El Chalten, Patagonia, Argentina

Hey,

       I’m in Patagonia Argentina looking at Mt. Fitz Roy. Mt Fitz Roy is one of the most famous rock climbing mountains in the world. People come from every where to hike it. Fits Roy is just outside of the little town that we are staying in called El Chalten. El Chalten is a hiking town which means all you do here is hike. For example, in the past week we have walked over 30 miles and 49,400 steps! That is a lot! On our hikes we get to see lakes, waterfalls, and glaciers. El Chalten is such a little town it is only 10 blocks by 3 blocks. While walking through town you can see llamas or horses just hanging out in someones front yard. Earlier in the week we were walking down the street and suddenly a herd of horses came running down the road. They were being brought across the river and to a pasture by two argentinian cowboys, or gauchos. One horse got caught in someones front yard fence, he was freaking out and it took him a while to find a way out. Once he did he ran across the river to the other horses.

  We continued our walk to go see a waterfall, which was awesome! Yesterday we hiked up to a glacier, it was beautiful. Then after the hike back down we came to a horse corral. On the fence we saw 2 cow skins drying inside out. It was disgusting, the hide hadn’t dried out yet so you could still see the skin and flesh covered in flies. We continued walking and came back to the trailhead. At the trailhead there was a man who ran the hotel across the road holding a super little puppy. We went over and saw two other puppies, so we asked if we could hold them. The guy said “sure” and we got to hold the little baby dogies. Then we asked why he had them and where was their mother. He said that she left them here when they were born and since then he has been taking care of them. We played with the puppies a little while longer, then we had to go back to town. This morning we got up early and hiked up a hill to watch the sunrise 7:30. On the way up, next to the trail, we watched a helicopter take off. The helicopter, we later found out, had Brad Pitt in it. Apparently Brad Pitt comes here almost annually. At the top of the hill we had a perfect view of all the big snowy mountains around being lit up by the sunrise. After we hiked down we went and ate breakfast. Right now we are all hanging out doing homework. Tomorrow we are taking the bus back to the airport in a town called El Calafate and flying back to Buenos Aires.