Balconies in San Telmo, Buenos Aires.
We didn’t know what to expect with a place like Patagonia. It may have been an odd choice to head to the Southern Patagonian Ice Field at the start of winter, but we didn’t care. We wanted to see Patagonia and we had two weeks of vacation to do it.
Fourteen hours of air travel took us from New York City to Buenos Aires, where we decided to spend one night catching our breaths. Kelly had heard about a “secret” restaurant while buying maps at Longitude Books in New York City. The Map Store Guy had just returned from a trip to Buenos Aires and was so excited about it that he pulled out his digital camera and showed her some of the photographs.
Afternoon moon in El Calafate, Argentina.
We had chosen to spend our first night in Palermo because it was 15 minutes from the national airport, and in the morning after our included breakfast of bread and dulce con leché — a caramel/Nutella-like spread that would become our morning staple — at the cheap, hospitable Casa Esmeralda hostel, we were on our way.
The cab driver gave us a look when he saw that we had luggage, as if it was a ridiculous thing to be transporting your belongings when heading to the airport. He was a fat Argentinian dude who took up one-third of the aluminum can of a vehicle and smoked the entire way. We weaved through the long, expansive boulevards riding on two wheels most of the way, slamming to frequent stops inches of the bumper in front of us, only for the driver to break out into a chorus of curses over the blaring radio. But he knew what he was doing and, more importantly, where he was going — so we let him have his way and tipped him well.
Snapshots of El Calafate and a few of the people we met at the wonderful America del Sur hostel.
The Arrival
In my foray into backpacking, I’ve stayed at hostels in France, Italy, Spain, Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands, Guatemala, and India, and none of them matched the atmosphere of the America del Sur hostel in El Calafate. I made reservations after browsing reviews on Hostelworld, where the only unanimous complaint was that “the rooms were too hot.” I couldn’t imagine that would be a deterrent during our winter visit, so we took our chances. A week later, the cab was turning onto the unpaved street on top of a hill where the hostel stood.
We entered through a wood-framed glass door and saw a scruffy, long-haired, Che Guevara-looking guy standing next to a short, exceptionally cute girl behind the counter. The girl was typing. The guy looked at me and pointed.
“TÄM-BUR, right?” His voiced boomed.
I nodded, not correcting his bastardization of my name because after living in Madrid for six months, I realized that’s how all Spanish-speaking people say my name.
Two Cabins with a View
It is 8 in the morning at the bus station in El Calafate. Outside, it is pitch dark and we are rubbing the sleep from our eyes.
This bus station is like any other bus station in the world. Glass-covered counter windows, orange and yellow flyers with rates to glamorous destinations, sleeping bums and dirty toilets.
There are seven of us. A German, two Irishmen, and four Americans, including Kelly and myself. There are others, but we’re not sure who they are yet. Later, there will be a Frenchman, a Spaniard and a couple of Danes, and a few others whose nationalities, much less their names, we won’t remember. There are some Argentines who aren’t traveling to the destinations on the flyers for glamour. They are the quiet ones. Just a few hours ago, none of these people existed.
