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Published: August 7th 2007
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Cerro Fitzroy looking spanking
Murphys Law - it was fine on the day we left. The view from the bus was nice... Our latest journeys consist of a road trip along the ´Ruta 40´, a road that stretches up much of the Western edge of Argentina. The landscape is still Patagonian steppe (i.e. tussocky and dry), but you are tucked in a bit closer to the Andes and come across the odd glacial lake. Certainly more interesting than the tortured 40 hour bus ride around the coast!
The first stop was El Chalten, a tiny town, complete with dirt streets, random horses and stray dogs, perched on the very edge of the Hielo Sur (the southern Patagonian ice cap). The town seems to survive on the backpackers/climbers that detour out that way.
Both me and Ben were fighting some decent colds, but since we only had two days to play with, we thought we should haul our sorry arses up into the mountains in search of the elusive Fitzroy and Torre peaks. We were rewarded with a 5 second view of Cerro Torre, before the clouds boiled over it again. Watching Fiztroy was a bit like a peep show. The peak would show its bits every now and again, but retreated behind the clouds for most of the day, much to
our frustration.
I got the distinctive feeling we were being watched. On the way back, we found some fresh puma tracks in the snow. They say if you see a puma you are extremely lucky. The puma is extremely lucky too! Gulp. We hadn´t practised our puma scaring techniques (consisting mainly of jumping up and down, shouting and ´aggresively´ throwing stones), so we legged it back to the hostel quicksmart, before we saw the puma or it saw us! Thankfully, we never found out whether Ben´s reaction would be to push me in its path and run (as he is want to do with cows and other scary animals).
The next day was mostly on gravel, and mostly driving at a breakneck pace. Sitting in the back of the bus, I was somewhat alarmed to feel it fishtail down the road. It was a good few hours of skidding before I could peel my knuckles off the seat in front and relax a bit.
Our only stops were at random petrol stations in the middle of nowhere for the drivers to catch up with their mates and look at car stereos.
Later in the day, the
drivers offered to take us up to an archeological site to look at some hand paintings. They wanted an extra 50 pesos each (about 1000 pesos between those of us on the bus), supposedly for petrol. This was probably enough to drive us to Buenos Aires, so we kindly declined their generous offer. They seemed a little miffed. Maybe someone else would have to shout the beers that night.
We stopped in Perito Moreno, a strange town where most of the locals drive vehicles with blacked out windows, staring at us as they drove by at 20kph. The town is not very big, so the boy racer circuit is a little limited.
Our accomodation for the night seemed to be someone´s garage where they had put a few bunks and a couple of mattresses on the floor. Eight of us were squeezed in there and we were wondering what happened to the promised night in a ´hotel´. Still, we did a little better than a group of Irish travellers who were bundled into a ute and taken to some cousin´s house. The teenage sons were promptly booted out of bed, and by all accounts the Irish got a
Puma!
Those paws are as big as my hand spans (and I have rather large hands...) good night´s sleep and breakfast to boot.
The owner was really weird. He wouldn´t open the door for us and we only ever saw him climbing in and out of his window, never the front door. He had a weird obsession with keys and we had to return the room key if we wanted to go into town. During the night I heard him let himself into the kitchen area and take the key, while we were all sleeping upstairs! I was glad to get out of there!
The next day was another long day, but more interesting as we headed towards the mountains. Things started to get more green again.
Bariloche is a nice place to rest. We´ve done some biking, some walking and eaten loads of chocolate and icecream.
A month has gone by already. We are now trying to figure out how much we can see and do in our remaining few months! South America is so huge...
Next stop somewhere in Chile, I think.
Some more beauties from the lost in translation file:
Me asking a lovely young Mexican woman if she enjoyed old ladies (- in my defence,
the words for old lady and travelling are very similar)
Ben, explaining to said young Mexican that he was extremely good looking. No defence for that one, Im afraid.
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Andy G
non-member comment
Gringo and Gringa!!!
Thats a damned funny post - throughougly enjoyed it. Wicked photos too. Sounds like you guys have been having a coooooooool time. Keep up the blog effort!! Love big Bro