Beautiful Bariloche

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Are we in Slovenia, Swiss Alps or Lake Tahoe? I am hearing more German being spoken and there are chocolate shops on every other block. The homes are made of logs or have split timber siding. However, lots of Spanish is being spoken and there are plenty of parillas to get your carne fix. Must be Bariloche! The ride here from Mendoza was overnight, 17 hours and tiring. Most of it was high altiplano and desolate. Then, miracously in the last 50 miles, the lakes and snow capped mountains appeared. This is the beginning of the Patagonia region. We are staying in a little hotel about a 10 minute walk to the civic center. The hotel sits right on the lake with a view of the snow capped mountains on the other side of the lake. We also took a bus out to Llao Llao hotel about 30 minutes from town which was in a pretty setting. It kind of reminded me of the hotel in the movie/book “The Shining” but with the lake. However, we never saw Jack Nicholson come around any corner saying “Here’s Johnny!” This area is all about the natural setting with plenty of hiking, skiing in the winter and beauty.

We have spent three weeks in Argentina including the bustling Buenos Aires, the sub tropic Pt Iguazu with its magnificent falls, the colonial city of Salta in the altiplano, the vineyards of Mendoza set against the snow capped Andes, and Bariloche of the lakes region of Patagonia. This trip has been one where we have seen wide variety of landscape and weather. We have also covered a lot of distance and Argentina still extends over a thousand miles south of here. In the last three weeks, we have also ate a lot medialunas and dulce de leche for breakfast, and probably had more beef and wine (well maybe not wine) than we have had in the last year. As poorly as we did in Buenos Aires, I know we have danced our last tango!

We now leave for the lake crossing to Pt Varas. It is a bus-boat-bus-boat-bus-boat-bus trip through the lakes with several snow capped volcanos.

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Comments

[buxcador]

Nicest towns missed
Bariloche environment is beautiful, but not the city. The jewel city of Patagonia is San Martin de los Andes, or maybe Villa La Angostura (both lake cities near of Bariloche). Sad that not many tourists know that. They also misses the beautiful forest-cities on the coast of Buenos Aires: Costa del Este (not to be confused with Punta del Este on Uruguay), Valeria del Mar, Mar de las Pampas, Cariló. These are cities made in the forest, at the beach. Trees are protected to the point that some houses are built around the trees. Holes are made on floors and roofs to avoid interference with trees, and houses have no fences, making possible to walk between gardens (not all the cities allow walking between gardens).