Patagonia 2017
The last of my goals for 2016 was a long hiking trip on my own, and although the trip took place in 2017 I consider this trip to Patagonia the realization of that goal.
Yes, it still sounds strange even to me. I have been to Patagonia. Like, real Patagonia. It took me a while after arriving in El Calafate to realize I was a world away from my beloved Europe, in the land of dreams, of open spaces, of crazily strong winds and mountaineering history.
Many things happened in the 26 days of my trip, and I would love to be a writer to be able to tell a story, but I wasn’t able so far, and I am not writing that story now. Like in a dream I can think of the Dakar team I met on the plane from Amsterdam to Buenos Aires, the rugby team I met in the lounge in São Paulo airport coming back, the never working ATMs in Argentina, the closed border crossing with Chile, the smell of the Pacific Ocean, the cold wind that blew my tarp (almost) away one night, the complete exhaustion I experienced after hiking for more than 34 km and with an elevation gain of more than 2200 meters, the absolute elation I felt reaching, alone, Paso John Gardner and setting my eyes on the immensity of the Grey glacier.
There is too much for words. Patagonia is immense, and it’s too much for me to describe. So much that I’m actually weeping a little while writing, looking at the world map on this room’s wall, looking at that faraway place that I had the luck to walk on.
Maybe one day I’ll sit down, take a stroll through memory lane, and write about my adventure in Patagonia. Today, though, I’ll simply post a video I made with images of the trip. But before that, a quote from Chatwin’s “In Patagonia”, my favorite quote from the book:
“Which religion have you?” Ali asked. “Christian?”
“I haven’t got any special religion this morning. My God is the God of Walkers. If you walk hard enough, you probably don’t need any other God.”