Dream Trip 2009

Great Travel Moment

I was on my way from El Calafate, Argentina to El Chalten, a tiny town inside the Parque Nacional los Glaciares, when I snapped this shot. On a map, the two towns appear close, but with only a circuitous dirt road to connect them, it's a long, bumpy ride. I remember emerging from the Jeep (and most other vehicles in Patagonia, for that matter) coated from head to toe in a thin layer of dust that seemed to stay with me for days on end. This trip, a week and a half in Patagonia with friends from a Buenos Aires study abroad program, was the first time that I had to navigate my way around a foreign place without a safety net (i.e. my parents). It was in this beautiful, desolate place that I first learned to rely on myself and developed a love for the open road.