After spending a week at a charming airbnb in Buenos Aires and a relaxing weekend in the romantic little town of Colonia de Sacramento, Uruguay, we were rested and ready for our Patagonia adventure. We knew it was going to be a busy three weeks with lots of hiking, biking, rafting and even some horseback riding thrown in for good measure but the scenery promised to be amazing.

Our adventure started with a couple of days in Mendoza. This is the area of Argentina that is known for sunshine and wine! True to form, we had beautiful sunny weather and found no end of wineries and tasting rooms. We spent a lovely morning touring wineries by bicycle.

From Mendoza we also got our first taste of the Andes. It served as our jumping off point for a long day hike up to the basecamp on Aconcagua. Aconcagua is the highest mountain in the Americas at 6980 metres and it would normally take upwards of two weeks to summit. Kind of makes our trek to the basecamp at 3400 metres seem a bit soft but it was actually a pretty decent hike!

After a lovely couple of days in Mendoza, we steeled ourselves for the next adventure….a 19 hour bus ride to Bariloche! The distances between towns in Argentina is pretty significant and we are told that taking an overnight bus is a good way to experience how vast the country really is. Hmmmm….I think I would have believed it without the bus ride but what are you gonna do? It actually wasn’t as bad as we anticipated. Don’t get me wrong – it isn’t something we are dying to do again anytime soon but we survived intact. And the reward was a few days in Bariloche – just in time for some Carnival celebrations!

Bariloche is a very cool little town on the shore of Nahuel Huapi Lake. It is a ski town in the winter and has a distinctly Bavarian feel to it. Brewpubs, outdoor equipment stores and chocolate shops – sooooo many chocolate shops – rule around here! We tried our best to distribute our tourist dollars as widely as we could in this town! Hahaha!

Bariloche served as our base for some fun activities – white water rafting on the Rio Manso as well as a day of horseback riding on a local estancia. On the horseback ride, four farm dogs followed us the whole way – apparently that is their job and they take it pretty seriously – until they get to the lake, then they just frolic in the water! The trail was dusty and the horses were pretty docile but we rode through a beautiful valley and along the most spectacular blue lake before heading back to the ranch for some traditional Argentinian asado barbecue. Warren definitely got his meat fix!

From Bariloche, we flew further south into the heart of Patagonia. We spend several nights in each El Calafate and El Chalten. The highlights here were the many hikes around El Chalten and the Perito Moreno Glacier in Los Glaciares National Park. Our big hike was the Laguna de los Tres trek that took us up to a fantastic viewpoint of the Fitz Roy Peak.

The Perito Moreno Glacier was amazing as well. I can try to describe the beautiful sunny day and the thunderous calving of a 200 foot wall of ice but won’t do it justice so have included a little video. Excuse the shakiness….it was very windy and I was a bit excited!

Our next stop is Puerto Natales on the Chilean side of Patagonia to prepare for the W-Trek!