Gateway to one of the great natural wonders of the world. El Calafate sits at the edge of Los Glaciares National Park — a UNESCO World Heritage landscape of advancing glaciers, turquoise lakes, and Patagonian silence unlike anything else on earth.
El Calafate is a place that puts the scale of the natural world into perspective. A small, thriving tourist town on the southern shore of Lago Argentino in the Santa Cruz province of Argentine Patagonia, it exists primarily as the gateway to one of the most extraordinary landscapes on earth — Los Glaciares National Park, declared a UNESCO Natural World Heritage Site in 1981.
The park covers over 726,000 hectares of southern Patagonia and contains one of the largest ice fields outside the polar regions — the Southern Patagonian Ice Field, from which dozens of glaciers descend into a landscape of lakes, rivers, and jagged granite peaks. The most famous of these glaciers is Perito Moreno — a wall of blue-white ice 5 kilometers wide and 60 meters tall that advances into Lago Argentino at a rate that makes it one of the few glaciers on earth still growing. When sections of ice calve from the face with a crack like thunder and collapse into the lake below, it is one of the most dramatic natural events you will ever witness.
But El Calafate is far more than Perito Moreno. The park also provides access to the Upsala and Spegazzini glaciers by boat, to the trekking country of the Cerro Torre and Mount Fitz Roy area from the nearby village of El Chaltén, and to a landscape of such raw and extraordinary beauty that travelers who come for three days routinely find themselves wishing they had booked two weeks.
The town of El Calafate itself is warm, well-equipped, and surprisingly good for a remote Patagonian village — with excellent restaurants, comfortable hotels, and a population whose lives revolve around the natural world that surrounds them. It is one of the most rewarding bases in Argentina, and one of the most humbling places on earth to simply stand still and look.
Southern Patagonia — Santa Cruz
Santa Cruz
El Calafate
El Chaltén (trekking base)
October to April
Patagonian — Cold, Windy, Variable
Spanish
Argentine Peso
ART (UTC -3)
Comandante Armando Tola International (FTE)
Los Glaciares National Park — Natural World Heritage Site (1981)
Perito Moreno is one of those rare places that exceeds every expectation. A wall of ice five kilometers wide and sixty meters tall at its face, it advances into Lago Argentino at a rate that makes it one of the few glaciers on earth still growing. Standing on the walkways above the lake and watching the glacier move — watching cracks form, towers of ice lean, and enormous sections collapse into the water with a sound like cannon fire — is an experience that belongs in a different category from ordinary travel. It is a confrontation with geological time and natural scale that stays with you permanently. A private guided visit to Perito Moreno, with a guide who can explain what you are looking at and find you the best vantage points, makes the experience richer still.
For travelers who want to go beyond the walkways and actually set foot on Perito Moreno, ice trekking offers one of the most extraordinary experiences in Patagonia. Fitted with crampons and accompanied by expert glacier guides, you walk across the surface of one of the world’s great ice formations — threading between blue-walled crevasses, past meltwater pools of impossible color, and across a landscape that looks and feels like no other terrain on earth. The mini-trekking option is accessible to most fitness levels. The full Big Ice trek goes deeper into the glacier for experienced trekkers seeking a more demanding and more remote experience.
Lago Argentino is the largest lake in Argentina — a vast body of intensely blue glacial water that reflects the ice and mountains above it in a way that makes every photograph look implausible. A boat excursion across the lake to the Upsala and Spegazzini glaciers — both larger than Perito Moreno but accessible only by water — takes you through a floating world of icebergs calved from the glacier faces, some of them the size of buildings and tinted in shades of blue that range from pale aquamarine to deep indigo. This is one of the most visually overwhelming experiences Southern Patagonia offers, and one of the most peaceful.
For travelers who want to get closer still to the ice, kayaking on the waters below Perito Moreno offers an entirely different perspective. At water level, the scale of the glacier face becomes overwhelming in a way that is impossible from the walkways above. Icebergs drift past. The sound of the glacier — creaking, cracking, occasionally thundering — is immediate and all around you. It is a profoundly quiet and profoundly moving experience. Guided kayak excursions are available for paddlers of all levels, from beginners to experienced kayakers seeking a more technical outing.
Three hours north of El Calafate along the shore of Lago Viedma, the small village of El Chaltén sits at the base of the Fitz Roy massif — a cluster of granite spires that rise so dramatically and so vertically from the Patagonian plateau that they seem to belong in a different dimension from the landscape around them. Mount Fitz Roy and Cerro Torre are among the most technically demanding climbs in the world, but the trails that approach them through lenga beech forest and across open moorland are accessible to any reasonably fit hiker. The views from the higher trails — Fitz Roy emerging from cloud, the southern ice field visible on the horizon, condors riding thermals overhead — are among the finest in South America.
We place you in the best 4 and 5 star hotels El Calafate has to offer — properties that combine comfort and warmth with the dramatic Patagonian landscape right outside the window. Every hotel is personally vetted for location, service, and character. In a town this remote, where you stay matters.
Every El Calafate experience is led by a private, English-speaking guide with genuine expertise in the glaciers, the national park, and the Patagonian landscape. Whether you are standing on Perito Moreno’s walkways, trekking on the ice, kayaking below the glacier face, or hiking toward Fitz Roy in El Chaltén, your guide makes every moment richer and ensures you never miss what matters most.
From arrival at Comandante Armando Tola International Airport to your final transfer out, all ground logistics are handled by our team. Private vehicles for all transfers and excursions — including the spectacular three-hour drive to El Chaltén if your itinerary includes Fitz Roy trekking. In Patagonia, the journey between places is part of the experience.
El Calafate is served by regular flights from Buenos Aires and other Argentine cities. Our team and trusted partners can help arrange the best connections for your itinerary. For guests combining El Calafate with other Beagle destinations, we coordinate the full routing to make the journey as smooth as the destination is extraordinary.
Perito Moreno Glacier
Patagonia Argentina
The gateway to Argentina and the most natural starting or finishing point for any Patagonian journey — a short flight north and a world apart.
The lakes, mountains, and forests of northern Patagonia offer a gentler and equally beautiful counterpoint to the raw drama of El Calafate.
The araucaria forests and ski slopes of Caviahue complete a Patagonian circuit that covers Argentina from its northern mountains to its southern glaciers.
Tell us when you want to go, how long you have, and what kind of experience matters most to you. We will take care of everything else from there.