We are back from the Nahuel Huapi traverse. Its been a tough six days, and now we are completely shattered and drinking lots of water. Also everything stinks. I have this fear we'll be kicked out of the hostel due to the smell. Here are some notes on the route, which might be of use to others.
Maps and stuff: we used the lonely planet book Trekking in the Patagonian Andes. The times in the book are optimistic. Speculation as to why:
I like the first theory, though the last two have the advantage of being true.
The map was kinda crappy too. Crags aren't marked. I suppose that if you want a map with crags they start with a black bit of paper. The nav was pretty easy throughout the trip, but mostly because we could see the way owing to good weather. It would be a pain to do in poor weather.
We drank the water from the rivers. It was lovely and freezing cold. We often had our cups on the outside of our bags, and dipped them into streams. We passed a gang of scouts singing the Spanish version of "I want to go a wandering". That's our life now. Drinking water from streams, singing kids, green trees, Lewis and Clark wandering past, foxes barking.
In less good water news, the folks down in CAB suggested added a drop of bleach to each litre of water.
The book claims you can get food and sleep in huts known as refugios. We shunned this option, mostly because we had the tent etc. and we didn't fancy booking ahead. One hears mixed reports about the quality of the places, how watertight they are etc.
We headed up on the ski lift from Villa Catedral (this is the primary route in the book) mostly due to the parties of Argentine teenagers heading for the path up to Refugio Frey. We were warned about the wind at the bottom. It was a cold strong wind, but we were pretty stable on our feet when we were up there. We did end up wearing thick gloves, balaclava, many layers etc. Only one lift at the ski centre was operating, so we took that one and had to figure out where we were at the top.
We did the traverse from the ridge above the ski center to the turning for Refugio Frey. This is mostly over shattered rock, following the dots. There were good views over the ridge at a low point. The turn off to Frey (the left) and Jacob (the right) was drawn on a rock.
The book suggests dropping down to Frey, then climbing back up and down the other side the next day. We shunned this option. It featured a pile more height gain and loss, Megan (who we had met while white water rafting) described her night there as an effort to hold the tent down in the wind, and we didn't fancy hanging around with tons of teenagers.
Its worth noting that the trek had quite a few parties of folk in different levels of gear. We saw folk in trainers, without rain protection. Slow progress down to the valley - long scree descent. We hit a low point when Laura stepped in someone else's poop. A shame everyone doesn't carry a plastic trowel. Camped in the valley - its a big site along the path. We didn't see anyone else that night, but more folks showed up when we went to bed. In the evening, three dogs came and sniffed around. No idea how they got into the park. It was brass monkeys in the valley (see Committee to Ascribe a Naval Origin to Everything).
This was a short day - and we had hopes for day three - we pulled out of the end of the valley and over the pass to Refugio Jakob. The descent is more on scree fields and pretty slow. If you like walking over shattered rock, you can do the two tops here.
When we got down to the Refugio, they said that the high route over to Lag Negra by Cerro Inocentes and Cerro Navidad was closed due to snow. This led to much griping. We wandered up to a high lake (and wonderful corrie coated in snow) to peer at the next day's route. It looked good to us. We had scanned the route with binoculars from the other side of the valley, and were unconvinced by their concerns. We restrained ourselves from sneaking off at 6am, and planned to do a extra day walking out and walking in the next valley.
Foiled, we headed down the valley. This is a bit slow to get started, but once over the bridge, we bombed it down the valley. Its a nice gentle slope. However, its longer than the book says. (the book claims 13k, and the sign at the bottom claims 18k, and the sign is a good bit closer). Its a nice walk in the trees, but its nothing like as good as the ridge would have been.
We hitched from the bottom almost to Colonia Suiza. As we walked the last mile or so, we could hear a very long rock and roll guitar solo. This kept on playing for about forever. We pitched up at a big camp site somewhat more used to holidaying Buenos Aries folks than smelly hikers. I almost fainted. We ate massive burgers and drank wine. This is the life.
The end of the day was probably the toughest uphill of the walk - a 400m pull up by the waterfall. Slow slow progress with the heavy packs. The location of La Negra refugio is fantastic. Its on the rocks by a high lake, above a massive waterfall. The rocky sides of Cerro Negra tower above. We camped in a hollow in the bushes. There were many such hollows - no one is brave enough to camp in the open. The notorious Patagonian wind howled most of the night. Laura shunned pasta, ate cold pizza leftover from lunch, and woke up at 4am in a hunger. Considering how bad the pasta was, this might have been the better route. If you have suggestions of camping dinners other than soup, pasta and sauce please send them on!
This was by far the best day. We went around the lake (which is harder than it looks, and features hanging off dodgy bits of fixed rope), up to the ridge on the far side, and along to the top of Cerro Bailey Willis (1850m). The views from up here are fantastic. The speedy Israeli bloke cut under the summit, and you can do that too (He seemed to do the same as us until the top of Pico Turista, then he when back to the Refugio). We dropped down to a col on the ridge, then headed to the top of a valley where there is a camp site.
That was the first half of the day. From then on it got harder. We headed up Pico Turista, about a 400 meters climb up a very steep scree chute. Going was slow and unpleasant. We then went right down the other side, climbing down loose rock. This was slow going, and the massive bags didn't help.
It was a slow 400m of vertical descent down to Refugio Lopez. Once there, it was about 8pm. Again we found Lonely Planetś times optimistic. The Refugio was full of scouts. We wanted to stop here, but the book suggested camping lower down, further from the wind and on green grass. Sadly, when we got down to the area suggested, it was a bog. And not even a flat blog. We were also pursued by a fox down to the area (which was maybe 200m below the Refugio Lopez). We figured the fox wanted dinner, so we kept on moving.
The map showed another Refugio called La Roca below Lopez. We went down miles of 4x4 track (which was massive switchbacks) until we turned up at a restaurant and asked for two beds and dinner. The Netherlands-Argentine couple explained it was a restaurant and had never heard of the mythical La Roca refugio. We were persuaded to eat but as it got darker fortunately they allowed us to camp outside the restaurant which we very much appreciated. There was a great view and no electricity. The waitress told us what food they had and we ordered almost all of it. The hunger had set in. Four empanadas, a pie, a pizza and a salad, followed by dessert. She said "wow you are really hungry!" We explained we had been walking for 5 days. And 12 hours of walking, a tough day.
We had coffee and a chat with the restaurant owners which was interesting. It turns out that only about 30% of Argentines have official jobs and pay tax. Most don't have bank accounts. We then walked out along the switchbacks - this wasn't far, but we don't know how far - and back to Colonia Suiza. Laura saw Magellanic woodpeckers along the way. We aimed to appear on ruta 79 as close to Colonia Suiza as possible, and we popped out on a road with private property notices all over it. Oops. No one hassled us. The bus back to Bariloche was the final straw - we waited 50 minutes past the time, then got lunch, then went back and waited some more, all with no sign of the bus. In the end we got a taxi. And then steak. Massive steak. We wore the same clothes for 5 and half days and we are sorry for whoever washed them for us.
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