Backpacking near Fitz Roy

Laguna las Tres and Fitz Roy

We've been having trouble posting to the blog from our phones, finally hoping this post from a week and a half ago works this time...

Can you say we got lucky with the weather at Monte Fitz Roy? We absolutely could not have asked for a better two days for backpacking in the northern part of Glaciares National Park. 

We started our backpacking trip late in the afternoon on the 30th and camped at a backcountry campground just before the ascent to Lagunas Los Tres (pictured above). After we hiked to Lagunas Los Tres the next morning, we continued up Cerro Madsen, for which we had gotten a permit the day before. It's not a technical climb, but it did involve some rock scrambling and snow. It was a challenge but got us away from the crowds. We only saw/talked to a handful of other people who climbed Madsen that day - among them a guy on skis!

Hiking up Cerro Madsen

We didn't quite go to the top, but we found a spot to eat lunch with an outstanding view of Fitz Roy. We could even see some mountaineers descending on a glacier in the distance. 

View of Fitz Roy from Cerro Madsen

After our descent we packed up our camp at 5:30pm and headed over to a campground in another valley - the Alaskan way - frantically doing as much as possible while there is both daylight and good weather! We rolled into the campground around 9pm but were treated to a mostly empty trail and stunning views of Cerro Torre. We were certainly glad we went for the evening camp move because this morning Torre was socked in. I felt guilty that we had such luck as we passed hundreds of people hiking in. 

Cerro Torre