Boaz Kantor

We met a nice Israeli couple (Michal and Erez), also aged 30+, who were in touch with a second Israeli couple (Nataly and Israel). Both couple were about to rent a van with a driver to ride the Carretera Austral, and were looking for a third couple. We decided to join them, however, the van was only available a couple of days later. So we decided to do something productive with our time, and headed to El Chalten.
This small and cute town is a base for trekkers and mountaineers (mountain climbers), and is located in the national park of glaciers called ¨Parque Nacional los Glaciares¨. Among others, this park has the biggest ice cap in the world after the polar ones, and the Perito Moreno is also in it.
We arrievd at our hostel at about 11:20. At 12:00 we have already been packed and walking towards a local trek to Laguna De los Tres. It was going to be just another trek, however, two facts made it one of the most significant activities we´ve done so far:
1. The mountain is the holy grail of mountaineers. No, not the himalayan peaks. The everest summit, for example, is stepped on up to a hundred times a day. The Fitz Roy summit is reached only about once a year. It´s a monster, who has claimed many lives.
2. The trek ends with a very steep climb of 450 meters, which should be twice as difficult as the (unfinished) Torres climb.
After walking for about 4 hours we arrived at camp Poincenot, named after one of the first explorers to climb this mountain. From this point on, it´s just sweat and blood. Erez and Michal decided to head back to town, as it was becoming too late to climb the hill. However, Jenis and I, in a blink of an eye, decided to ¨just do it¨.
I was afraid. I´ve known fears in my life, but this one was different. It was the same fear I had of climbing the Torres mountain. I´ve been in good shape in the late 1990´s, I´ve ran half a marathon and was thin and muscular. However, for the past 10 years or so, I have been losing fitness and gaining fat. I´ve reached rock bottom about 6 months ago, and decided to get in shape. And so I´ve been working out for the past 6 monhts, and have come to some better level of fitness.
However, I had no idea where my limits are. What my body is capable of. I was afraid that at some point in the middle of the way I won´t be able to climb up any more.. nor to climb down.
At the age of 33 I overcame this fear and reached the top with Jenis. We´ve reached the closes possible point to Fitz Roy without climbing it, with a beautiful crystal lake and still glaciers. The view was magnificent, but the adventure and the achievement was even more.
The photos below may start depicting the experience, but do me a favor and multiply everything it makes you feel 20 times more.

Hey guys,

Where are we? What is Patagonia?
The Patagonian Andes is the south-eastern region of South America, spanned across Chile and Argentine. It´s a land of wild mountains, gushing rivers, thick forests and huge glaciers. People come to Patagonia to see nature at its best.
First stop: Barcelona
We first spent a day in Barcelona and had a speedy day of tourism around numerous sites there. We used the Metro to get to places, and walked quite a bit through the wide and crowded streets. The beauty of Barcelona to me lies within the huge modern roads with fashion corners, with hidden narrow alleys of gothic cathedrals, combined with out-of-place crazy artworks of Antony Gaudi.
South-most inhabitated place in the world: Ushuaia
There's no better place to begin our South America journey than the southernmost city in the world: Ushuaia. There's nothing much to do here. The city is a base of Antarctica excursion teams, so everything here is around that. We went to see some penguins, hiked among the lakes and forests of Tierra del Fuego and took an adventure in the woods and swamps to see the hidden Laguna Ezmeralda. Of course, the most significant advneture here was waiting for my backpack to arrive from Spain, after Iberia had decided to lose it, be rude to us, not return calls and of course, have me pay for a taxi to pick up my bag from the airport 4 days late. We then left Ushuaia a bit north (where else) to Puerto Natales, a backpackers town and a base for Patagonian trekkers.
Parque Nacional Torres del Paine
As we arrived at Puerto Natales, we quickly packed only the basic stuff needed for trekking (weighing about 20kg) and left to the park. There are 4 hotspots in this park: a grey glacier you can get very close to, a viewpoint in the middle of a mountain-circle (called the French Valley, or as I call it "trois valles"), 3 granite towers rising up to 2,000 meters and more, and a "pass", which is the highest point in the area, that as you pass it you see the entire park and the whole glacier at your feet.
We, as beginner-trekkers, decided to take it easy. We set up a tent at the bottom of the park, and in the next morning we took only necessities (about 7 kg) and hiked to see the glacier. We reached it after about 4.5 hours of a not-too-easy walk. I took another climb down a rock just to touch some huge floating ice coulders that disconnected from the main glacier. The glacier is really big, not really grey and the view was magnificent. We took some photos and headed back to our base camp.
Surrendering to the winds
The next day we packed or stuff and headed towards the next resort: the 3 towers (the Torresses). The plan was to climb from the base point to the next camp carrying all our gear, then waking up at night and climbing to the torresses with nohing but cameras and water. But God has his own tiny little plans for us.
We started climbing. It was hard. VERY hard. Heavy. My thighs were burning. As we got higher and higher, the winds became stronger. And stronger. And stronger. At some point, we actually had to lie down and hold on to tree roots in order to stay put. The wind got so strong at the top, we were afraid to be thrown off to the chasm below. Jenis fell and hurt her knee. I got boulders stuck in my eyes. It was too much. Too dangerous. After 2.5 kilometers, we headed back down. The descending was even harder than the climbing, even with the wind in our backs. Thank God we arrived safely down. For my birthday, Jenis took us to a luxurious hotel (that's stuck here for some reason), and so we had one of the best showers and beds in history of mankind.
The plans
We now plan to get back to town and head straight north to see the glacier Perito Moreno, and maybe climb it and do some "ice hiking". If time allows, we may be touring the Fitz Roy mountain and drive the Carratera Austral.

Kisses to all, pictures soon,
Boaz.