Archive: Month: February 2016

This is me, drinking Mate. It’s ubiquitous in Argentina and Chile (and probably other places, I haven’t been all over South America yet). Everyone carries these cups (gourds) around with them, and a thermos, and is constantly filling up. Well, a lot of places anyway. I even saw a juggler stop a guy as he was crossing the road and ask him for his Mate, which was duly given and drunk from.

So, we were in a museum and there was free Mate, so I was completely keen to try it. Ick, didn’t really work for my tastebuds I must say. Tasted mostly like tea that had been stewed too long.

Still, the gourd looks great, the silvery drinking straw is good, and I kinda like the idea of the institution of sharing the drink (though one wonders about communication of infections…) Anyway, I was culturally sensitive (the Mate was finished) but at the cost to my tastebuds ;)

Coming back from the most awesome Paso Huemul circuit we were a little tired, and went out for dinner. Upon time to pay, Maaike’s Debit card (which masquerades as a credit card while abroad) bounced. Hey ho, that’s life we thought, having had issues with Debit Cards while travelling.

Or so we thought.

A day later, after the bus back to El Calafate, Maaike tried to get cash out of an ATM, again, no joy. This was a little more worrying because the card had worked OK in ATMS.. mostly. Anyway, after that we went back to the campsite we were at to check the bank balance. $-6.73. What? Then saw a whole bunch of withdrawals on the 9th Feb. Upon closer inspection they were all from the Philippines, which was somewhat strange, seeing as we weren’t actually in the Philippines. They’d drained the account. $2,700. Somewhat annoying/terrifying/worrying.

We emailed the bank immediately of course, then tried to Skype. Internet kept dropping out, so eventually we decided to go to an actual real-life telephone and call out. It was expensive, but nicely reassuring to talk to the bank. They basically said “we’ll take care of it” and to email their fraud department (which we duly did).

Since then, being somewhat paranoid, I have reduced my credit limit on cards, and only put 1K or so in any accounts which are actually linked from anywhere. Exposure has been reduced. Maaike’s card has been cancelled (we have 5 more … we’ll be fine ;).

We’re not sure where they skimmed the card (and pin number – more worryingly). If you’re interested in this stuff, then the all about skimmers section on krebsonsecurity has a lot of interesting (and somewhat terrifying) info on it. It’s big business this stuff, and, frankly, impressive. I mean within days? they’d copied the details over to the Philippines and taken out almost 3K. Our bank refunded us the money the same day!, but someone is out of pocket. In a small way reminds me of the ladykillers. Worth a watch sometime :)

Remember kids, always cover your fingers when typing in your pin code, give the ATM a bash to see that nothing is obviously loose, and just hope they don’t have thermal sensing..

This goes down as the best multiday hike I’ve ever done. The “Paso del viento” circuit from El Chalten. As I mentioned in the last post, we were lucky to hear about it from overhearing a French couple. They unfortunately only had 3 days (and you need 4) so were unable to do it. Hey ho. The hike has two Tyrloean traverses on it (crossing rivers) so you do need some extra gear. The park authorities do check you for this before you go, so you have to have it. They also assess you for experience. Now, strictly speaking I’ve never done a tyrolean before, but as I’ve been climbing for 20 odd years I felt happy saying I had. But that link above was quite useful to check over what needed to be done. We hired an extra sling and carabiners for securing the backpack to the wire separately from ourselves (just makes it easier to cross).

We got our gear from the very lovely Polly at Viento Ouest.. she was one of the loveliest people we’ve dealt with so far… can highly recommend. It was only 90 pesos for the harness slings and carabiners, an an extra 30 I think it was for the extra sling for the rucksacks.

So, started our hike out of El Chalten. First stop, Lago Toro. Nice walk in, you have views out to Fitzroy for a while too, before descending into the valley by the lake.

It was a windy night, and we were a little worried about the next day, as we did have the tyroloean and the “pass of the wind” to pass… however, it calmed down a bit and by the morning it was OK.

The next day off to the paso itself. They don’t make the way completely obvious, at least at the start, probably to deter people? Not sure. I’d cheated anyway and downloaded the entire route onto my GPS (my navigation has deteriorated a little, but the GPS really is great ;). Anyway, first stop, the tyrolean traverse. From the Tyrol region in Italy, it is a way of crossing between two points via a wire. Our crossings all had pulleys, which cuts down on friction and makes the crossing easier. It’s still quite a bit of work, especially when going “up” on the other side of the crossing.

