Jean's travel blog

El Calafate is famous for the glaciar Perito Moreno but believe me there is more there than just the glaciar. You get in fact different nice glaciars and great sceneries. Lakes, hills, flamingos, icebergs are part of the incredible sceneries. As well the town is nice as the surroundings are just great.
Some recommendations of tours to do is the mini trekking on the Perito Moreno and the boat excursion to the Upsala glaciar and from the estancia Cristina taking a 4x4 to view the Upsala glaciar. This 2 tours are really worth the money!
I had 2 fantastic days doing them.

I stayed here in hostel Marco Polo inn and I had a great time. Met some very nice people and did all the excursions together with them. I could have stayed here couple of days more!

Ushuaia is quite dissapointing after Torres but it is a nice place to relax and search for a boat to go to Antarctica. There isn't much I can recommend you to do here as the parc Tierra del Fuego is really not impressive compared to Torres but you still have some nice sceneries.
The glaciar is quite dissapointing as well.
One thing that is really cool though is to walk with the Pinguins. The tour takes you by bus to some place. From here you take a boat to a small island. There you'll walk among the pinguins and that is just awesome. The sceneries are also really nice so defenately a thing to do.
I went as well to see lake Esmeralda. This is a very nice hike as well but put your trekking shoes on as the paths are really muddy. Sometimes I was almost till my knees into the mudd .
In Ushuaia I stayed in Hostel Freestyle and the athmosphere here was great. Lots of nice people and defenately a place to stay. Good music as well.
As bonus you'll get a free hug when you check in from big rasta man

Well I did the Circuito and this was an experience. We were really lucky with the weather as it is known to be very changeable and it can rain for several days and be cold and very windy It doesn't really invite for starting a trekking of 8 days. Well we were lucky and had only 1.5 hour rain during the day and had actually lots of sun and warm temperature. In the evening it can get really cold so you must take warm clothes as well!
It was very windy at certain moments and that is really though but fun as you just can't walk straight and certain moment nor forward as well
The days were very tiring as the walks are not really easy Carring 10-15 kilos stuff isn't as well the most relaxing part on this trip and believe me there were lots of parts of my body starting to hurt very soon. But with all that I can tell you Torres is an experience you will never forget and give it a couple of days and you will want to return! At least I did and I will.
This parc is just awesome, amazing, incredible just put all the superlative together and you get Torres del Paine. The nature is beautifull and very diverse. You will walk through forests, along rivers, lakes, glaciars, mountains, las Torres,...
An advise just plan enough days for Torres as even 8 days is really tough to make the tour. And if you get bad weather than forget to make it in 8 days. As well it all depends on your fysical condition. Some people were doing it faster as we did but for me it was already really tough and you get so many beautiful landscapes that now already we were too fast to absorb everything.
You can as well do the W but then you will be trekking all the time with much more people than on the Circuito.

I took the Navimag boat to go from Puerto Montt to Puerto Natales. The trip is really fun but only the last day you really got to see cool landscapes (fiords). The glaciar is beautifull. It cost some money though so it's up to you to take it. I met lots of nice people so it made it worth it.
In fact I met there a Scottish couple with who I passed the next 10 days. We were trekking together in Torres del Paine and even in Ushuaia.
I met again 2 Belgians...I never met so many Belgians in my travels than here in South America
And than lots of people from a bit everywhere. Just a pitty I don't get that much in contact with locals as this is as well one of my goals on this trip.

To cross the border I did the famous circuito Andino but the weather was really crappy so it wasn't really a highlight. It rains there 90% of the time so I can not recommend it as it really cost a lot.
The trip was fun though as I met a whole bunch of Belgians with a Belgian guide and they were quite fun. As well I could practice my spanish with a local what is always good but not always easy. Believe me
Stop at Puerto Varas for the night as it is a nice place.