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Traverse of the Hielo Patagonia Sur - Argentina & Chile
In March 2010, Ivan and I made a tour with spectegular views. We have circled the complete Fitzroy and Cerro Torre groups starting and finishing in El Chalten. Starting at the lovely paths and side trips just east of Fitzroy, we entered with a northern bow the Patagonian ice field at Passo Marconi. From there we climbed the CO Gorra Blanca,
crossed west over the eastern branch of the Hielo Patagonia Sur towards Nunatak Witte. There we tried to climb CO Moreno emmiately from the West, which lies in the center of the ice field, but huge crevasses and bad weather blocked our way. From Nunatak Witte we succeeded to cross back to Passo del Viento from which we have continued the long and remote bow towards the Viedma calving front near Passo Huemul. All glacier and camping gear and 14 days of food, snowboots and one sledge made a heave bag at the start and an empty stomach at the end. Several of our adventorous stories will follow later .
Crucial info:
Crossing the very cold Pollone river: should be done in the morning, no cables, no bridge, no stepping stones, nothing, the best place of crossing is near the splitting almost at the Lago Electrico.
From Playita to Passo Marconi: we went along the left side of Lago del Marconi, high into the morene dust and blocks (finally quite steep and left) then we entered the glacier actually at the first possibility over dark slippy stone covered ice. From there, as soon we reached bare ice, we headed emmiately west and continued in the middle slightly left (south). To approach the real ice cap we went up to the rock bastion, climbed down it steep snow (crevasses) up to obvious ice crevasses, a little below them we stepped over on to the rock, which can be climbed with some zigzag, finally ending up at the left (last water), at the top go a bit right to gain the ice.
Rif. Gorra Blanca can be seen from quite a distance (coming from the east), it lies at the end of a rocky ridge, its opening is below in the floor.
To reach Passo del Viento is not an easy tour, it needs a lot of glacier experience to find your way through the large area of crevasses. We entered near a very grey hidden lake (not on the maps) the rock. One should defenitly enter before the two long morenes on the ice (showed as rock on the map).
Rio Tunel can be crossed using the broken toggle, just hold the cable and cross by bare feet.
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