There it was – the mixed feeling of fascination, motivation, respect, excitement, joy and fear. It was August 2016 and I stood in the middle of a dirt road close to the town of Peine, approximately 100 km south of San Pedro de Atacama, Chile. Food for roughly 2 weeks and 22 liters of water were stowed on my hiking trailer.
In El Bolson you can literally watch the time going by. There is no rush – no stress – especially if you hike up the mountains towards the border of Chile and hop from refugio to refugio, enjoying delicious self-made pizza and cerveza.
While El Bolson is a known place amongst the backpacker scene, the hikes up in the mountains are not flooded by tourists yet. I was there over the Easter holidays 2015 and even then I met only few people.
El Chalten is an upcoming (if not already) hot spot for tourism and on the edge to become a mainstream place-to-be in Patagonia. Nevertheless, not yet a McDonald’s restaurant can be found there so I can still recommend to pay a visit to this lovely spot close to El Calafate.
The trip below was a short 3-4 days trip we did in September 2015 around Mendoza, Argentina. This region allows you easily to chose amongst plenty of different possibilities to plan your own trips / routes in the amazing pre-Andes environment of Argentina.