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Published: June 21st 2007
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We left Buenos Aires on the 21st on Aerolineas Argentina on a flight to Rio Grande (10:30 am - 2:30pm) we actually arrived at our accommodation at 11:45pm that night. Why you ask? Well the plane which because we are tourists we pay double - broke down and had to land at Trelew in the middle of nowhere. The 3-4hr wait turned into 7 and we were a little annoyed. Nothing to do in the airport except eat overpriced food and wait not knowing what was going on. They flew down their engineers who quietly fixed the problems and flew off into the night while the Argentinean passengers began to get really vocal.
When we got to Rio Grande there was snow, and it was bloody cold. I had to rethink my clothing options while we waited outside in the freezing conditions for a taxi for 1/2 an hour. Rio Grande doesn’t have much so I won’t elaborate except when I was writing the northern Brazil blogs outside it was -15 degrees Celsius with wind-chill factor. A bit different from Townsvilles 35+ Temp. We got a bus the day after down to Ushuaia, the southern most city in the
world, for some long awaited glaciers and skiing.
The first day we got up a bit late from our hostel and decided to hike 6-8km up to the Glacier Martial, not far from town. The hike is really beautiful and we stopped on the way to use our newly purchased stove on the way up the mountain. It was snowing which was surreal and I hadn’t experienced it since I was a kid. When we got to the top there is a ski slope and a chairlift that takes you to the top for $20 pesos or $8AUD for a day, absolute bargain.
It was 3:15pm and we had just got off the chairlift and had a 1km hike uphill to see the glacier. We had an hour and fifteen before the last run of the day when we would have to walk down the mountain. We made a dash for it. We crossed a few bridges and then the path disappeared. We only knew the general direction of the glacier and it appeared to be up and over the edge of the mountain ( a few hundred metre climb @ 35-50 degrees) the snow was already getting
deep, 2-3 foot at times. Lisa was well out of her comfort zome I could tell but I thought I´d see how she´d go.
We had no snow pants on or boots just our quick-dry pants and thermals, powering up the mountain. We made it 2/3 of the way up when Lisa was exhausted, to her credit though she was still coming but time wasn´t on her side. She needed encouragement so I in my Asics runners went back down to motivate her. Now remember that movie where they slip on the ice and start sliding down the hill? Well I did just that, heading straight for Lisa for 10m until I could spin myself around and dig in. Any chance I had of convincing her of taming this hill went when I went sliding. She wanted off that hill and did not want look down let alone walk back down the couple of hundred metres. We walked carefully down, the safest route and at one point Lisa´s leg fell through the snow and she could not feel the ground. She let out a deafning scream and I went over and pulled her out. We continued to run our way
down the hill getting to the chairlift with 2 minutes to spare. Lisa shaking and both of us cold and wet, the mountain had won this time.
The next day we went back up the hill to try snowboarding. It cost $59 Pesos to hire the boots and board or $30AUD and $15 peso taxi ride. This would be the cheapest snowboarding in the world I think. We didn´t need the lift pass yet as we were just learning today and we hit the training slope. We took a couple of hard hits that day and when we woke we were in a world of pain. Hiking in the national park was all we could do this day up to the Chilean border. The day after we paid even less and hired ski´s and it was back up the hill to the training slope. By the end of the day I had her stopping and changing direction and hopefully by the next ski town she´ll take on the slopes.
From Ushuaia we left Argentina for Punta Arenas in Chile, then the next day to where I am this minute at 5pm on the 1/7/07 in Puerto Natales ready
to leave for 4 days of hiking in Torres del Paine National Park Chile look here http://www.overland-sodexho.cl/
I should be back by thursday night Friday your time with more pics more stories and frostbite, cause its bloody cold here. Time to shop for provisions.
Take care all.
Jeff
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