Day 4 was our final day at Calafante, a place that really struck a cord. we knew we needed to seize the day. it was a goal of ours to summit mt friase, the mountain behind the hotel. it was a mile or two to the top and about 2500 ft of vertical. It looked simple but we have learned that everything looks smaller in Patagonia… We headed out at 10:30am. I was weighed down with a full pack of water, wine, foul weather gear, and boxed lunch (plus gear: camera, gps etc). Katie of course looked great in her latest mountain trekking outfit. Most of the hike was off trail and rambling through the brush. This was a very different experience because we got to pick our path. we had to read the land and our bodies. We would traverse when we got tired and shoot towards the top when we felt good. of course there were moments where we had no choice but climbing stairs. eventually we made our way to the rancher’s road the wound its way around the peak. we followed that around the back of the mountain and came across a family of Guanacos, similar to Lama’s. they startled us about as much as we startled them. At that point we saw the road start heading down and we made the choose to summit. the final push was through a forest of weathered trees whose shapes spoke to the intense winter winds of the Patagonian winters. We rose over a hill and finally saw the valley floor before us. the views were worth the trek. We enjoyed a glass of wine at the summit and got to look down on the falcons circling the valley. the snow covered chilean peaks were in the distance. you couldn’t ask for a better backdrop. after a nice break at the top, we started our decent down the front face of the mountain. we had horse back riding scheduled at 2:30pm. half way down we took a quick break for lunch just above Eolo. We found a cover patch on the leeward side of a knoll where we probably would still be laying had it not been for the scheduled horse back ride. once back at the hotel we collected ourselves and headed out to the horses. It was nice having the horses carry us across the valley floor to a lagoon. I don’t think there was anything left in our legs.