The Patagonia and Glaciers

So I am now officially in Patagonia, which is very far away from Concepcion, where the earthquake hit.  The earthquake did change alot of peoples plans who were heading north, but it is not affecting me much. 
After Pucon, Chile, I headed to nearby Bariloche, Argentina, a city set on the lake amongst many snow capped mountains.  I hiked up this mountain nearby, which national geographic voted as one the top 10 views in the world, and here are the pictures from the top:

 

After Bariloche, I took a 30 hour long bus ride south to El Calafate, finally reaching the patagonia area.   The temperature is dropping and it is very windy.

And then I visited the glaciers!!!  El Calafate is the base to explore the glaciers. 

This is the 3rd largest ice mass in the world, only after the south pole and Greenland.  It constantly snows east of the andes, and this snow builds up in the mountains and after hundreds of years forces it way down into the valleys, 1000s of meters below, which is where we hiked.  Its kind of hard to get an idea of how large these are, so here is a picture of the Moreno glacier with a large cruise boat in the bottom right corner. 

The ice is constantly moving, up to two meters a day, which is why you can constantly hear loud thunder like noises, which are the ice breaking and falling into the water. 

And here are some pictures from the glaicers!

(there is a boat in that one too)

I had to cut my trip a bit short so that I could visit grad schools, but I am heading on one last backpacking trip around the glaicers, which is suppost to be one of the highlights of the patagonia, and then I´m heading home!!