"Life is what happens to you while you are busy making other plans"

(allt ì fìna) From Argentina - part I

Click here for a map of Patagonia:
It was a long busride from Pucón, Chile to San Martin de los Andes, Argentina. The driving was not the worst factor but the endless waiting for something or sometimes, apparently, nothing. The stops at the border were long and teadious...first at the Chilian border and then at the Argentinian border. On the bus i met Sarha and Caroline from Canada and as it was very hard to get accomodation in San Martin, we ended up finding a triple room together... and a pretty expensive one. We had a nice dinner... I had pizza with deer meat!!! and after a short stop at the local market we called it a day. The next day we went bike riding around Lago Lacar (photo above) or at least around half of it (riding 12 km. up a hill) and after a lunch break at the beach we took the ferry back to San Martin. After delivering the bikes we took the bus to Villa de Angostura and from there straight to Bariloche. Two pretty scary busrides. In the first, we had to have the windows open because the aircon. was broken (not unusual here) and there was dust everywere. The driver was trying to fix some box above his seat using boath hands driving at 80km an hour on a narrow road, and we almost drove into a horse. The next bus was a little overcrowded so I had to sit on a box in front of the bus that drove almost one hour in the dark without headlights!
Then we got to the hostal from hell...it seamed to be the only hostal available in Bariloche. It was like cut out of a Stephen King novel. I am almost sure that they filmed the horrior film "The Hostel" here. The owners were also very spooky. I only took one nioght there and found something else for the next night....took a long time and was about us$7 more expensive...but worth every penny!! The next day we chilled in Bariloche went down to the beach and watched a kitesurfing competition (photo below). Then we found a restaurant for snacks with a beautiful view of the lake. I also used this day to find a tour for the next day to Calafate with stops at Perito Moreno (the town...there is also a glacier by the same name) and El Chalten.
That night I said good buy to Sarah and Caroline and the next day I boarded the Route 40 bus heading for Calafate. Buses in Argentina are, as a rule, between one and three hours late and pretty used up with numerous cracks in the front window...this particular bus had 6 big cracks in the front window, the breaks were really dodgy, the oil was leaking and our driver had only slept 3 hours the night before. We sat in this bus for over 13 hours to Perito Moreno where we finally arrived at midnight only to find out that the hostel people had given up on us and there were no longer rooms for everyone. We had to wait while they found something else for us, some stayed with a family and even one guy had to sleep at the camping place. Up early the next morning for an excusion to Cueva de los manos a very nice drive to a very cool place. The Cueva De Los Manos or the Cave of Hands, is situated in a big canion and on the way we also saw lots of animals both domestic and wild. like Guanaco ,Armadillo, and ostrich. After the caves we drove on the last part about 6 hours to El Chaltén where I found my accomodation after a short walk in the dark with silhouettes of the huge cliffs hanging gostly over the town....(To be continued.)

posted by Nonni @ 3:29 e.h.