The glacier town — Perito Moreno's crackling ice walls, southern Patagonia lamb asado, and the last frontier before the Patagonian ice fields
El Calafate is a small tourist town on Lago Argentino in Argentine Patagonia, existing almost entirely as the gateway to Perito Moreno Glacier — one of the most dramatic and accessible glaciers in the world, a moving wall of blue-white ice 5km wide and 60 metres tall that calves house-sized icebergs with explosive cracks audible from the viewing boardwalks. El Calafate is also the jumping-off point for the Los Glaciares National Park trek and the more remote El Chaltén climbing base for Fitz Roy. The local culinary signature is cordero patagónico (Patagonian lamb) slow-roasted on a cross over…
El Calafate was founded in 1927 as a rest stop on the route to the remote estancias of southern Patagonia — named after the calafate berry (Berberis microphylla) that grows wild throughout the Patagonian steppe. Argentine legend says whoever eats the calafate berry will always return to Patagonia. The town remained a tiny estancia settlement until the 1990s when ecotourism infrastructure developed around Perito Moreno Glacier, which was designated part of Los Glaciares UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1981. El Calafate now receives over 700,000 visitors per year despite having a permanent popula…