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El Calafate is a little village in Patagonia, Argentina. It is situated in the southern border of Lake Argentino, in the southwest part of the Santa Cruz Province, about 320 km northwest of Rio Gallegos.
Its name comes from a little bush with yellow flowers very common in Patagonia, with dark blue berries: the calafate; the word comes from the word calafate, which is Spanish for caulk.
El Calafate is an important tourist destination as the hub to visit different parts of the Los Glaciares National Park, including the Perito Moreno Glacier (one of the most visited in the world) and the Cerro Chalten and Cerro Torre.
 HISTORY OF EL CALAFATE
The history of El Calafate began in the first decades of the twentieth century. Originally, it was just a place of shelter for wool traders. It was officially founded in 1927 by the government of Argentina to promote an increase in its population. But it was not until the creation of the national park that the little village, already with electrical power, started to grow slowly, and better roads were built to reach it.
TRANSPORT
The 220 kilometers separating Calafate from El Chalten on the other side of the Lake Argentino in the national park are paved, as well as the 315 kilometres to Rio Gallegos.
Other distances are: to Esquel 1108 km (mostly dirt road); Comodoro Rivadavia 959 km; Puerto Madryn 1388 km; Buenos Aires 2727 km; Ushuaia 863 km and in Chile - Puerto Natales 362 km and Punta Arenas 605 km.
The town is served by El Calafate International Airport (IATA: FTE, ICAO: SAWA) located some 20 km east of the village. Opened in 2001 it has daily flights to Buenos Aires and Trelew. The airport has a 2,200 meters long, 45 meters wide runway that permits Boeing 727 and 737 to serve the area.
EL CALAFATE TRIVIA
The gliding altitude record of 50,699 feet (15,453 m) was set near El Calafate on 30th August 2006 by Steve Fossett and Einar Enevoldson in their 'Perlan' high altitude research glider. This record is pending certification by the Federation Aeronautique Internationale.
From Wikipedia, the Free Encycopedia
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