LAGO ARGENTINO

Thanks to the kindness of Quensel, I am able to give some details of his interesting and perilous voyagings on Lago Argentino. This big lake has the typical Andine character; its western branches run far into the mountains and receive extensive glaciers from the inland ice. Quensel went on horseback to the end of the south arm and to Lago Frio, but in order to continue his work to the most westerly part he had to take to the water. There was in Cattle’s farm an old canvas boat, rather dilapidated but still usable, of the same pattern used by us on Lago Belgrano. Here follows Quensel’s narrative:

“At sunrise on January 13 (1908) we finally got away, after having waited two days on the shore for calm weather. From the very first moment Æolus was not very gracious to us. A surface like a mirror and a blazing sun encouraged us to set out on the lake, but we had just gone so far that it was too late to turn back when the first black line appeared announcing a gale of wind, closely followed by a white line of foam, and the water was flung more than thirty or forty feet into the air. To pull against one of these squalls was impossible, and the best thing to do would have been to land, but often there were steep cliffs all round and the only chance was to turn the stern against the sea, which threatened to crush the small, heavily laden boat. But Pagels had not sailed round the globe for nothing; his skill served us in good stead, and everything turned out all right, though more than once we had a narrow escape.

“Our first destination was the Bismarck Glacier in the Southern Arm, which we reached in two days. Half-way we had met some big icebergs and were prepared for what was to come. They measured about a hundred feet above the water. The glacier in question was first visited and described by Professor Hauthal, and is of special interest. From the inland ice it protrudes more than a mile out into the water; the height of its front wall, crowned by innumerable pillars and needles of pure ice, varies between sixty and a hundred feet. In front of it was a broad belt of drift-ice, but we navigated carefully through the ‘pack,’ which gives the branch its name, Brazo de los Témpanos.

“We camped on the south side of the glacier and spent the following days in studying the ice. What makes the Bismarck Glacier so remarkable is that, in contrast to all other glaciers in South Patagonia that I have seen, it is advancing rather rapidly. Without exception the others withdraw, sometimes indeed so fast that the vegetation is not able to follow, so that there is a sharp limit where the ice stood before. But this one forces its way through the high forest on both sides, crushing everything in its way; I saw trees, still green, that had been knocked down by the ice, and under the very edge shrubs still alive peeped forth. We were able to reach the southern end of this fiord. I walked on foot to Lago Frio and climbed a mountain. Below, in a southerly direction, was Lago Dickson nestling among green woods; in the west were Mount Stokes and the glaciers from the inland cover, the largest dividing into two branches, one extending to Lago Dickson, the other to Lago Frio. Thus I stood on the water-parting between Lago Argentino and the Payne region, between the Atlantic and the Pacific—the water from one and the same glacier seeking such different ways.

“We left the southern fiord in order to get into the northern. The entrance is narrow, but inside it widens into quite a system of inlets, of which different maps give different ideas. A narrow gap called Hell Gate is the entrance; outside we waited one day before we could venture in, and late in the afternoon of January 31 we got through. Everything indicated that we should have a calm night, so we resolved to row as long as we could. Hour after hour passed. Above in the twilight hung the tremendous cliffs, sometimes as high as 3000 feet; in the half-light summer night we could just make out the few places where we could seek refuge in case of a sudden storm. At midnight the moon rose, the larger icebergs shone with a ghostly glimmer, their fantastic outlines assuming the most marvellous shapes. With frequent changes we made good speed. We knew that the storm was only gathering its strength, and our object must be to take advantage of every minute. At 3 A.M. we caught sight of a big glacier glowing with a certain peculiar light as if it were luminous. Nothing is more difficult than to judge the distance to a glacier or an iceberg in the darkness. One believes oneself to be close to a piece of ice, or even turns aside to avoid a collision—and there is half an hour’s pull to it!

“At dawn we landed on a low promontory, where the fiord divides into three branches, each of them ending in a glacier. Large masses of ice were adrift here—one could very well imagine one was in a polar country. The next day we wanted to pull into the southern branch. Tired as we were after the strenuous night, we overslept ourselves, and the sun was high when we were ready for a fresh start. The clouds had begun to chase each other across the sky, portending wind. Hastily we loaded the boat and set out, but in a couple of hours the first gust came, and a strong swell from the bottom of the inlet showed us that it was blowing hard in there already. We followed the eastern shore; it was steep and inaccessible, and a heavy sea broke on the rocks. There was no time for long consultations. We chose a place where a shelf ran out into the water, pulled to it, and I jumped ashore ready to hold the boat. It was an anxious moment. Up to my knees in water, I managed to hold it; pots and pans and sleeping-bags, cameras and haunches of venison were hurled up on to the shelf. We bore our craft out of reach of the waves and were safe. But not a moment too soon, for five minutes later we should not have been able to land there.

“We had now time to examine our refuge more closely. The small ledge was overgrown with shrubs; above rose a precipitous wall. The ten square yards served our purpose, and with the teapot and the frying-pan over the fire we spent a comfortable night in our prison. We tried again the next day, but in vain, and I resolved to go back and devote my energies to the north glacier and the big mountains round it. At nightfall two days later we landed on a beach with high forest in the background and a row of large icefloes outside. The glacier itself was hidden by a promontory. The following night we had a most remarkable experience, that might have had very serious consequences. As usual we had pulled our boat high up on the shore, sixty feet from the water and ten or twelve feet above the level of the lake. Wishing to get away at sunrise, we went to bed early. At dawn I was roused by Pagels, who stood in the tent door, ripping out with a fine flow of strong language: ‘Himmel! Herrgott! Sakrament! Donnerwetter noch ein Mal!’ it came without a pause. I sprang up to see what had happened, supposing that a fox had made off with some of our geese, a trick Mr. Reynard had played us before. But the sight I beheld drove me to complete Pagel’s morning prayer in fluent Swedish. The broad strip of beach where we had landed had disappeared, innumerable small icefloes floated round almost to our tent; our boat was gone—on the spot where it had been left a small, deep blue iceberg was aground. Where was the boat? What had happened? How were we to reach human habitations again? These questions whirled through my brain at the very first moment. To two of them there was no answer—what about the last? The future looked dark enough—a march of four or five days across the unknown Alps north of the lake was not a very encouraging prospect. But we had good luck. We found the boat 800 yards further down, stuck fast between two huge blocks. And later we learnt the explanation of the catastrophe. In front of the glacier was a barrier about three miles long and one and a half broad; large icebergs were piled on each other, and the interstices were filled up with smaller pieces of ice. It looked like a field of screw-ice in the Arctic sea. We understood that the glacier had discharged all this ice during the night; it dammed up the inlet, making the water in the narrow place rise nearly fourteen feet. Gradually it recovered its usual level. The gigantic glacier with the ice-barrier presented a splendid sight. I have called it the Upsala Glacier; it is the largest I have seen in Patagonia, the front wall attaining a length of not less than eight or nine miles. The wall was a hundred feet high, more or less. On the flanks magnificent granite mountains rose; in the background there was a marked depression, for ‘Ventisquero Upsala’ comes directly from the inland ice. During an excursion on foot up in a side valley I gained my northernmost point. With regret I had to go back and commence my return journey. The boat being heavier than ever, we had an adventurous run through Hell Gate. Pagels ran before the wind as far as he could, and I had my hands full baling with my hat, the most capacious baler I could find.”

After two days Quensel was back in Cattle’s farm, and from there went to Ultima Esperanza, whence he made a trip to the Balmaceda Channel. His arrival in Punta Arenas, where he joined the rest of the expedition, has already been related.