Volcan Lanin

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Many apologies for my laziness; I am now foregoing exploring leafy Palermo to belatedly write this. It might be short!

My last day of spanish lessons was the best yet - a wander around Bariloche taking in museums (one suprisingly interesting given it´s modest initial impressions, one closed!) and a coffee, one of my favoutite pasttimes in the town. The lesson was good because we just chatted and it was great to finally put some of the grammar into practice. Having delayed leaving for a day in order to have a last hurrah paragliding off Cerro Otto, I was pretty disappointed to miss out because of the whims of "paper,scissor,stone" (I lost and ended up on the second flight) and a building breeze at the landing site which made it too difficult. I did get one last view of the lakes at least!

The early morning bus to San Martin de los Andes did not raise many expectations; it was not the "7 lakes route" - supposedly beautiful, but whose timings did not work out. Perhaps because of this I spent the entire journey glued to the window, marvelling at the crisp silver mist sitting just above the surface of Lago Nahuel Huapi and later the river at the bottom of the valley we were driving up. Spectacular patagonian scenery slid past; the lakeside service station was the most charismatic I´ve ever been too! Jumping off the bus early in Junin de los Andes because it was closer to Volcan Lanin, I found myself in a small village on a sleepy sunday afternoon. I took advantage of the universally practised siesta to spend a pleasant afternoon reading, paddling and snoozing on the banks of a New Forest-esque river.

I then hired a mountain bike and cycled 70km to the foot of Volcan Lanin in Parque National Lanin. The saddle was not very comfortable by the end! The route was amazing, very little used by cars but I passed several farmers on horseback, eagles and hawks sitting on the fenceposts metres from me, condors soaring overhead. After camping out under the stars, I woke early and registered to climb. The volcano is almost perfectly conical, meaning a steep climb! Four distinct sections (forest; myriads of dry meltwater runoff streams on a rocky plain; the "fishbone" ridge; the "muletrack") got steeper, slippier, steeper and it was with no small amount of pleasure that refugio RIM finally appeared around the corner. I pushed on up to Refugio CAJA, as high as I was allowed to go unguided, for lunch with a view and then dropped down again for a quick chat with the soldiers manning the military RIM refuge. With an eye on the return cycle to Junin I was determined to enjoy the descent, but to keep moving. Sliding, almost skiing, down the loose scree and finding it much more fun than going up (and previous descents which are not normally my favourite) I didn´t dare tell the group I passed at the bottom of the Muletrack how hard it had been to climb, and how much further thay had to go!

The cycle back was only just perceptibly downhill, but it made for a significantly quicker and more pleasurable ride (and allowed me to coast along standing on the peddles - phew). Passing classic trout streams for 3 hours I decided what to have for supper, but first had the habitual dip - a natural water-park ride down the rapids of my now favourite river back in Junin (I was later shown how to do it properly by the local kids).

The San Martin de los Andes was slightly underwhelming, but was the start point for the 7 lakes route and the completion of my loop back to Bariloche. A striking contrast to the road up we wound through narrow, twisty, unpaved roads, driver managing to stay on the road one-handed while drinking mate (a kind of tea, drunk incessantly and with carefully observed ceremony), chatting and pointing out the view. I counted 10 lakes, with 3 more signposted less than 2 kilometres away and wondered why they undersold themselves!

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