Climbing More Mountains

Today was a beautiful day, thankfully after the snow and clouds of the day before so it was a perfect day to go and climb up some more hills and while not quite mountains, things that were definitely steep enough.  Fortunately I met someone on the bus out here so I wasn't climbing alone, that would not have been fun.  

Overall it's about a 4 hour hike out to the base of mount Fitz Roy.  The first 7km is a little uphill, climbing about 350m.  Ok, so more than a little.  However, from the viewpoint you get you first aight of the mountain, and it's quite impressive.......

However, there's still another 6km to go before you get to the base.  The next 3km is nice and flat and you can go and a good pace and see some gorgeous valleys and the whole mountain range.

As well as the glacier hanging off the side.

From there the only way is up.  400m up in the space of about 2km to be precise.  There's snow on the ground and it's slippery.  Thankfully it was a good day, in bad weather you'd never make it, not to mention that you wouldn't see much anyway.

Oh, and here's my climbing companion, having 'borrowed' a walking stick off a nice / stupid Russian who offered it to her.  I wasn't there at the time so I only have her word for it but I know she gave it back.

And the view from the top is quite something.........

Getting down was treacherous to say the least with loose stones, snow, ice and all manner of things to make you fall over.  As is my way with these things I hit a patch of snow and promptly dumped myself on the ground.  Fortunately, as I'm sure most of you know, pride and dignity said farewell to me a long time ago so at least I didn't have those to lose.

Tomorrow is a rest day and then the bus back to El Calafate, one night and on to Ushaia.  Going to take it easy and rest up, I'm absolutely shattered after today.  Maybe a little stroll out the waterfall but that's about it.