1. The internet is next to obselete
As a child of the internet age, of course I have to start with this. There “is internet” and all the places in town advertise that they have wifi, but this is false advertising. If you are expecting US wifi, you will be disappointed.
In El Chalten, it takes several minutes to load a page, and the wifi crashes constantly. At times, it felt like we were going back 30 years.
This was especially problematic as we tried to book a flight, and then confirm that the flight was booked. Dan tried to use Priceline to buy a flight, and after pushing “purchase,” there was a 10 minute period where we had no idea whether the flight was actually purchased. Since there were only 7 seats left on the flight (and the only other option was a 24 hour bus ride) we were very anxious to get the flight.
We later saw a confirmation page, but never received any confirmation email, and couldn’t use Skype to make a call to figure out if we had actually bought the tickets. We finally had to email Nick to get him to take care of it from home.
2. El Chalten doesn’t have enough power to support the town
Because El Chalten is so remote, and so new, it really doesn’t have the infrastructure to support the people that visit during “high season.” This doesn't just apply to internet, it also applies to electricity.
Our first night in El Chalten, we spent 40 minutes without power. We were sitting in our room watching spanish South Park, and suddenly, everything went off, and battery-power generators came on. We were pretty surprised.
Fortunately, this is such common occurrence during high season that our hotel was prepared with flashlights, candles, and emergency battery-powered lights. We went down to the lobby to see everyone sitting around, drinking wine in the dark, as if everything was normal.
3. El Chalten is younger than you
Part of the reason the infrastructure is so bad in El Chalten is that the town didn’t even exist until about 28 years ago, when Argentina got involved in a dispute with Chile about the location of the border.
Because El Chalten is way up in the mountains, it’s tough to draw a line where one country ends, and the next country begins. To stop Chile from claiming the territory, Argentina put up some buildings in 1985, and built an information center for people visiting the park. Within 7-8 years, about 6 families had come to settle in the town.
Today, El Chalten is still relatively empty but rapidly growing (from 40 locals in the 90’s to about 1500 today) and because of this, the power, sewage lines, internet, etc, are regularly pushed beyond capacity.
4. El Chalten is in the middle of NOWHERE
It takes 3 hours by bus to get from El Calafate to El Chalten, and about 6-7 hours to get to the next city in Chile. It is REMOTE. I think El Chalten was the first place on this trip that I started realizing just how big, remote, and spread out Argentina is.
5. El Chalten is a great place to have a beer
If you are going to be stuck in El Chalten, let’s hope you enjoy craft brews. Because there are a lot of them, and they are delicious!