Ruta Nacional 40 & El Bolsón

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Heading out of El Chaltén we hit the road about 10am for what we expected to be about a 500km driving day on a mixture of pavement and gravel roads, mostly the latter. A nice surprise met us as returned to Ruta 40 with the pavement extending 50km further than was marked on our maps - off to a good start! With the uneven gravel returning, we slowed down and waved to several groups of motorcyclists en route (we've seen so many groups of people making the pilgrimage down to Ushuaia, mostly on motorbikes, about a hundred on bicycles and some even on foot!!!!)
A close call with our petrol supply helped us learn some more Spanish to ensure our gas station attendants would always fill the tank to its absolute maximum! (Chilean fuel would give us about 500km/40L tank whereas Argentine fuel surprised us wit only about 400kms!) But onwards we went and with far more paved roads than expected we ended up covering 800km in 8.5hrs of driving and reached the sheep shearing town of Rio Mayo for a sleepover.
Heading further north the next day we began reading the guidebook recommendations for Bariloche and it's surrounding area of national parks in the lakes district. We stumbled across a lovely description of the little hippie town of El Bolsón and decided to take a pit stop there instead of straight to Bariloche itself. It proved to be lovely with a campground for us to relax in the evening sunshine before another gourmet concoction on the camp stove for dinner. The following morning we headed to the artisan handicraft markets that hosts 300 stalls all containing handmade goods, food and drinks. We snapped up a few more souvenirs and enjoyed the local specialties: chocolate, waffles with dulce de leche, empanadas and microbrewery beer. Then it was back on the road again to roll into Bariloche mid afternoon.

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