Today is the end of our W Trek - Classic tour. After breakfast, we all go our separate ways. Both the London family and we happened to book the same bus to El Calafate, Argentina this morning.
The bus left Puerto Natales at 7:30 am, arrived at the Chile border control about an hour later. We waited ~30 minutes to clear the Chile border, then went to the Argentina border close by, waited another 40 minutes to clear this one. Finally, we arrived at El Calafate, Argentina around 2 pm, slightly ahead of the 2:15 pm scheduled time. So, the whole trip including 2 border crossings took about 6.5 hours (or ~7 hours according to schedule). For some reason the same trip going back is listed as 5 hours (8 am leaving El Calafate, 1 pm arriving Puerto Natales). Do not ever believe that. When we took that bus 3 days later we arrived at Puerto Natales after 2 pm, barely made our next bus connection to Punta Arenas. Anyway, I really regret backtracking from El Calafate to Santiago by buses and plane. It was boring and wasted so much time. We should have flown from El Calafate to Buenos Aires instead.
1. Chile border control.
2. Argentina border control.
3. Encounter traffic :)
4. Lupins at El Calafate, Argentina.
5. Laguna Nimez Nature Reserve.
6. Flamingos at Laguna Nimez Nature Reserve.
7. Laguna Nimez Nature Reserve.
8. Black-faced ibis at Laguna Nimez Nature Reserve.
9. Laguna Nimez Nature Reserve and Lake Argentina.
(To be continued)
