Dwarfed by snow white

The radar system for all flights across Argentina had broken, the flight attendant said, and we had only two choices: Stay put or go somewhere we had never planned to visit.
“Have you heard of El Calafate?'' the attendant asked, smiling.

My husband and I had wanted to go to El Calafate, the home of one of the world's most breathtaking glaciers, since we began planning our trip to Argentina last March.

But had to narrow our travel plans down due to the expense. Now we would get to add El Calafate to our agenda free of charge.

Even from the aircraft, we could tell that El Calafate would be unlike anything we have ever seen.

Despite temperatures in the 50s, El Calafate looked like the Arctic: a town walled off by ice-covered mountains, with sea-blue Lago Argentino, the country's largest lake, as its centrepiece.

The town of El Calafate itself has developed around a single tourist attraction: Glaciar Perito Moreno, a spectacular ice field that has developed over millions of years in a gap in the Andes Mountains.

The town itself is a lovely place to spend the roughly two nights it takes to see the sight.

Invitation to indulge

The main drag, Av del Libertador General San Martin, is a pleasant place to stroll at night and houses many gear shops, cosy taverns and top-flight restaurants where one can indulge in appetisers, mouthwatering steaks, refreshments and dessert.

My husband and I arrived at dusk and headed straight to Heilo y Aventura, an adventure-tour company that takes groups on day treks over the glacier at a price of about $100 (Dh367) per person.

The agent booked us for the next day and instructed us to dress warmly, pack a lunch and be ready at the crack of dawn.

When we got our first glimpse of the glacier, from a great distance in Glacier National Park, it was difficult to tell just what we were seeing.

It was like a vast white-water rapid, spilling towards us from between two distant mountain ranges, then ending abruptly in a frozen white waterfall.

Glaciar Perito Moreno formed when Pacific storms broke out between two mountain ranges, dropping huge loads of snow in the valley there.

Over millions of years, that snow, under tremendous weight, crystallised into ice and was pushed steadily east to form what is now a 160-square-mile ice field.

Dynamic uniqueness

There are reasons that make the Moreno Glacier unique. The first is its accessibility.

You can get to it by car, without having to hike for miles through ice. Second, the Moreno Glacier is dynamic, meaning that it is constantly forming at one end while breaking off at the same rate into the water at the other.

As we drew closer and drove lower into the valley, the enormity of the glacier hit us.

At the edge of the lake the glacier spills into, the ice wall rises about 180ft above the water and extends back into the distance as far as the eye can see.

But it is the sound show, as much as the visual majesty, that makes the Moreno Glacier so awe-inspiring.

As we sat eating our lunch on a cliff overlooking the glacier's edge, we heard loud creaks, followed by ear-shattering claps of thunder.

Then, if we were quick enough to spot it, we could glimpse an avalanche of ice falling from the edge of the glacier into the lake below.

Though global warming is a threat to glaciers, our guide assured us that the melting of the Moreno glacier is part of a natural annual cycle that has been happening for thousands of years.

After lunch, we were taken by boat across the lake and on to the bank of the glacier itself.

There, we were each outfitted with crampons to help us climb on ice and snow, before we set out on our two-hour hike into the glacier itself.

From the inside, the glacier's terrain is beautiful: icy hills and valleys, separated by deep crevasses and tiny streams of bright blue water formed by newly melted ice.

The walking wasn't easy and our guides were there to help us over deep canyons and down steep grades.

People who had brought water bottles filled them up in the glacial streams and the rest of us sucked on small chunks of million-year-old ice, a surprisingly delicious treat, which we were assured was perfectly safe.

To sudden reroutes!

After a couple of hours, we came over a peak and saw our guides ahead of us, standing around a table that had been set up on the ice.

On the table was a glass of refreshments for each of us — each with a chunk of glacier ice in it — and a bowl full of chocolate truffle.

At that moment, we thought back to the airline booking agent who had rerouted us to El Calafate.

The last thing he had said was: “You will remember me.'' And we do.

Go there ... El Calafate ... From the UAE

From Dubai

Buenos Aires is one of the closest airports to El Calafate

Lufthansa flies daily via Frankfurt.
Fare from Dh8,450

Air France flies daily via Paris.
Fare from Dh6,680

— Information courtesy: The Holiday Lounge by Dnata.
Ph: 04-3166160