Inside Patagonia, from glaciers to peaks

Perrito Moreno Glacier in the Patagonia region of Argentina. Photos by Marielle Grenade-Willis

Marielle Grenade-Willis was a participant on a Patagonia tour organized by the Angeles Chapter Sierra Club. She shares her thoughts here on what she learned during her time in Argentina and Chile. Click here to learn more about the Chapter's Travel Adventures.

I hear the sound before knowing where it came from. It travels down to my marrow like the artillery of one thousand cannons going off. Then, a great spire of glacial ice falls from its indigo cathedral into the electric blue of Lago Argentino. The 19-mile-long Perito Moreno Glacier acts like a giant pair of lungs, in a constant state of expansion and contraction. It seems that Patagonia is like the glacier, growing in popularity as an outdoor enthusiast’s paradise but also showing signs of environmental side effects that arrive with human progress.

The end of the earth is a sparsely populated region spanning the southern portions of Chile and Argentina. I, like many people who visit Patagonia, felt captivated by the extravagant display of biodiversity: the vast golden steppe, sprawling glacial lakes, dense beech forests, and boundless ice fields within the core of the Andes. It is astounding that one can travel through six different ecosystems in an hour and within two weeks, our group only visited two of the nine national parks in the region. Torres del Paine National Park and Parque Nacional Los Glaciares are the quintessential gems of Patagonia offering spectacular vistas of glaciers, copious bird sightings, and the famous granite towers.

Patagonia encompasses a unique, multicultural history in that it represents the “last frontier” of European settlement and exploration for many curious pioneers such as Charles Darwin. The vigorous establishment of European estancias, sheep ranches, throughout the 19th century greatly impacted native hunter-gatherer tribes as well as the environment. The sheep devoured the native coiron grasses through overgrazing and soon after, the Selknam and Tehuelche peoples were devoured by disease and genocide from contesting land use with ranchers. Ironically, this clash of cultures did give rise to the iconic South American cowboy, gaucho, who was recruited from the native peoples to look after the herds. Now, estancias thrive as cultural tourist destinations, serving the traditional barbeque, asado, and fried pastry, sopapilla, as well as advertising wool shearing demonstrations by deft, beret-clad gauchos.

Torres del Paine National Park in Chile.

As more land once owned by estancias is being claimed for environmental conservation by such prominent figures as the recently deceased North Face outdoor clothing company founder, Douglas Tompkins, there is a rising suspicion among locals of international interference with Patagonian natural resources. While we wish to believe that environmentalists like Tompkins really did care about saving the earth, there are many countries interested in exploiting this region’s resources such as the pristine drinking water from the glaciers or the oil located underneath of them.

The Perito Moreno Glacier faces such scrutiny as developed countries like Canada have already begun conducting studies about oil drilling underneath of its body. An additional chilling component to this debate is the pace at which glaciers are melting due to warmer weather patterns that turn snow into rain, further augmenting the rate of glaciers’ ablation. Although Moreno is currently in a state of accumulation, many other glaciers are imbalanced causing local communities to be concerned about their precious drinking sources.

Being a Western tourist, I found this complex spectrum between conservation and tourism intriguing. Arriving in El Calafate, the bordering town of Argentina and Chile, I could see that the shops and restaurants catered to Western tastes: fly fishing shops, windows filled with overpriced outdoor gear, and stores littered with trinkets to take back home. Although in the height of the summer season, I wondered how desolate and quiet it would be in winter.

I experienced this same sense of novel tourism in the tiny village town of El Chalten, right outside of Parque Nacional Los Glaciares. Created as a basecamp for trekkers and climbers, El Chalten has been in a state of furious development since the 1970s. Everything is new: the roads, the hotels, and the restaurants. The aim for all of these energetic initiatives is for “ecotourism” but I fear if the development is not kept in check by environmental guidelines that safeguarding the surrounding nature will prove difficult.

Mount Fitz Roy in Argentina.

Some private businesses have been able to maintain the balance between profitable development and ecologically sound operation. While in Torres del Paine National Park, our group stayed at Refugio Torre Norte which is one of several dorm style hostels owned and operated by a private company on the grounds of the park. On a plaque in the main lobby, the regufio touted the many ways in which they kept their practices “green” from composting toilets to shutting off electricity during night hours.

However, Torres receives 150,000 visitors a year and without proper regulation, there are far reaching consequences of such mass volumes of visitors on conserved land. One of the most devastating impacts that foreigners have had on the Patagonian ecology is unawareness of basic safety principles for respectfully being in the wilderness and “leaving no trace.” During our bus ride to the park entrance, our local guide pointed out the large silvery patches of burnt beech where a wildfire devastated 30,000 acres of park land in 2011. A tourist had ignited their toilet paper roll and the intense gusts, which can reach up to 60 miles per hour or more, spread the flames for miles.

Incidences such as these have been Patagonia’s growing pains, but as more governing bodies regulate and form preventative, environmental measures, spatial awareness can be created between humans and their interaction with wilderness. People will never stop visiting Patagonia for its saturated, outdoor splendor and enchanting vitality unlike anywhere else on earth. Whether you are a long distance trekker, hardcore rock climber, or simply someone looking for rustic inspiration, the end of the earth is a very special place to be one with the natural world. The landscape does not ask for any approval or discussion, simply an appreciation of its function and how well it can stir your heart to be still. It only asks how well you can listen to your own lungs, expanding and contracting breath, as you look out over the ridge.

Marielle Grenade-Willis is a native of Virginia who recently completed a year of national service with AmeriCorps in rural Colorado. She is planning on pursuing a graduate degree in creative writing where she can continue exploring the intersection of humanity and nature. She recently published her first chapbook of eco-poetry called "Prairie Crocus." Through her writing, she hopes to uncover the many ways in which millennials like herself will impact future conservation movements.