Blue Lagoon and Patagon

The sun rose over the hill at 7.40 and streamed into our ground floor room.  It looks deceptively warm and calm, but our Full Paine excursion has been postponed until tomorrow because of forecast winds which may abate later and ensure that the boat trip can proceed tomorrow.
We found the restaurant for breakfast, (B&G the trip reminded us of Malta as we had to walk from block to block);  the selection was very good (just under top notch).
We walked back tour room outside in the warm sunshine; donned our boots and put all the cold and wet weather gear in our rucksacks and met Carlos who was our guide for the morning excursion at the very acceptable time of 9:15.  We were joined by Val from Sydney, whilst her companion Pat had a one to one excursion elsewhere.
The morning was most enjoyable with short car trips and walks in between, allowing us to see lots of wildlife, such as Condors, circling for their kill, Guamacos (not llamas as we thought yesterday) a grey fox, ibis and a black chested buzzard eagle.  We saw flamingos from a distance and upland Magellan geese.  On the ground was mother in law's cushion (looks lovely but is prickly) and a red flowered Neneomacho.  The Guamacos were having territorial fights in places.  We walked the shore of the blue lagoon and saw the ibis close up.  On the way back to the Hotel we stopped at the waterfall on the Rio Paine.

We returned at 12:30 for some hot chocolate, uploaded our photos and then had a leisurely lunch, beautifully served in the restaurant before our next trip at 15:00


!5:00 we met Ricardo our guide and were joined by Pat, while Val "chilled out" for the afternoon.
We were driven out to the start of our 7km hike via a neolithic cave "Patagon" ending up at the largest lake in the area, Sarmieneto.  Walking was fairly easy to start, but there was a climb up to the cave. Plenty of stops to take pictures of the scenery, get up close to the wildlife and view the carcasses left by the elusive Pumas, who were not coming out to play.
There were still paintings, with paint made from berries and animal oils visible in the caves.
In the distance it was just possible to see the Patagonian ice field, which we hope to get a closer view of in a few days time at El Califate.
  We saw long tailed meadowlark, grey sparrow, austral thrush,  collared sparrow and a few hares.  On the way back we stopped at the side of the road to watch the rheas feeding.  The weather so far has been gloriously sunny, with a very variable wind which can appear suddenly out of nowhere and knock you sideways!
Back to Hotel by 19:30 where we had a refreshing drink and confirmed tomorrows "Full Paine" excursion and ordered our packed lunches from Carlos.  Not being hungry enough for a full restaurant meal it was into the bar to blog and snack (with just a little wine of course).