Driving in Argentina

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Friends and family,

I am waiting for some photos from the fishing trip on Monday and Tuesday, so I thought I would fill you in on driving herein Argentina. I feel safe in doing that now that we have returned the rental car without incident.

First the roads, most of them are gravel. The major highways are paved and most of the streets in the middle of town. However everything else is gravel, from the secondary roads that connect towns to the neighborhood streets. Additionally, most of the bridges, except on the major routes, are one lane and often wooden. The rule about how you cross such bridges is similar to intersections, see below.

It being summer, this is road construction season. Unlike the states with long waits for construction traffic as one lane creeps past, here you are simply warned to slow down and then you weave in and out between the construction vehicles. At one bridge, one lane of course, a series of cables were being moved from one side of the road to the other. The workers stopped us, one stood up on the bridge guard rail and held the cables as high as he could, another on the other side hoisted them up on a large broom, and we were carefully guided under the cables.

All of these roads, paved or not, are traveled by large buses that are the major form of public transportation--and are excellent. Even the smallest cluster of homes out in remote areas are served by buses and Bariloche has buses going everywhere all day long. We have taken them three times and they are on time and dependable. (Though the lady next to us crossed herself every time the bus passed a bicycle.)

Now to driving, it is not for the feint of heart and rule follows need not apply. Lets start with the speed limit, the reason they post it so seldom is that it is a waste of sign material. And the most futile job iN the country is painting double yellow lines on the road. There seems to be a kind of Darwinian natural selection process going on with the highways, as there is a total lack of what we know of as highway patrol cars. The idea being that if you let people drive like idiots the worst offenders will soon no longer be in the gene pool.

And that brings us to intersections. Almost all of them, from out in the country to the middle of cities, have NO traffic lights or signs indicating who yields to whom. John, who enjoys the free-for-all at every corner describes them as round abouts without any rules on entry or exit--or, think of four way stops as four way 'gos'. And this does apply in major cities. Bariloche, for example, is a city of 50,000 people, 10,000 dogs, and 3 (count 'em) stop lights. So how to get through? There are some unwritten rules...first to the intersection counts, as does keeping the traffic flow, you do not stop if everyone else is going through with you. More importantly, size matters. This is a place where motorcycles find no virtue in being obnoxious as buses and trucks take the right of way, period (if you challenge that, refer to gene pool rule above). My strategy has been to use sheilds when I decide to cross. That is, if I can cross beside a bus it works. But the best shields are grandmotherly types with shopping bags, mothers with strollers, or attractive women on tight jeans.

Finally, a word about the stop sign. As it was explained to us, the word "pare" on the red octagon does not really mean stop. Rather, it refers to an attitude. One might consider stopping here, if there was a reason...such as a bus crossing in front of you or a dog taking a nap in the road (more on dogs in another post).

Wait, I almost forgot stop lights. When they do exist, the provide those of you who want to be first away from the light with an ingenious count down system. Either there is a box displaying how many seconds until the light changes or stays green or, when it is about to turn green, you get a red and yellow combination...sort of like a drag strip light bar. But even iN the most remote out of the way places, with absolutely no traffic, everyone obeys the traffic lights. Clearly the gene pool strategy is working.

Having said all that, I also need to say that the system works. Traffic moves and we have not seen an accident. Even when I stumbled half heartedly into an intersection when I could not see around a bus, the on coming driver did not honk but rather waved me on through with a gesture that said "allow me to help you." You have to love this place.

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Photos

A small road
Who needs bridges when you can drive through the water?