El Bolsón

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Hola Amigos Locos!

As promised, I am trying to keep on top of my travel blogs, so I am writing the El Bolsón entry straight after my Bariloche one. This is much shorter, as I only had 3 nights in El Bolsón, and I was a bit tired from all the trekking in Bariloche and knew there was more trekking to come in El Chalten, so I chilled out for 3 days in El Bolsón doing all the necessary things like laundry, e-mailing and planning where I was heading to next!

There are 3 random facts you should know about El Bolsón:
1. They have a Skype boycott. It is a small town, but has a good few internet cafés, and none of them allow you to use Skype. There are big signs up either just giving you a general message, ´No Skype´, nice, simple and easy to understand. Or you have the more threatening, ´There is no Skype here. Do not download, we will know´, not so nice and just a bit weird! Some of the stricter places (I found myself in such a place) have a little man who is clearly a member of the Skype Gestapo patrolling the aisles wearing a bumbag and staring at the screen to make sure no-one is sneakily trying to use Skype. And the thing is, I reckon it´s pretty easy to spot someone using Skype, I mean, they will be talking at the computer screen, so the Skype Gestapo have a really easy job! And I don´t know what the relevance of the bumbag is. Maybe they give you an on-the-spot fine or something.
2. They don´t wash socks. Not generally, that would be a very sweeping statement of the people of El Bolsón. But I went to 2 laundries, and neither of them would wash my socks! It wasn´t a personal attack on the state of my socks, although I had been wearing them to trek around Bariloche so they were fairly sweaty, but they had signs up there with a picture of a sock and a big cross through it! These people love their signs! So I spent an afternoon handwashing all my sweaty trekking socks, lovely.
3. They have the best jam in the world. Every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday, there is a market in El Bolsón where you can get non-tacky crafts and the best food! And the hostel I was in had some of the home-made jams for breakfast. By far the best jam I have ever had, better than anything in the UK I´ve tasted. All it needed was a good, English cup of tea...

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Comments

[Tania]

Hippies Can Be Strange
No Skype allowed or sock washing? I know hippies have a hatred for wearing socks, but I didn't know it extended to washing other people's socks for a living. Strange indeed!