The drive from El Calafate to El Chalten took us about 3 hours. We arrived at lunch time and checked into our airbnb. The weather was phenomenal for El Chalten hiking, especially for Patagonia. No wind, sunshine and no clouds so we went right away for a short hike. Here is more on the hike to Condor lookout and Aguilas (eagles) lookout.
After the hike we had a very nice dinner at one of the restaurants in El Chalten. El Chalten has a surprisingly good collection of restaurants, bakeries and cafes for such a small place. On this first evening in El Chalten it seemed every house had a barbeque going (parrilla to be correct) on the occasion of warm beautiful weather. Butcher almost ran out of meat!
There are two major full day 20km plus hikes from El Chalten to consider. Laguna Torre (overlooking Cerro Torre the tallest of the 3 skinny mountains) and Laguna de Lost Tres (overlooking Fitz Roy). Many other hikes are a part of or connecting to these two main trails.
On our first full day in El Chalten we thought we would go to Laguna del Los Tres. But as we reached Laguna Capri along the trail, the cloud cover was very thick and we decided that we would try Laguna del Los Tres another day. We had a nice hike to Laguna Capri, then went to Ftz Roy lookout, had our sandwiches and watched clouds moving and slowly lifting from Fitz Roy. Here is more on our hike to Laguna Capri and Fitzroy lookout.
The next day the weather deteriorated. It was windy, very cloudy with rain in the forecast. Instead of hiking we drove around. First we went to Lake Viedma. One cannot see Viedma Glacier because of how the mountains are, but the lake and birds around it are good. Then we went up towards Rio Electrico to check access to the alternative route for Laguna Los Tres hike via Piedras Blancas glacier lookout that we were considering.
The weather kept getting worse. Winds were blowing at over 40kmh and rain started. There was no point driving around as we could not see much of the scenery. We went back to our airbnb to watch the storm from inside and enjoy some Argentinian vino.
On our third day in El Chalten sun came back and we went hiking to Laguna Torre. It is a 20km mostly flat hike. The hike was great and skies mostly blue. But Cerro Torre was covered by solid cloud that was not lifting. Good thing is that we had a few days in El Chalten so we went to Laguna Torre again on our fifth and last day, after we made it to Laguna de Lost Tres. Here is more on our Laguna Torre hikes.
On our fourth day in El Chalten we finally headed to Laguna de Los Tres. Since we already did half of the trail when we went to Laguna Capri, we decided to take a different route. We started at Rio Electrico near Hosteria El Pilar and hiked past Piedras Blancas Glacier lookout point. This route is slightly shorter arguably flatter. Except for the steep last section of the hike to Laguna de Los Tres that one has to do no matter what. We felt that this hike was more difficult than Laguna Torre, but not as difficult as Torres Base lookout in Torres del Paine in Chile. The view at Laguna de Los Tres was definitely worth it. Here is more on Laguna de Los Tres hike.
We had excellent stay spending full five days in El Chalten. It has a really nice vibe and just feel slike a very happy place. It is also helped by the fact that El Chalten has some phenomenally good restaurants. We made our own sandwiches for lunch for all the hiking but ate out every night. Our favorites were La Tapera, La Oveja Negra, and Fuegia Bistro.
