# 58 Traveling to Epic Patagonia: Helpful Things I Learned
On Bariloche, El Chaltén, El Calafate, and Torres del Paine.
Patagonia lives at the southern end of South America, stretching across Chile and Argentina. The region is over one million square kilometers of steppe, mountains, glaciers, and fjords, and can make us feel we’re at the end of the world.
We travel to Patagonia for dramatic landscapes and skies, famous hiking paths, wildlife that behaves as if humans never entered their realm, and winds that rearrange our thoughts.
But before we can get lost in the mountains and become part of the natural world, we must get there first, find places to lodge, eat, and get around.
Here are some helpful things I learned.
Contents
1. General Advice on Patagonia
Take your time. Don’t squeeze too much into one trip. If you have only ten days, pick one or two destinations in this article. The weather is unreliable and if you’re at your destination only briefly, rain, wind, and mist may make it impossible (or very unpleasant) to hike. Ensure you can take bad-weather days off or rest between long hikes.
Count on delayed flights: Winds are fierce and interfere with airline schedules. Avoid flying with Air Bondi if you can.
Download offline maps (from MapsMe or the paid version of AllTrails) to ensure you can follow the trails. There’s no signal in the mountains. All popular hikes are well signposted and will have other hikers showing the way.
Bring water purifying tablets or a water bottle with a filter so you can drink from the mountain streams. If not, carry two liters of water a person for all-day hikes.
Take a hat, sunglasses, and sunscreen.
Bring many layers of clothing. Even in summer, it can be nearly freezing with the cold morning wind blowing from the glacier. Yet around noon, it’s too hot to sit in the sun. Sometimes we started the day with hats, gloves, and double top layers, and ended up in T-shirts, pants rolled up.
Check the weather on reliable apps such as WindGuru and avoid long hikes when the winds are too strong. In Torres del Paine authorities regularly close routes when they deem the weather unsafe.
I recommend hiking poles for everyone, especially in Torres del Paine, where even the young and experiences need them to brace themselves against the winds.
Crossing the border from Argentina into Chile by bus? Be careful what foods you bring. Everyone must fill out this form in advance. (The bus company provides more information about border crossings.) Some bags were thoroughly searched, others not. For sure: Don’t bring fresh fruit and count on delays.
Because of inflation and changes in fees, I don’t mention costs in this guide.
Good news! You can drink the tap water everywhere.
More good news: You can find all the hiking gear you need in all the towns for reasonable prices, except for water purifying tablets or bottles with filters.
More general information: https://www.interpatagonia.com
2. Bariloche and San Martín de los Andes in the Lake Region
Hiking in Bariloche is wonderful, but getting to the trails can be hard. There’s only one two-lane road along the lake—Avenue Exequiel Bustillo—and in high season, this road is jammed with traffic. It’s only 26km from the town center to the main attractions on Llao Llao Peninsula, but it regularly takes an hour or more to get there or back.
Bariloche definitely suffers from overtourism. If we were to return here, it would be in the shoulder season. The lake region has a different climate than Southern Patagonia, so it can be comfortable here in spring or fall. In summer (Dec-Feb) it’s very busy with hikers and in winter (Jul-Aug) the ski crowds arrive.
Why Go
El Circuito Chico is a route that centers around the Llao Llao Peninsula, where you can walk all day or do easy and short (2 hour) hikes. Sendero de los Arrayanes is mostly flat and very beautiful. If you get to the beach on that trail, you can walk a long time along the lake and find a quiet picnic spot. We walked from the end of Los Arrayanes to Lago Escondido and from there to Playa Los Troncos, where we spent several hours.
Cerro Llao Llao (on the same peninsula) is a steep hill with amazing views. You can get there from two different ways, so you can choose to go back by the same route or make a longer loop via Sendero Villa Tacul, which I recommend.
Downsides: bathrooms only exist at the entrance of the Llao Llao park and in Hotel Alun Nehuen (on the other side of the peninsula).
Refugio Frey is the classic long hike most people come here for. We didn’t attempt it; we feared it would be too difficult and too hot. Now I think we could have accomplished it with an early enough start.
The trail to Muñoz Beach is a lovely mid-length hike to a nice beach where foxes come visit to steal snacks from the people drinking mattes on the beach.
Campanario Hill offers a short, steep hike up a hill with a great view—it’s a good excursion if you have only half a day, not a must-do activity. There’s a cable car, too, and a cute cafe on top.
El Circuito Grande offers a road trip of 240-300km that gets you to various lakes and towns. It can be done by renting a car or joining a tour. The roads outside Bariloche are not so busy, but they’re still only two-lanes, so you can easily get stuck behind a truck or need to pull over because impatient people are tailing you.
Entry Fees
Llao Llao peninsula has a voluntary entry fee that nobody seems to pay.
The Refugio Frey hike is free but requires a registration.
To visit the volcano and the surrounding El Parque Nacional Lanín, you need to register and possibly purchase a ticket. (We didn’t go.)
All other hikes: Just show up and enjoy.
Where to Stay
Choose your accommodation in Bariloche based on where you want to hike. If we came back, we’d search for something close to Llao Llao peninsula. Small shops and supermarkets are nearly everywhere—just check with the host what’s at walking distance. Bariloche town is nothing special. Even if you want to eat out every night, you can find restaurants all along Avenue Exequiel Bustillo.
We took the bus to San Martín de los Andes mainly so we could see more of the region and experience the famous seven-lake route. San Martín de los Andes was a nice town with a pleasant beach surrounded by gorgeous mountains. It’s a great stop if you’re on a road trip, not a must-see town. In short: Go there if you have your own car. Skip it if you don’t.
Getting Around
Bus: All major hiking trails in Bariloche can be reached by public bus. Google gives reliable information on routes and bus stops. Time tables are here. BUT if you board the bus from the center of town you risk that the bus is full and will pass you by. So get on at the first stop in town or from the main bus station. On the way back, it’s equally difficult. One day, after a full-day hike on the Llao Llao peninsula, we had to stand for 90 minutes in the bus to get home—not fun. To ride the buses you need a loaded Sube transit card. We bought them at a cigarette kiosk in Buenos Aires and went into a subway station to load them with cash. We couldn’t figure out how to load them digitally; we probably didn’t have the right banking apps.
For buses between towns, you can buy tickets online via https://busplus.com.ar or https://www.busbud.com/en.
Uber: Reliable and inexpensive. We shared Ubers with other people waiting for the bus and ended up paying the same price per person as we would have on the bus. But Ubers will stand in the same traffic as everyone else.
Car rental: I recommend renting a car to do a road trip around the lakes and stay in different towns. I would not recommend renting a car to get to the trails in Bariloche because of the jammed roads and limited parking spaces. (In a bus or Uber, you get to play Duolingo at least.)
Bicycle: You can rent good (electronic) mountain bikes. Daniel and I considered doing El Circuito Chico on bicycle and were happy we did not: There are no bike lanes and you will be sharing the road with thousands of cars.
More Information
Bariloche Visitor Center’s has a Whatsapp chatbot in English and Spanish.
It can send you maps, weather reports, bus schedules, links, and more
+54 929 445 798 37The official park website (only in Spanish): https://nahuelhuapi.gov.ar
For weather alerts, check: https://nahuelhuapi.gov.ar/alertas/
