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Distance: 92 km. Altitude range: 783 m. Total climb: 2,582 m. Total descent: 2,605 m. Duration: 3-5 days. Grade: Medium to easy. Recommended: warm, weatherproof clothes, and hiking boots.
This is a beautiful trail that combines most easy to reach sights of the El Chalten region in a long trail with 3-5 overnight stays. No registration with the park office is needed for this trail. There are many camping options along the way (see OpenStreetMap), so it is not necessary to stick to the three-night option explained in the following. Furthermore, Mount Fitz Roy can be done in the evening or the morning, depending on the weather and expected clouds.
The 3-night trek is recommended as follows: (1st day) El Chalten to Laguna Torre and from there to the camp ground of Mount Fitz Roy. See the sunset or sunrise at Lago de los Tres. (2nd day) From Mount Fitz Roy camp ground hike down Rio Blanco on its western side to Laguna Piedras Blancas with the beautiful glacier, from there further through the picturesque forest by Lago Eléctrico to the far end of the trail at Laguna del Marconi. Here, depending on your time and considered camping options, you might go further to its glacier to the west or the impressing Laguna Loe, its waterfall and its glacier to the north. At the end of the day, hike back until Ruta 23, where right before it you will find a camp ground. (3rd day) Hike into the privately owned Huemul Reserve up to the wonderful blue Laguna Azul and from there by Laguna Verde up to Laguna El Diablo, which is the farthest point of the trail from El Chalten. At the second half of the day, hike back from here directly to Ruta 23, and up Rio Blanco again, but on its eastern side this time until the Laguna Capri camp ground. (4th day) An easy hike down to El Chalten in the morning.
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8-hr (mostly easy) round trip from the town. There are outstanding views of the Mount Fitz Roy range along the way. The trail ends at the stunning cobalt-blue Laguna de los Tres, at the base of Mount Fitz Roy. The last 1.5 km of this hike are very steep and exposed to the elements and as a result some hikers choose to overnight at the nearby Campamento Poincenot prior to climbing the difficult last stretch however in good weather its no more than a hard slog uphill, in bad weather it would be very difficult perhaps even dangerous. A 500-m well-marked additional trail winds around to the left of Laguna de los Tres and leads to a spectacular, cliffside overview of Laguna Sucia, some 200 m below Laguna de los Tres. It is possible to shorten this walk somewhat by getting a transfer to Rio Electric (approx $18,000 as of 2026) and starting the walk from there, many walkers do this. A list of businesses offering transfers is available at the bus station.
6 hr easy round trip that leads to a lake at the base of the dramatic Cerro Torre, which, although only 3,100 m tall, was not summited until 1975, a generation after all the more than 8,000-m Himalayan peaks had been conquered. Cerro Torre's near vertical walls and a permanent, unstable ice veneer at its summit defeated all earlier attempts.
This is the easy way, referred by most packaged tour tourists, but you will not see much of the glacier, only its end. A boat trip combined with a glacier trek on the Lago Viedma and the adjacent Glacier Viedma. No longer possible due to the receding glacier as of November 2023.