El Chalten Ranger station, Parque National de los Glaciares. The lady Ranger rounds us into Spanish and English speaking rooms. Out of the rain the excitable trekers peruse cheaply framed photos of the local stars, the jagged granite Fitz Roy Mountain Massive, defaced with dotted marker lines to depict routes mental climbers have ascended (or attempted) the various summits. Out comes the flip chart and telescopic pointer and class begins. Todays lesson: National Park and generic treking etiquette...
In short: Stick to the paths, don't burn down the forest and no defacating in the rivers. Short and informative, the way I like my women.
Piled back on the bus for a poin tless 100m shuttle we're suddenly off again in the really rather ugly hamlet of El Chalten. Digging around for jackets and scarves, our trecking collective huddle together against the brisk windy rain awaiting our guide. A long ten minutes later we're rounded up by the gortex-clad Martin and Lorena and shuffled though town for briefing. At this stage, under the gloomy sky, I'm sure more than one of the 8 of us secretly hoped the trip might be cancelled so we could spend two days in a warm bar drinking Chocolate Caliente by a blazing fire.
Lorena hands us a medical questionnaire (read: liability form) and our packed lunches and we are told a check list of things we should have. Sunglasses, waterproof, suncream, gloves and so forth. I've heard here also the weather also likes to deliver a randomly selected part of all four seasons in a single day - a Patgonian theme. I'm just hoping my grandmothers' leather driving gloves won't let me down. Also, the night previous I also accidently cut my big toe nail painfully short and hope I don't have to amputate.
The questionnaire asks: ''Are you on a diet? Do you need it?'' Oh how we chuckled.
This is the SUPERTREK! The red cape and spandex wearing trek! The Superted of treks! The Supercalafragalistic trek. A two-day trek extravaganza bigged up by the LP & Footprint guides (''highly recommended!''); promising panoramic vistas, a rope bridge river crossing, ice treking and ice climbing, with ropes and manly ICE AXES!! And this is (borderline) luxurious treking! Tents, sleepingbags and hot meals await us and all we have to carry is our lunch... and 7 kilos of photographic equipment.
Without as much time as to introduce ourselves, we're stomping out of town, into the drizzle under a thick bank of cloud. We climb steeply, at an impressive and unrelenting pace up rugged hillside. The old heart ticks over double-time and reminds me where it lives. Apparently, there's an early steep part of the Inca Trail called 'Dead woman's pass', and it seems a bit of training is in order. No respectable male would want 'died on dead woman's pass' on his headstone.
Mist floats about in clearly glacial U-shaped valleys, over trees painted with the first strokes of Autumn. Apparently on a clear day the Fitz Roy would be right in view, up the valley flexing his rock hard muscles. Mr Thrustle, my A-level Geography teacher, would shit his pants here with all this terminal moraine, drumlin action and truncated spur stuff.
Out of breath we start to get to know one other, exchanging tales of Argentinian airline incompetence and stopping sporadically for rainswept photos. Over the crest we pull into a mini campsite marquee for shelter and lunch. Mini cornish pasties, fruit and triple-stacked chocolate-covered biscuits. Choice. Apart from the fruit. So far we'd only seen one season. Winter. Possibly, with a literal splash of April showers.
Back on the trail we plod on, through marsh, scrub and a forest graveyard. It seems this new soil lets trees grow real tall, but only in shallow soil, so the harsh winds just bowl them over. 20% of the trees are white and dead and a good 50% lie on their sides, but yet they keep trying. Silly old trees.
We stroll round varous reedy lakes, all the while being told the hidden location of the mighty Fitz Roy, where occasionally the cloud is blown aside to reveal a fat snowy base. It's cold, in the mid one digits, and a bitter wind whips our cheeks red. My kingdom for a hot cuppa tea... and a sherpa to carry my hefty lenses.
We finally roll into base camp, are fitted for crampons and shown our tents. We cower from the weather in a communal tent over powdered coffee. The excellently named Aussy, Joe Cocco, keeps quoting the Footprint guide: ''Highly recommended'' with more than a trace of irony. His lady, Christian, gelled up with Deep Heat to counter the cold. 'Get the gell on!' became the catchphrase. There's nothing like a bit of adversity to bring a group together. We share a warm meal (still in gloves), good banter and join over a few games of candle-lit 'Tuti-fruti', in which Christoph the witty German (with a bizarre Germanic-Anglo-Irish accent) makes up cheaty German words.
We realise all our decks of cards are back at the hostel, toy with the idea of chopping napkins into 52 handwritten cards, but end up opting to hit the four-seasons sleepingbags for an early start the following day. In the dark I search using mobile phone screen-light for the (apparently) brown-roofed toilet, and sincerely hope I didn't pinch a loaf in the green-roofed store cupboard.
Tonight the temperature is in the low one digits, but factoring in wind chill, it is likely to feel like minus 3 C. Under the patter of the rain I settle into a chilly, lumpy bedbag in combat trousers & T-shirt. I optimistically think to myself that the weather will rain itself out tonight and today's viewless day'll be rendered irrelevant after climbing sheer walls of ice with MAN AXES!
Barnstaple
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