Patagonia: Welsh Nostalgia Arises While Traversing Glaciers

The day-night cycle of this country is definitely problematic. Even though it is freezing cold during winter in June and the day breaks later in the morning, driving along Route 40 at 9 a.m. feels like being on a night bus where you can barely see your hand when reaching out the window. At 9:30 a.m., the sun lazily climbs up above the horizon, casting a pink halo on the roadside. Abandoned chapels, forsaken waterwheels, a lake tinted pink by the halo and a drooping flag— the sceneries outside the window gradually come into view, only to be swiftly replaced by the desolate wilderness cloaked in darkness.

It's my winter journey in 2016. The bus has left the southern town and is still far away from its destination in the north. As it is about to enter a dull world, why not, I figured, that I open my laptop and enjoy a film called "Patagonia" (2010), which features a similar landscape, during my long journey?

The initial settlers of this southern wilderness were Welsh immigrants. In the film, an old Argentinian lady named Cerys, who is the descendant of these settlers, visits her motherland, Wales, before passing away. The farmstead of yesteryears is now submerged beneath a lake. A Welsh photographer, accompanied by his girlfriend, travels to Patagonia to capture the traces of these pioneer immigrants, particularly windmills and chapels. However, in a moment of folly, his partner engages in a one-night stand with a local Gaucho guide. Their relationship becomes strained and the estranged couple coincidentally arrives at a small desolate town in the north called Cholila.

In real history, Cholila is the very place where the infamous characters of the Wild West – an American burglary gang consisting of Butch Cassidy, Sundance Kid, and his girlfriend Etta Place, decide to turn over a new leaf and recultivate the land for farming. Their legendary story was adapted into a seminal New Hollywood film titled "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" as early as 1969. Robert Redford, who portrayed the Sundance Kid, went on to establish the renowned independent film festival in Utah, known as the "Sundance Film Festival," using his character's name.

The film “Patagonia” opens with a broadcast in Welsh accompanied by an intertitle with Spanish captions. It mentions the tea clipper "Mimosa" carrying 153 Welsh settlers from Liverpool to Argentina in May 1865. After providing the broader historical context, the narrative gracefully transitions to the stories of individual characters’ journeys across the sea. It becomes evident that this is a film about the realization and loss of nostalgia. In reality, the Welsh people still have lingering ties with Y Wladfa—the Argentinian settlement in Patagonia they sought and intermittently built 150 years ago.

In the 19th century, due to relatively infertile lands and low wages for laborers in the western part of the British Isles, the Welsh people began to venture abroad. A nationalistic missionary called Michael D. Jones was distressed by the rapid assimilation they faced after surveying the settlements of his compatriots in North America. Therefore, he sought a frontier in the New World that would help preserve the Welsh language and culture by accommodating a significant number of immigrants.

Coincidentally, Argentina, a nation that achieved independence recently, urgently needed to cultivate its vast southern wilderness so it actively sought to attract new immigrants. Jones and the Argentinian government reached an agreement, designating 260 square kilometers of land in the southern central part of the country along the Chubut River near the Pacific Ocean side as a settlement for the incoming Welsh agricultural immigrants.

Time passed with the flow of the River. Some departed in disappointment, but more villagers arrived. Some elements of language, culture, architectural styles and festivals were preserved, while the majority of them, from marriage to daily customs, had long been seamlessly integrated with those of the indigenous people and larger mass of European immigrants. They became one with the Gauchos who were hunters or farmers on the Pampas grasslands and Patagonian highlands, much like Cerys’ family, and the photographer’s guide in the film “Patagonia”.

Six generations have passed. According to estimates by Cardiff University, there are now approximately 5,000 people in the Patagonia region who can speak Welsh. And they have persisted with hosting the annual National Eisteddfod of Wales, a cultural festival that includes poetry, proverbs, literary translations, music performances, folk dances, photography exhibitions, and short film screenings.

The place I visited first was a small town called El Chaltén. It was just after the winter solstice in the Southern Hemisphere and the town presented its most desolate and quiet state during "off-season". Only three to four hotels, two restaurants, an outdoor equipment store, a supermarket, and a children's clothing store were open on multiple streets. The buildings appeared as if they were assembled from various precast concrete blocks, yet they could withstand the powerful winds that nearly swept pedestrians into the air like plastic bags. In such circumstances, it was rare to encounter people on the streets, let alone hear them speak Welsh.

Take a few-kilometer hike into the mountainous area, and you will find a landscape reminiscent of the Scottish Highlands or Welsh marshes. Dry, yellow grass sprawled crazily between piles of rocks and skeletal trees. While the arrangement of its mountain ranges may not rival Scotland’s, there are unique, translucent ice blue glaciers that set it apart from Scotland. I embarked on a 10-kilometer one-way hike, and although the slope of the mountain path was not steep, a layer of puffy ice cream-shaped clouds hung in the sky. I knew behind those beautiful clouds, an angry ice storm was likely brewing.

As expected, as I approached the peak that resembles a ski slope, Patagonia showed its true colors. First came a sudden downpour, followed by wind gusts exceeding force 10. Struggling up the rocky slope, I caught glimpses of the ice lake and glaciers in the distance. Just then, a hurricane of a high category slammed across, fiercely defending its territory and preventing any living being from advancing further.

I once thought that El Chaltén, where I went for a day trip, was the same town of Cholila that the photographer and his girlfriend visited in the film. It was only after checking Google Maps these days that I realized how far off I was. In the movie, Cholila is located in the northern part of Patagonia's Chubut province, the designated settlement for Welsh farming immigrants. On the other hand, El Chaltén, where I went for outdoor experiences, is in the centre of Santa Cruz province, a major tourism hub in Argentina that boasts some of the world's most magnificent glaciers. That’s right, both towns are part of the Patagonian region, and the provinces they belong to are adjacent to each other. However, in the vast expanse of Argentina, the road distance between them is a whopping 1,258 kilometers, with a travel time of nearly 17 hours!

So, let's put aside "Patagonia" – the film that kept me company during the long bus journey – and the Welsh immigrants in its story. Underfoot is Santa Cruz, the province with the lowest population density (1.4/km²) in all of Argentina, meaning that visitors can easily be engulfed by its vast landscapes. Programs by the National Geographic and BBC's documentary "Patagonia: Earth's Secret Paradise" are destined to be more appealing to tourists than narrative films about the stories of Welsh immigrants.

After escaping the harsh weather in El Chaltén and returning to the more tourist-friendly city of El Calafate, one has the opportunity to approach the glaciers via various modes of transportation and angles. Sailing on the largest freshwater lake in the country, Argentino Lake provides proximity to the Upsala Glacier, which is approximately three times the size of Buenos Aires. From the water’s surface, the part of the glacier that extends into the lake resembles a frozen, colossal tongue. If one is fortunate enough to follow a scientific expedition team on an aerial inspection, he or she would witness three silvery blue crystalline rivers. And a small section of the wooden walkway in the Glacier National Park allows for a frontal view of the most aesthetically pleasing Perito Moreno Glacier.

The Upsala Glacier is rapidly retreating, which is a stark confirmation of global warming. The lost crystals seem to have found their way to the Moreno Glacier, which advances at a remarkable rate of two meters per day and is strangely active. In the presence of the Perito Moreno Glacier, even the most cheerful and playful tourists tend to quiet down to listen attentively to every fracture sound during glacial sedimentation. Moving closer, chunks of ice often break off and fall on the front of the viewing platforms. It is akin to a slot machine in a casino: the rewards look promising, but the actual gains are disappointing .