San Carlos de Bariloche to Esquel

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I start with an apology for the delay since my last post. The reason, for those who don't know will be revealed in the next few posts, but as I have been encouraged to continue with my blog up until the fateful day, I shall.

San Carlos de Bariloche was not in fact closed at all. Come the late afternoon when I decided to go for a walk it was open for business. Being a Sunday this was perhaps unusual but San Carlos de Bariloche was a tourist town and they were clearly out for your dollar. The Swiss influence did not extend just to chocolate but to skiing and San Carlos de Bariloche is a popular destination for the Argentines.

One of out group thought Prince Charles had visited many moons ago - PD - pre-Diana. This possibilty did not seem to far fetched as we all agreed he loved to ski and San Carlos de Bariloche was at the western edge of the Welsh influence on Argentinian Patagonia and he could of been on a Royal visit of some sort becuase of that Welsh connection and just called in. I am not entirely convinced though, as if Prince Charles had visited PD that would of meant he would of had to have come in the early 1980's which seems unlikley given the Falklands conflict.

Most of the shops were either selling chocolate or ski wear and the smell of chocolate was quite amazing. The town itself had an aire of wealth (& chocolate) about it and fronted Lago Nahuelhuapi and was quite lovely. I found a bank and took out some Argentina Pesos. I had brought some with me but as we would be in Argentina for several days altogether it needed more.

Kevin, our tour leader, had recommened a place to eat, which was not too far away, but we had to be there at 8 pm to get a seat. No reservations, you just turn up, grab a seat and eat. It was that kind of place and extremely popular. It was an Argentina steak house. I had previously had an introduction to South American steaks in Chile but this took the art form to another level. I left my camera behind but managed to snap a pic on my phone but cannot seem to upload it for you to appreicate to size of the steaks.

I had a simple "Lomo", which I suppose is a bit like a sirlion steak. It was far from being the largets available, but it must have been 2 inches thick and about 10 inches long ! Some staeks were 3 times the size !! As in Chile if you order steak that is what you get - nothing else, so we all ordered salad and fries as recommended. What we were not expecting were these were also of gangantuan proportions. Why the waiter didn't raise an eyebrow I don't know but each side portion of salad and fries could of fed at least 4 hungrey bikers ! Most of it got left untouched - even by me !

Kalok, one of our party, celebrated her birthday that day. Kevin had sneaked out and bought her chocolate cake from one of the many chocolate shops in town. A waffle thin mint it was not. We each got a slice, sang happy birthday and felt obliged to eat, what in fact was a delicious cake. Thank God the hotel was downhill and we could all roll home!

Monday 19 March

The next day the route initally took us out of town along the lake front before a short 9 kms detour on gravel before joining the main, tarmaced, road south. The weather was horrid. It was raining, cold and misty. The gravel section was not very pleasant because the rain made it greasy and my non-misting visor kept misting up !

The weather soon improved though and it turned into a lovely summer's day and quite warm with it too. There is some confusion, well certainly in my mind as to what road we were actually on. Not that I was lost I knew where I was but not, and to this day I'm still not sure, the name of the road. All the indications were we were riding south on Argentina's famous Ruta 40. This is the main north/south road across Argentine Patagonia and perhaps the Argentine equivilent to Chile's Caretera Austral. Ruta 40 is mainly gravel, although there are large sections that have been laid to tarmac and there is a project to modernise the whole road but my map had the road marked as Ruta 258 with a gravel section of Ruta 40 running further east. It is perhaps all a bit acedemic but to be able to claim to have ridden Ruta 40, or at least part of it, is one of those boexes adventure bikers like to tick. Could I tick that box ? I don't know.

The route south was great, whatever the bloody road was called and reminded me once more of what I imaged the American west would be like - cowboy country. It was superb, especially as we now had the weather to go with it.

Lunch time saw us ride into the town of El Bolson, which to be frank had absolutely nothing of note to recommend it, except perhaps a petrol station and somewhere to eat. I, along with Nick, were one of the first to pull in and get fuelled up so it was down to Nick & I to find somewhere decent to eat. There was no obligaton to do so it is just natural that if we stopped somewhere our fellow bikers would join us. I applied the advice Ron Ayres had given me some 10 days eariler and stopped at a place we could see the bikes parked outside of.

It was nothing special but sold coffee and fresh made sandwiches - and chocolate! The team rolled up in dribs and draps and we had a well earnt break. A local pulled up and parked his little motorbike next to ours. I cannot now remember the make & model of the bike but it had seen better days. The rear tyre was completely bald and you could see the canvas !

I was keen to take the detour off road just past the village of Epuyen, about 60 kms south of El Bolson on Ruta 71. I had asked Kevin about it the night before and he said it wasn't that spectacular and we would have plenty of gravel to come. At El Bolson Kevin asked me if I still wanted to go that way and I and half a dozen of the others all did.

At the turn off though the road was tarmac, which I later learnt from Kevin it wasn't last year. Initially I was joined by John and Theresa. John was a geologist and Thersea a doctor and I had struck up friendship with them as they were early arrivers at Osorno and we decided we would go on regardless. I sped ahead to lie in wait for them in the hope of getting a good photo as they rode past but they nerver showed. I knew John and Theresa were looking to ride off orad and I assumed they didn't think after all the long detour was worthwhile if the road had now been tarmaced, so I carried on along.

After about 30 kms I came to the small village of Cholila. Apart from the modern buildings it looked all the world as if it was straight out of a western. Cholila's claim to fame was Butch Cassidy & the Sundance Kid were meant to have holed up here for a short time. I think there is alot of speculation across South America about where Butch Cassidy & the Sundance Kid actually were and I think they were finally gunned down in Bolvia. I suspect there are plenty of places like Cholila that lay claim to an association but whether they did ever visit Cholila or not it was quite a thrill to think they might of. Certainly Cholila gave the impression it was the sort of place the two fugitives would of been at home had they visited.

The route out of Cholila was far from clear and as I was sat scratching my head John, Theresa and a few of the other who had said back at El Bolson they would come this way turned up. They had stopped a short way back and asked for directions from a local so I jumped back on my bike and followed the crowd. John & Theresa clearly had not turned back but had found a bit of gravel to practice on and I had obviously given up on them too early.

We were soon on to gravel and the road wound it's way up into the hills and towards Los Alerces Noational Park. After about 10 kms we entered the National Park and the road ran south of Lago Ravadavia and Lago Futalafquen for about 40 -50 kms before we rejoined the tarmac. The road was not at all difficult but in places the pot holes and the "wash boards" slowed you down. The "wash board" were series of short ridges, close together caused by heavy trucks/ The trucks break and concertina the gravel into ridges and as you rode over them it felt like you were riding over a wash board. The trick was to turn of the bike's traction control off as the wash boards tricked the bike into thinking it was losing traction and you would suddenly lose power as the bike tried to re-gain grip. Standing on the foot pegs also made the ride more comfortable as well as making the bike easier to handle. Kevin's advice was also to leave the ABS on and turn the left wing mirror up so you can use it when stood up. These two tricks were something I had not been taught on my off road course before I came out. Usually you turn the ABS off when going off road but Kevin's reasoning was if you panic and grab the break with ABS off the front will lock up and you could drop the bike. The mirror trick was useful because locals would speed past in great big 4x4 pick-ups, expecting you to move over. It would be a good thing to see them coming! Given there was nothing Kevin didn't know about riding in these sorts of conditions I did exactly what he suggested.

The last 5kms or so was a beautiful twisty road which eventually lead into the town of Esquel, our destination for the evening.

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