A day trip to the Perito Moreno glacier, Argentina.
A must-do detour to see one of the most stunning glaciers in the world.
I came back to Argentina in March 2025, after having visited the country for six weeks in 2023. This is the third article of the series. We started our trip by hiking the Tierra del Fuego National Park near Ushuaia, then flew to El Calafate to hike in El Chaltén. Coming back, before flying out of El Calafate to Iguazú to see the famous falls, we detoured to the Perito Moreno glacier.
When I think of glaciers, my mind usually goes to Glacier National Park in the US, with its amazing expands of ice, far away in the mountains. I never thought I could see a glacier so big, so overwhelmingly beautiful and yet so close I felt I could almost reach out and touch it.
Such is the magic of the Perito Moreno glacier, in the Parque Nacional Los Glaciares, in Argentinian Patagonia.
First, a few numbers: the Perito Moreno spans 97 square miles and is 19 miles long. At its bottom, it is 3.1 miles wide, with a height of about 240 ft above water level. Most of the ice sits within Argentinian borders and is fed by the Southern Patagonian Ice Field, which represents the world’s third largest reserve of fresh water.
The Perito Moreno glacier seen from the coastal path.
The glacier was christened Perito Moreno in homage of Francisco “Perito” Moreno, an Argentinian explorer who successfully helped Argentina claim a lot of Patagonia as national territory against Chile. A national park (distinct from the glacier) is also named after him.
It would be hard to argue that this beautiful Argentinian landscape is an undiscovered gem. As a matter of fact, it is one of the most visited sites in Patagonia. However, most tourists there are Argentinian nationals, and while international tourism is on the rise, especially from Asia, it isn’t yet at a level that would disqualify this beautiful glacier from being featured on this blog.
What makes the Perito Moreno glacier so unique is how close you can get to it on foot.
You will see tour buses. You will see guides. You will also marvel at the overall park signage and organization that helps make your journey enjoyable. It won’t be as remote as the Tierra del Fuego National Park, but there are many ways to enjoy the park on your own.
We arrived in a rental car, a little later than planned – I wish I could say this was my idea, but in fact I waited in line at the Hertz counter for a long time. It seems like I wasn’t the only one thinking I’d be renting a car at 9am to get to the glacier.
A closer view at the Perito Moreno glacier.
On the bright side, this meant we arrived at the glacier after most of the tourists (some of them were on their way out already) and, having purchased the National Park Annual Pass (more info in the Practical Information section below), we didn’t have to queue to buy a park entrance ticket. There were still four buses worth of people lining up to buy passes, and it would have taken at least thirty minutes to get through.
What makes the Perito Moreno glacier so unique is how close you can get to it on foot. There are four main footbridges along the shore of Lago Argentino that allow you to get various vistas of the glacier and its wall. Along the way, you can see the glacier from above or from below its peak, and from the west or the east, giving you ample opportunities to marvel at its incredible size. I am not sure what’s most impressive, from the incredible landscape to the bright blue color of the ice, to the feeling of being so little in front of such a massive work of nature, but it was, for all of us, one of the highlights of this Argentina trip.
We spent about two hours wandering around the various paths, even stopping for lunch (the cafeteria, in the main park building, gets very crowded around lunchtime, which I knew from 2023, so we brought our own sandwiches).
The Perito Moreno glacier is one of the fastest moving glaciers in the world. It is estimated that it advances about 6 feet a day. This means a lot of ice calving happens on a daily basis, and it is very likely you will see one or several calving events during your visit.
Ice calving from the Perito Moreno glacier's central section.
I don’t need to tell you they are impressive to witness. We were actually seated on a bench in a viewing area when a big one happened, but many smaller ones occurred before and after that. It’s mesmerizing (and slightly scary).
It’s also important to know that the glacier has only recently started receding. It’s hard to pinpoint the exact reasons why, but of course global warming is seen as a possible culprit.
After having walked all the paths (a full review of them is below in the Practical Information section), we made our way back to the car park and slowly drove back to El Calafate (the road within the park is quite winding). The next morning, we would take two domestic flights to reach Puerto Iguazú, our next destination.
Practical information (updated as of April 2025)
Getting to the Perito Moreno glacier
- Getting to the Perito Moreno glacier from the US: El Calafate airport (FTE) is the closest airport to the glacier, and basically only exists to cater to tourists going to El Chaltén or the Perito Moreno. There are no direct flights to El Calafate from the US, and very few international flights, to Chile, in the high season. Aerolineas Argentinas, the country’s flag carrier, flies to El Calafate from several airports, including Buenos Aires Ezeiza airport, where all US flights arrive. It also offers flights from other cities including Ushuaia (USH) which can be useful if, like us, El Calafate is one stop of many in the country. Low cost airlines JetSmart and FlyBondi also operate to El Calafate from Buenos Aires. Check Google Flights to see what flights are available the day you’d like to travel. We had to work our itinerary around the flights, since there wasn’t a daily Ushuaia-El Calafate service.
