Refried Neurons

The night wasn’t terrible—mostly because the heating was cranked up, so we were warm despite sleeping in our clothes. I even decided to take a shower! Regretted it almost immediately. Ugh, fucking shower curtains—especially the ones in hotels or hostels. They cling to your body like an unwanted hug, and you can’t help but wonder whose body they stuck to before yours. The shower walls didn’t help either—some weird mix of concrete and resin that made me spend more time trying not to touch anything than actually getting clean.

Sort of clean, we checked out quickly and headed for breakfast. Breakfast was probably included in the hostel price, but after a mediocre night, we wanted something better than the usual hostel fare of cornflakes with milk. Before breakfast, we wandered around town to stretch our legs and feel slightly less guilty about all the dulce de leche we were planning to devour. El Calafate has a great vibe—hiking and outdoorsy, like a surfer town but without the mountains (or the ocean, obviously). The main street is green and lively, with loads of outdoor shops, cafes, and restaurants.

What stood out, though, was the sheer number of tour operators. Most had A4 sheets taped to their windows with “$900” scrawled on them. We figured they were advertising tour prices but didn’t give it much thought. Pietro’s Café caught our eye, with a decent menu and, more importantly, pancakes with dulce de leche. For the uninitiated, dulce de leche is South America’s gift to the world: caramelized milk turned into an addictive, calorie-laden spread that tastes incredible on anything—or straight off a spoon, Nutella-style. Sure, it’s unhealthy, but we convinced ourselves that all the trekking we’d eventually do would burn it off.

What I do remember clearly is the shock when the bill came. Last night, we’d paid with the cash I brought from London, but this morning, I used Revolut, so I saw the conversion in real time. Breakfast was European-priced—not London, maybe, but definitely Manchester or Warsaw. Wasn’t Argentina supposed to be cheap? M was fuming and certain something was off.

As we walked down the street, still baffled, we spotted a massive queue outside the post office at 9 a.m.—mostly tourists, at least 50 meters long. We stopped to figure out what we were missing and quickly got the scoop.

Here’s the deal: Argentina’s crazy inflation means locals prefer stable foreign currencies like dollars, pounds, or euros. The government’s official exchange rate was 1 USD = 300 pesos (same rate as in London). But the unofficial “blue dollar” rate was closer to 1 USD = 900 pesos. Had we exchanged dollars before breakfast, it would’ve been three times cheaper! Lesson learned, albeit $20 too late.

The queue was for two reasons: first, the post office had a Western Union, so travelers were collecting dollar or euro cash sent from home. Second, because the highest peso bill is 1000 (worth about $1), the city frequently runs out of cash—literally too bulky to keep in stock. For context, inflation was so wild that five days later, the rate was 1 USD = 1000 pesos. Imagine earning a peso salary: at the start of the month, you might get 5,000,000 pesos (worth $5,555 on Monday) but by Friday, it’s only worth $5,000. Brutal.

A lovely British couple explained that those “$900” signs weren’t tour prices but exchange rates, signaling you could trade your dollars there, semi-legally. We spent the morning hunting for the best rate but ran into the same story everywhere: no cash till 11 a.m. Finally, we struck gold in a jewelry shop where the owner not only had pesos but also Polish roots. Small chat, $200 exchanged, and suddenly, we were peso millionaires! I had to empty my cosmetics bag to stash the cash—it was taking up half my kidney bag. Let me tell you, walking out of a jewelry shop feeling like a millionaire was something else.

With a 3.5-hour drive to El Chaltén ahead, we decided to linger in El Calafate a bit longer. We headed to the lake, hoping to spot flamingos. They were there, but so far away they were basically specs. After a quick 15-minute stroll and a photo with the town’s sign, we concluded it was coffee time. Because, you know, safety first—never drive without caffeine! We grabbed coffee and a massive slice of cake from a bakery, then hit the road.

The drive to El Chaltén was stunning. Bright blue lakes, endless steppe, and sadly, lots of guanaco carcasses hanging on barbed wire fences. This area isn’t as wild as you’d think—it’s mostly pasture land. If a guanaco fails to clear the fence, well… it doesn’t end well.

As we neared El Chaltén, the scenery got even more dramatic. The dead-flat steppe gave way to jagged mountains in a distance, with Fitz Roy looming larger at every turn. It’s the kind of approach that makes you stop every kilometer for another photo and unless you have great camra, you can’t see anything on them. Entering El Chaltén feels like stepping into Middle Earth—narrow passes, towering cliffs, and condors circling overhead.

The town itself is small—about 20 streets, one tarmac road, and lots of gravel side streets. We’d booked an Airbnb on the outskirts, which was still just a five-minute walk from the center. It was a lovely upgrade from the hostel: a cozy, clean ground-floor flat. M volunteered for the single bed in the living room, leaving Sheepy and me with the double. I couldn’t wait to crawl into bed for some proper sleep.

By 5 p.m., we were starving and ready for an early dinner. M found a cute restaurant, and we snagged the last table. Within minutes, the place was packed with hikers fresh off the trails. The decor was charming—lots of natural wood, old newspapers as wallpaper, and chandeliers made from tree roots. The food was so good we decided to return the next day.

After dinner, we hit the supermarket for supplies for tomorrow’s hike: bananas, chocolate, eggs, avocado, and pastries from a nearby bakery. Supermarkets here are nothing like in Europe or Chile—imported goods are insanely expensive, and local produce is surprisingly limited. Anything imported, like sunscreen, costs a fortune (£20 for 100ml!).

Exhausted, we skipped the local pub and called it a night. We attempted to watch Top Gear: Patagonia Special, but the town’s internet couldn’t handle the influx of hikers. Alarm set for 6:30 a.m., we crashed, ready for our 25km trek to Fitz Roy the next day.