Category: Bike Touring

Well New Years wasn’t quite alone in a forest, but it wasn’t too far off. I was in a nice little riverside campsite, along with maybe 10 others. I had had a tough day on the bike, so although I could have joined them in the cabin, I ended up drinking some wine from the Tetrapak I was carrying, and falling asleep by 10pm. People talk about noisy Argentinian campsites, and I was a little worried about that, but it was no problem. I would have been too deeply asleep to notice anyway.

After Bariloche, I headed south in the wind and rain to Lago Steffen. This is a 10km dirt road detour off the main road. 4 of those 10km are very steep, with multiple switchbacks. I lost 400m in altitude, coming down to just below 600m. I think that this, combined with being more sheltered, made it feel warmer at the campsite. Still cold though – the temperature inside my tent dropped to 5 degrees overnight. It was a simple campsite, but with a shower block. There was a wood burner attached, that heated the water. There was no fire at first, but later someone lit it – lucky for me, because I didn’t think they would, since so few people were there. I was pretty grateful though, as I was too cold to face a cold shower.

In El Bolson, I stopped at the brewery, which has a campsite. Only one other person was camping, but plenty of locals were eating at the restaurant. Hot water, shelters, food, beer and Wifi – I was pretty happy.

More cold, wind and rain the next day, interspersed with hot sunshine, and some bad roads, made for a tough New Years Eve. New Years Day was a shorter day, but still a lot more climbing than I would have liked. At one stage I picked up a stray dog, that decided to follow me for 5km. It was mostly climbing, so it could keep up. Couldn’t seem to shake it, until I hit a long downhill. Kept trying to discourage it, because I didn’t want the skinny thing following me for miles, only to luck out on food.

Finally the sun came out for extended periods, as I rolled into Trevelin, a former Welsh colony. First time in short sleeves for weeks. Nice easy day too, and a nice hostel – Casa Verde.

I was planning a quiet night, but some others encouraged me to go out. At first we sat by the main plaza/roundabout watching the same cars go by again and again. Turns out there’s not a lot happening in this town of 5-10,000. It has one bar, the “San Patricio Irish Pub” which would be the least Irish Irish pub I’ve ever seen. The only Irish thing was the green curtains.

The problem of course is that Argentinians don’t go out until quite late – we got there at 1:30, but it didn’t pick up until at least 2am. I have no idea where all these people were the rest of the night, but they were still going strong at 5am when we pulled the plug. A note to others going to this pub – do not order the “Cuban Mojiti” – rather than use fresh mint, they appeared to have used toothpaste for flavour. We’re not sure what was in the “destornallido” either, but it was strong. Another note is that you should be wary of places that let you pour your own vodka mix. Perhaps we should have done what the locals did, and stuck to beer.

So today was spent recovering, and wandering about this town. Odd place, with fair Welsh-looking people speaking Spanish. It’s also interesting seeing the places with immaculately groomed and watered lawns, something you don’t often see here. It rains a lot, but the dry winds seem to strip the moisture rapidly.

Tomorrow I will head back to Chile, to join the famed Carretera Austral. Not sure what communications will be like for the next week or so. Will update the blog, and add photos when possible.

I’m sitting in “San Carlos de Bariloche” – or just Bariloche for short – trying to work out what I should do for New Years Eve. I’m planning to leave here tomorrow, and head to El Bolson, an old hippy community about 125km south. It will take me two days to get there, so I should arrive on the 30th. If I don’t stop there for a rest day, then New Years Eve will almost certainly be camped somewhere in a forest, by myself. Again. I need to decide now, because places are getting fully booked now, and it looks like there is going to be a LOT of camping coming up, because that will be the only place I’ll be able to get.

Christmas was spent alone though, so it won’t make much difference if I do the same for New Years. Probably wouldn’t be the best idea to ride out of town on New Years Day anyway. At the time I’m leaving, people will just be getting into the swing of the party. So I’ll keep riding, even if it’s only short days.

I left San Martin on Christmas Day, through eerily empty streets. Around the lake the good road was deserted, but then as I began a long climb up a gentle gradient, I was surprised at the number of vehicles passing me. Cars, trucks, carrying/towing boats, old American-style pick-up trucks with 10 niños (kids) in the back, all sorts. I couldn’t work out where they were all going – don’t they know it’s Christmas?

At the top of the pass was “Arroyo Partido” – it doesn’t look like much, but it’s where a small river splits in two. Yes Lindsay, that’s boring, who cares. Well it turns out that one branch of the river ultimately flows to the Atlantic, while the other flows to the Pacific. I think that’s pretty cool. So I stopped there for a while, reading in the sunshine.

Later in the day, I finally worked out where everyone was going – they were all parked next to Lago Falkner, or its neighbour, Lago Villarino. There was a large field beside Villarino, and I was concerned about the clouds that were coming in, so I decided to stop and camp there, with all the Argentinian day campers. You see, although a place looks very busy during the day, they almost all leave at night, leaving you in peace. There were a couple of British cyclists there, who were just packing up. They’d been having the day off, but felt they should probably do some exercise, so were going to push on 20 or so km down the road, before the rain hit. I’ll probably catch up with them again soon.

I thought I’d done well with my tent site, behind a little bit of shelter from the rising wind, not far from some small clean creeks that ran across the field. But then as various vehicles left, and drove close to my tent, I started getting concerned, because there was a bit of standing water left where the vehicles had passed, and the rain was about to start. Suddenly I realised that I could be in trouble if ground water levels started rising, as my tent handles wind and rain, but not groundwater. It was too late to move though, so it was a nervous night huddled in the tent, listening to the wind and rain.

