El Calafate, Argentina
This post is part of our epic adventure to the Falklands, South Georgia, and Antarctica. In case you don’t want to read this sequentially, or you are looking for a specific part of the trip, here are some shortcuts:
- Introduction
- Departure Day
- Santiago, Chile
- Torres del Paine, Chile
- El Calafate, Argentina <-- You are here
- Ushuaia, Argentina
- Embarkation Day
- Stanley, Falkland Islands
- Sea Days
- Tour of the Ship
- Right Whale Bay, South Georgia
- Salisbury Plain, South Georgia
- Grytviken, South Georgia
- Fortuna Bay, South Georgia
- Stromness, South Georgia
- Godthul, South Georgia
- St. Andrews Bay, South Georgia
- Gold Harbour, South Georgia
- Cooper Bay, South Georgia
- The Scotia Sea Surprise
- Cuverville Island, Antarctic Peninsula
- Port Lockroy, Antarctic Peninsula
- The Drake and Ushuaia, Argentina
Getting There
There are three ways to get from Torres del Paine to Ushuaia:
- Drive to either Puerto Natales or Punta Arenas, and then fly to Ushuaia. This requires connecting through Santiago AND Buenos Aires and takes about 15 hours
- Drive to Ushuaia, which takes about 11 hours but requires a ferry AND a rental car that can cross from Chile into Argentina which is expensive
- Be driven to El Calafate, Argentina and then fly direct to Ushuaia
We chose to be driven.
We left our hotel in Torres del Paine in a giant van at 11am with a driver who didn’t speak much English. He asked “cancha carrera?” which Google translate said means “frontier.” We nodded in agreement, assuming that meant he was taking us to the border, but we weren’t clear on what would happen after that.
About an hour later, we arrived in Cerro Castillo, the town with the wolf hat store. This was the Chilean-Argentinian border. We checked out of Chile with our US passports and then drove for about 10 km where we checked in to Argentina with our AUS passports. We then drove for another 1km where we met the driver who would take us the rest of the way.
Three hours later, we arrived at the Design Suites in El Calafate. The hotel had a cool view, but our room was uncomfortably hot.
The restaurant was closed for a special event on Christmas Eve, so the concierge suggested a restaurant in town that opened at 8pm. He confirmed that we didn’t need a booking and booked us a taxi for 7:30pm because the free shuttle was at 6pm. We were starving at 5:30pm, so decided to take the 6pm shuttle (which turned out to be a random person’s car) and try to find somewhere that was open. We found the restaurant, Casimiro Biguá Parrilla & Asador, suggested by the concierge. Not only were they open, but they were booked for the night! They were kind enough to offer us a table in exchange for our promise to be out in time for their first booking at 8pm. We ordered queso frito, carne para dos, and a lovely bottle of red wine. The cheese was perfection but the meat was overwhelming. The portion was enough for four people, so we stuck to the recognisable parts and happily left the squiggly bits untouched.
Next up — Ushuaia, Argentina
