The next morning, I took a bus to El Calafate and back to some more civilization. Alissa was on the same bus and we ended up talking just about the whole time up.
El Calafate is a beautiful, but really touristy and expensive town. I stayed in a really cool hostel that was recommended to me by a friend even before I got to South America. It is called America del Sur and after being there for about 5 minutes, I totally understood why it was so highly recommended. It was a very warm, comfortable place with a great staff. The floors were heated so everyone was running around in their socks and the rooms were so clean and warm. It was such a great change to what I had been experiencing for the few weeks before that.
That afternoon, I took a trip with Alissa out to see the Perito Moreno glacier. It is one of the fastest moving glaciers and calves pretty often. Unfortunately, I only saw one pretty decent size chunk fall off in the few hours I was there, but that was definitely worth the trip. When the ice falls into the water, the deafening sound is like a crash of thunder. It`s awesome. The glacier itself had some of the most beautiful hues of electric blue in it`s deep crevices. Needless to say, I took lots of pictures. :) That night, Alissa and I treated ourselves to a really nice dinner and a bottle of wine at her friend´s fancy pancy restaurant.
I was planning to leave the next morning to go to El Chalten, but I didn´t wake up until 9 and I decided it was a great day to chill out and enjoy Calafate. The city itself is really touristy, but it is clean and there are amazing views of the lake from the hostel. I ended up chatting with one of the guys who worked at the hostel for a little while and he invited me to go check out the cultural center in Calafate that he and his buddies have been working on for the last few months. It was a really cool experience and they have obviously put a lot of hard work into it. They took a few minutes to play some music and they tried to teach me how to play the digeridoo (sp?) so I could participate as well. It didn´t really work out too well...
I went out for a bite to eat with Alissa again and when I got back to the hostel, everyone was just hanging out drinking some beers and playing some music. What turned out after a few hours, was a full blown jam session with people who worked at the hostel and some guys from Ireland. There were a few people playing guitar, a few playing the digeridoo and one guy playing a blow piano thingy. It was awesome and I stayed up almost all night. Lucky for me, I made it up two hours later, just in time for my bus to El Chalten!