Boxing Day brought more rain, but luckily there were breaks in it. First time I’ve had to get all the wet weather gear out, and I needed it. During a break in the rain, I packed up my tent, and got moving. The tarmac ended after a kilometre, and then I had gravel roads, that they’ve been working on for several years. Roads being worked on can be even harder than un-maintained roads, but these were generally in quite ridable condition. Based on their progress, I think it will be a few more years before it’s all paved though. Some bits are ready for paving, other parts still need some massive earthworks. Beautiful area though.

I had planned on camping, but I was cold, wet and tired, so I wimped out, and got a dorm bed in a hostel at Villa La Angostura. Central heating, very nice. I got confused trying to follow my GPS to the hostel location though – it was saying there was a road in this direction, and to head up that road…but all I could see was a little dirt track. Turned out that was the road though. It’s like Romania here – the main road through town is paved, but nothing off it.

Yesterday I had an easy 60km, with a strong wind behind me, and I was just cruising. Couldn’t last though – I hit a 90° junction, and now the wind was trying to knock me over onto the now busy road. Struggled through the last 20km, and was grateful to make it to my hostel, “41 Below“, run by a Kiwi here. Nice place too, I would recommend it. Safe, warm, quiet, but very central. Cool people here too.

Just been mucking around this morning, getting a few chores done, trying to track down a few items I need. I’ve also gotten a haircut. Low maintenance, number 3 all over. Next time I’ll go shorter though I think. Should cut down on the amount of soap I need to carry. Now if only I could track down some White Gas aka Bencina Blanca…

Oh and before I forget, does anyone know why the Argentinian car fleet is a weird mix of mostly new, and a few quite old vehicles? There’s not much from say 80s, early 90s, but there are quite a few old Ford Falcons and Renaults from the 70s, and a few crappy old Minis. Something odd about it, there’s no progression to the ages. Must be a reason for it.

The problem with random conversations with cyclists, is that you can end up different things to what you planned. So it was, and so it is that I am now in Argentina, several weeks earlier than I had thought I would first visit. I had planned on staying in Chile a while longer, but after chatting with another cyclist, I decided to head to Argentina from Villaricca.

I headed down to Lican Ray, then around the lake to Conaripe. Herr Meyer struck again here – my high school German managed to get me free lunch. I was picking up some supplies from the supermercado, when a local came and started chatting to me. He had been born here, but his parents were from Munich, and so he spoke German. There is a strong German influence in Chile, which you can see in the houses, some names, and the beer. Anyway, he took me to a local bakery, where he seems to have an account, and bought me an empanada. These are a pastry turnover, with different fillings – e.g. cheese, mince, etc. I’d been pretty disappointed with them in the past, as they were quite lacking in substance, but this was a proper one, filled with good quality ingredients. He told me a bit about the place and people, and sent me on my way, not letting me pay for anything.

From Conaripe, the pavement ended, and the ripio (gravel roads) began. A big slog up a hill, then a very steep descent down to a Termas. The Termas Conaripe is a fancy place, with expensive hotel rooms…but right next to it is the “Eco Termas Pellaifa” which is a bit more basic. Camping sites, 3 pools (cool, warm, warmer), bathrooms, etc. Plenty of other people there when I arrived,but they were only day camping. So by evening, I was the only one there. A bargain at $6USD for the campsite and access to the pools. I would have just liked to relax in the pools, but a Mapuche girl wanted to practice her English. Oddly enough, you are generally left alone by Chilenos, completely different to China, where people are always interested in you. I could have done with the rest, but it was good to chat, to learn a bit more about the place, and hopefully improve the image of tourists.

Next day was tough, taking a little used road towards Puerto Fuy. Some sections were extremely steep, with very loose gravel. In 20km, I saw about 5 vehicles. At the top, a guy in a ute asked if I wanted a lift – a bit late! On the way up to Puerto Fuy, I passed the Montana Magica Lodge. Surrounded by forest, up a gravel road, is this enormous wooden hotel. Looks like the sort of place that very rich celebrities go to when they want to “rough it” in a 5-star hotel in the middle of nowhere.

From Puerto Fuy, there is a ferry across Lake Pirihueico to Puerto Pirihueico. There is a very rough track around the lake, but the 90 minute ferry along the long, narrow lake is a better option. I had no idea what the timetable was, but figured I could always stay in Puerto Fuy if need be. But luck was with me, and somehow I managed to roll onto the boat 2 minutes before the 14:00 sailing. Turns out that the current timetable is 14:00 Fuy -> Pirihueico, and 16:00 return. In Janurary and February, it runs at 8:00, 13:00 and 18:00, returning 2 hours later. If I’d been just a little slower, I would have had a whole day to kill in the tiny town of Puerto Fuy.

At the other side, it’s about 11km to the border, so I decided to camp for the night. I thought I had a perfectly good little spot, hidden from the road, didn’t appear to have been anyone else around for a few weeks…and then after I’d set up a guy came past with a couple of cows. He didn’t seem to care though.

At the Chilean customs the next morning, the place was deserted. They are supposed to be open, but they know that there were no ferries due for hours. After a bit of waiting, I eventually went and woke some people up, and they stamped me out. Just as well I did get them to, as on the Argentinian side they checked my exit stamp.

A pretty long, very slow climb on the Argentinian side. At least the road surface improved dramatically, from loose stones, to a hard, reasonably smooth surface. But it was slow going, exacerbated by the fact I was very low on food, and there was nowhere open selling food until my destination. I was pretty happy when I reached the highest point (1040m), because then I knew I could reach San Martin de Los Andes, and food wouldn’t be a problem.

This is a very upmarket kind of place, and a big change to the villages on the Chilean side. It’s too expensive to stay long, but I will stay 3 nights, so that I will be here on Christmas Eve (Christmas Day NZ time). I’ll then ride out on Christmas Day, heading towards Bariloche. Looks like New Years Eve is going to be in the middle of nowhere too…