing short of amazing. Not only did we find incredible scenery but we also met really wonderful, genuine, and friendly people. By way of Toronto we flew to Santiago, Chile, where we met our friends Eric and Kim, and then flew four hours south to Punta Arenas, Chile.

The “W”
We hiked the “W” in Torres Del Paine (pronounced “Pine-eh”), staying at four mountain huts (one of them, Hosteria Las Torres, was actually far nicer than a mountain hut – it was more of a mountain hotel). Now I finally understand the difference between “Refugio” and “Hosteria” (to be explained later). After the “W” hike we took an incredible boat trip back from the last hut, during which we got closeups of Glacier Gray and the very blue ice blocks that fall into the water from the glacer.

We spent time in Puerto Natales, Chile, then went to Argentina to visit El Calafate, and El Chalten, where we did two days hikes and saw the Fitz Roy, probably the most incredible scenery of the entire trip.

Cape Horn
We also took a cruise to Cape Horn from Punta Arenas (it’s pretty cool going to the “end of the world”) and spent a long weekend in Buenos Aires where temperatures reached all-time record highs.

If you need any evidence of global warming, you can find it in the Southern hemisphere, where not only was the ozone layer ultra thin but the glaciers are receding at an incredible rate.

I took more than 2000 photos and, for the first time, some video. I uploaded the video here using a service called Fliqz.

That’s what having multiple 1 Gigabyte memory cards will do for you. I used a Canon SD800IS which took great photos, although for the next trip I will definitely buy a higher end camera with a bigger zoom. That said, the 800 took great photos and the increased memory size for the first time made me feel comfortable taking video. The digital video camera really is the mainstream video capture device. I still cannot believe that a 1GB memory card can be had for less than $30.