haven said:
The best location for condors I've visited is in Patagonia, along the road from El Calafate to the Perito Moreno glacier in Los Glacieres National Park.
The road runs through miles of grassy scrublands used as sheep pastures. When a sheep meets its demise, the condors come flying in from many miles away. I counted 16 condors on the ground around a carcass, with more flying in.
Andean Condors are more than 4 feet tall when standing on the ground, with impressive claws and powerful beaks. So Doug's advice about keeping a respectful distance is wise.
El Calafate has a new airport with regular service from Buenos Aires, so it's within reach even if you don't drive the 1800 miles south from the capital.
Chip Haven
There are a couple of places that looked like they could be potential candidates for camping along the road leading from town to the glacier. Look at the access roads leading down to the river on each side of the major bridge about 2/3s of the way in. One side will have a big pump and fill hose for water trucks. Don't use that side.
[Note that the glacier is NOT Perito Moreno National Park. That park is noth of the glacier and is a "must see" destination. Perito Moreno National Park gets about 800 visitors a year and is the experiential opposite of the Perito Moreno Glacier, which gets about 80,000 visitors a year. And most of those 80,000 come on the morning tour busses on the day of your visit.
The only other non-ranger person we saw at Perito Moreno National Park was a guy in a compact car who showed up at the end of the 120 km road leading to the check in station looking for the glacier. Bad day for him. ]
Overnight camping is officially not OK inside the Perito Moreno Glacier park. During the high season (January to February) you will probably get chased out by the very nice and professional rangers.
We were at the Perito Moreno Glacier in the late shoulder season, so we were able to park/camp overnight in the upper parking lot above the glacier.
We just stayed down at the glacier shooting until the sun set. When we came back up the restaurant was closed, all the tour busses were gone and so were the rangers. We moved the rig over into the corner and listened to the booms of the glacier calving icebergs all night. See the post on this thread "How Big is Big" for details.
An incredibly friendly ranger very nicely asked me to move the rig to the middle of the lot in the morning so the busses could park along the rail.
I do not think that strategy will work during the busy months.
You will need to bring all of your trash back into town. There are pullouts with dumpsters at the outskirts of town.
There are several options for camping in town. We used the police association campground behind the fire station, it's a couple of blocks from downtown. There is a municipal campground a little farther from downtown, directly north down the road opposite the fire station.
There is an LP/propane bottle exchange facility. We did not use it. The guy on the dock there was the only unfriendly and unhelpful person we met in Argentina.
There are lots of ATMs. You will need them.
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El Calafate is the most overpriced town I have ever been to, and I've been around a little bit. The community aspiration model is Vail/Aspen/Insert the name of the highest end European resort town you can think of here. Bring money.
El Calafate has the slowest internet connection speeds in Patagonia, and that is saying something in the land of molassas speed connectivity. In general, it is not even worth spending the time to try and connect. An entire day to attempt to make a single post is common.
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