This Is Why I Remote Year: Patagonia Edition

On our first night in Patagonia, we walked from our hostel down to Argentino Lake, just in time to witness a stunning 9pm sunset. I was traveling with two fellow remotes, and we took a collective deep breath. It was Friday night, and the glaciers and mountains awaited us. Amy, usually the quietest of the three of us, announced "This is why I signed up for Remote Year."

Sunrise over Argentino Lake on my last day in Patagonia (also down the street from where we watched the sunset on the first night)

Throughout the rest of the trip, that sentiment popped back into my head many times: when I stomped around on a glacier made up of shades of blue I never knew existed... when we befriended a 20-year-old girl from Alabama in our hostel and ended up helping her ring in her 21st birthday over dinner that night... when we took a bus out to a tiny town populated by only 350 people year round to hike through some of the most gorgeous terrain I have ever seen... when I woke up for a run on my last morning and was rewarded by a sunrise so spectacular that I wanted a time machine just to Groundhogs Day-style go back and experience it over and over again (see photo above)... when I thought I had said goodbye to Amy and Annelise to go our separate ways for the remainder of the trip, only to run back into them at a cafe where we serendipitously got to spend another couple hours together...

As seen in El Chalten (350 person mountain town)

These are the experiences that pictures cannot capture and words cannot describe - and not for lack of trying (hence the giant run on sentence/paragraph above)!!! They're the reason I travel, and as Amy said it, the reason Remote Year was (is) so appealing. You never know what's going to happen, so you're regularly having invigorating new experiences that turn into lifelong memories.

Here's my favorite example of that from the Patagonia trip: You know how you can't have a rainbow without the rain? That was definitely the case when Amy and I visited the Perito Merino Glacier. We had a full day of glacier trekking planned, and it was a super cold and rainy morning, triggering terrible memories of when I got hypothermia as a teenager at a glacier beach in Alaska *shudders*. Halfway into the morning we were at the point of the tour that would be our only opportunity to get a photo in front of the glacier, so we started posing for pics (still gotta get the gram!) despite the rain.

The glacier mid-rainstorm - still pretty extraordinary

No joke, as Amy was taking my picture, the sun started to come out, causing us to break out in song ("Here Comes The Sun" - duh) and dance. It was only when we looked up from our sun celebrations that we saw the most unbelievable rainbow I have ever seen, giving whole new meaning to the rainbow after the rain.

NO WORDS

I'm not a talented photographer but this scene was pure absurdity. Some people who saw my Instagram post asked if I photoshopped the rainbow in... I'm definitely not that talented but it also definitely deserves that sort of skeptical reaction - like this rainbow was too good to be true/real... but it was real! You can't reeeeallly see from the photo, but there was actually a double rainbow going on here. What?!?! Ok. Ok. Deep breaths. Ok, I'm obviously still processing this magnificent once-in-a-lifetime experience.
Image result for its going to be ok gif

And that, mis amigos, is why I Remote Year. Thanks @Amy, as I'll now be saying that ad nauseam for the remainder of 2018.

Location: El Calafate, Santa Cruz Province, Argentina

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