- Getting from El Calafate airport to the Perito Moreno glacier: two options exist to get you there, understanding there is no accommodation in the park, so you’ll most likely spend the night in El Calafate. The trip from town lasts about 90 minutes, along beautiful Patagonian scenery.
o Option A) Book a tour to the glacier. There are many options to pick from. The town lives for tourism, most of it to the Perito Moreno, so its tourist infrastructure is a well-oiled machine. The pros: you get picked up from your accommodation, everything is taken care of for you, you just have to get off the bus to pay the park’s entrance fee (more on this below). The cons: you depend on the bus schedule, both in terms of when to leave to the glacier, and how much time you have there to enjoy it.
o Option B) Rent a car for the day. The pros: you have the flexibility to go at your own pace, can leave to the glacier whenever you want, and spend as much time as you need there. The cons: it may be more expensive for one or two travelers versus a tour, and the car rental offices get very busy every morning when tons of travelers come get cars to go to the park.
o I booked a tour in 2023, and decided to rent a car in 2025. I preferred the latter, for the flexibility it offered, especially because we all had an annual National Park pass and didn’t need to wait in line with all the tour bus groups to get entrance tickets. I would recommend this option.
o Note: if you’re really traveling on a shoestring, you may try to hitch hike your way to the park. We saw people do it, so it can be done. I can’t tell how long it would take however.
- Entering the park: the Parque Nacional Los Glaciares covers a vast area that also includes most hikes around El Chaltén, 2h30 to the north. Unfortunately, unless you buy an annual pass, the entry fees for each region of the park are charged independently. This means that if you buy a 7-day pass for the park to hike in El Chaltén, you cannot use, say, six days of the pass in El Chaltén and one day in the southern part of the park to see the Perito Moreno glacier.
- The park is open from 8am to 8pm during the summer (with the last entry being allowed at 6pm). The entrance fee itself is ARS45,000 per person for one day, however if you purchase 3 days at once, it will only cost you ARS90,000 (and ARS157,500 for a 7-day pass). Given you can see the glacier in all its glory in a day, it makes little sense to buy more than a one-day access pass, unless of course you’re planning to stay in Argentina for a bit and visit other parks: in that case, an annual pass for all Argentinian national parks can make sense, and is available for sale for ARS225,000 (we did this). Information and latest prices (in Spanish) here.
- Parking very near the glacier is impossible, except for some tour buses that can drop off and pick up passengers there. If you’re coming in a car, you’ll be directed to a big car park from which you can either take a free, 5-minute shuttle to the park’s visitor center, near the central viewing area of the glacier (see below info about the various paths you can walk), or walk on the blue trail, which is a great introduction to the glacier and offers really nice views of its northern side.
A review of the footbridges in the Perito Moreno glacier area
There are four paths that allow you a close look at the glacier from different vantage points:
- The yellow path, or paseo central, is the one that is closest to the park’s visitor center, allows the best overall view of the glacier and of its rupture zone, where ice calving is more frequent, and is, as a result, very crowded. The tour groups stop there. The official photographers are there. People who don’t have a lot of time go there. In other words, walk the path, enjoy the view, but don’t spend too much time on it. There are many other views and much less crowded footbridges for you to discover.
- The green path, paseo del bosque, is a trail that passes through the forest to get you to the red path described below. It doesn’t offer many views of the glacier but is useful to get to the less crowded red path.
- The red path (paseo inferior), built on the southern side of the glacier, brings you below the glacier’s summit line, and therefore offers you an interesting perspective on the ice, as well as a super close look at it. It has many viewpoints and far less people, and is an excellent way to get away from the crowds to have a more intimate glacier experience. I would suggest you start there and walk your way back to the yellow path.
- Finally, the blue path (paseo de la costa) is a path that links the central viewing area (yellow path) to the parking lot, built a mile or so away from the glacier. Don’t neglect this path. Most tourists opt to get to the visitor center via the free shuttle bus, but if you walk down towards the water from the car park, past the bus stop, you will end up at the entrance of the blue path. About a mile long, it will bring you to the center of the action, allowing you beautiful views of the northern side of the glacier, which you can only see very well from this path. It is a lot less crowded than the yellow path, so you can enjoy the views or take pictures in -relative- tranquility.
Safety
- The US State Department labels Argentina as a level 1 country, meaning “Exercise normal precautions” when you travel. In fact, Austral Patagonia is extremely safe, probably due to its location at the end of the world. My only advice would be to use common sense, but I have never felt remotely unsafe while in or near El Calafate.
Photos from top to bottom showcase the Perito Moreno glacier from various viewpoints. Some were taken with a Canon EOS50 and some with an iPhone 15 ProMax, which can explain some of the color differences.
All photos are mine.