Perito Moreno Glacier, El Calafate (Patagonia)

As much as I would have liked to stay in Bariloche, the southern part of Patagonia called. This is a wild area with strong winds, large glaciers and some of the most beautiful landscapes. There’s a lot of wilderness and not many towns. We flew into El Calafate yesterday and visited one of the most popular glaciers in the world, the Perito Moreno Glacier, near the boarder of Chile. The Perito Moreno Glacier is fed by the Southern Patagonian Ice Field, the third largest reserve of fresh water in the world, after Antarctica and Greenland.

Perito Glacier is on of only 3 glaciers in Patagonia that is not retreating. It advances about 2 meters per day, but also loses the same amount at it's terminus, so it's somewhat in a state of equilibrium. The water is a beautiful milkly green color due to the suspended sediment from the glacier grinding rocks into a find powder as it moves.


When I was in Spain, Kathryn lent me her Penguin socks, which I thought would be appropriate for the glacier trip today! The socks felt right at home!


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Despite taking over 231 photos today, Lyle and I were still not able to capture the immenseness of the glacier in our photographs. I’ll spare you all 200+ photos and have selected a few of my favorites.


Overtime, snow is compacted at the source, either forming or adding to the glacier. The fewer air bubbles suspended in the ice, the bluer the hue. (Photo courtesy of Lyle)



Lyle does his best GQ pose in front of the iceberg. With his long shaggy hair and Italian features, Lyle blends right in with the Argentine locals.


We were going to take a boat excursion to get up close to the glacier, but there were some small icebergs blocking the boat dock, so the excursion was canceled. This was a bit of a disappointment, because I think you get a much better perspective with just how massive this thing is when you are right up front. However seeing that a ship recently sank on its way around Antarctica after hitting a submerged iceberg, I thought being on the more cautious side was alright. I didn’t feel like an afternoon swim. The boat did try moving the iceberg as you can see in the photo, but wasn’t successful.


This boat (a tiny dot in front of the iceberg) must have come from another dock. Looking at the boat gives a slightly better perspective of the size of the glacier. The glacier is over 60 meters high (above the surface of the water!) with a total depth of over 170 meters. This is HUGE!!! The front part of this glacier is 5km wide. It was awesome in the classical sense of the word.

Is was really peaceful just sitting and listening to the glacier. We constantly heard cracks sounding like thunder and witnessed several pieces fall into the water. Look carefully at the picture above and you can see a bit falling into the water. (Photo courtesy of Lyle.) This is one of the most “active” glaciers…meaning that there are frequently large chunks of ice falling into the water. This was certainly one of the highlights of the trip!


(Photo courtesy of Lyle)