We had the normal sling + carabiner, + another carabiner. We also hired another sling + 2 carabiners for attaching the bag to the wire (as you can see in the picture of Maaike doing the crossing). You attach the bag directly to the wire and the other end clipped into your harness, so it’s dragged along as you cross. It’s funny, death wise it makes little difference how far you fall once it’s “far enough”, but, having a raging torrent of glacial water running underneath you does up the ante somewhat. It’s all well and good “knowing” that you know your stuff, but quite another to put it to the test ;) Anyway, it was fine, easy even. We met a lovely French couple (Guillaume and Alexan) who came up behind us at the crossing… Maaike asked Guillaume to double check, but all was in order :)

After the tyroloean, it’s slowly up alongside a glacier to the pass itself. This was probably trickier than the tyrloean itself, as the path had (we think) been partly nuked by a landslide in one place, so it was a little looser than it could have been. Anyway, on up the slope…

Then up towards the pass, the excitement of wondering what view we’d see was huge! I knew that we’d see the ice field, but not really sure what that would be like! I mean yes Antarctica.. but, I dunno, we didn’t get that high so didn’t get to see never-ending stretches of snow.. quite.

My pictures don’t really do it justice unfortunately, but wow, what a view!

Then you drop down the far side and along to the campsite at the refugio (basic hut). The wireless password didn’t seem to work.. most odd. We did try a new flavour of porridge/rolled oats. Chocolate. What a thing of beauty that was (we’d had a plain flavour for the last 3 weeks and were quite over it!).

The only bad thing about the campsite was the lack of a toilet, and really, lack of nice places to go. That coupled with… hmmm, less socially minded people meant there was the odd bit of old toilet roll and accompaniments around the place. Not so pretty.

Met a Dutch-Italian climber there (David) he’d just completed all his objectives (Fitzroy, Cerro Torre and another), and was wondering what to do next! He showed us a video from the top of Cerro Torre, enough to give you vertigo!. He was having a “rest day” and doing our entire hike in 2 days. ;)

Next day, followed the glacier along and up to the Huemul pass. There were some tricky little steps and a bit of a hike up to the pass, but pretty straightforward really. Quality views all the way, it really was special, and nice views down to Lake Viedma with little icebergs carved off and floating about.

Then came the trickiest part of the whole hike I think, the descent back down from Huemal. On the map it’s marked as a dangerous descent, and they’re not kidding. The exposure wasn’t insane, in that if you fell you were unlikely to fall all the way down!, but, it was very steep and mostly loose dusty soil over rock, really not the nicest surface to be walking on. I was definitely happy when we both reached the bottom safe and whole.

Found our little campsite. At least, I think we did. It wasn’t marked, but it looked nice a nice enough flat enough spot, and people had definitely camped there. I went for a little wander up the hill behind in the evening and there was some nice light on the icebergs.

Then an easy enough day out – another tyroloean to cross at the end, but we were experts by this stage.

The only downside really was getting back to El Chalten. There used to be a route from the end of the track back to town, but it has been bought and there were conflicting messages as to whether it was open or not. In the end we tried to hitch – a car did stop, only had one space, Maaike took it (felt very guilty for leaving me, so she says ;), and I failed to get a ride, leaving me with an 18km walk back to town :( I did manage to get a lift 6.5km out of town, but it was still not the best end to the walk. That said, I had my podcasts & language lesson podcasts so I used the time well enough ;)

All in all, I think this is the best hike I’ve ever done! Would highly recommend, but it is for “experienced” hikers I think.

Took the bus from El Calaphate to El Chalten. My advice would be, when you book the bus, insist on getting the seats at the front on the top deck. That way you’ll have a stunning view all the way there. It’s really magic seeing Fitzroy and Cerro Torre rise out of the plains. These walls are legendary amongst mountaineers (which I’m not!), but it was still wonderful to see them in the raw.

The town of El Chalten itself was lovely actually. Somewhat expensive but not awfully awfully so, and they have some very nice touristy places (like a decent ice-cream shop!.. nyom). We had planned a few walks to do while here, to Fitzroy and Cerro Torre, and to go O Higgins. However, when we were in the information place, we had our big map out and some French tourists were looking at it, and asking about a 4 day hike that we’d not considered which looked and sounded amazing. It did require getting a harness & slings & carabiners, as there were two tyrolean traverses to navigate. When we tried to book the gear, it was all out for 4 days (at least) so we opted to the walks to Fitzroy and Cerro Torre first. Good job too as it gave my stomach time to settle itself.

Just a 3-4 hour walk in to Fitzroy, but very nice views all the way along.

Then there’s a good hour walk steeply up hill to get to the final views. Worth it for sure.

I was too lazy however to get up at 5am again and walk all the way up the hill for the sunrise. No, I just got up at sunrise instead and had a look to see what I could see. Far easier ;)

Then the following day headed to Cerro Torre, there’s a nice little track which brings you from Fitzroy across, without having to go back to town. Hot day… stunning views though.

I’m no mountaineer, but the top of Cerro Torre looks damn hard, exiting out from the rock into the overhung mushroom of snow. It’d be awesome to climb it, but I’d want to be guided up there!. I dunno, I think those days are gone, and, while I’d love to be up there, it’s just a little bit too far outside my risk appetite zone, and you really have to be extremely single-minded about it. Anyway, great views and a nice little campsite too.

Next day, back to El Chalten itself. This time we stayed in the campsite (way cheaper option, and a nice place – worth thinking about if you do have a tent).