Hola. What a start we have had to our South American adventures, if only I could understand a word of what anyone was saying! But fear not as thanks to some Spanish classes we will be attending this week I will be speaking like a local in no time (that is to say I will be speaking very quickly and I won't be smiling!). We have just arrived in the gorgeous sun blessed town of Bariloche in the lake district of Argentina. Our first view of the 50th biggest town in this country was formed as we arrived after a 13 hour bus ride into a very hazy looking evening with the promised panoramic views all but obliterated. Our initial concerns that the weather was taking a turn for the worst were eased as we were told that all was fine as the haze was being caused by the currently active volcano nearby. So nothing to worry about there then. We have only been here 3 nights but have already been in 2 hostels as our first one, Pudu, although being friendly wasn't the cleanest of establishments so we quickly found our way to Hostel 1004 which is fantastic! Sitting on their 10th floor balcony overlooking the lake with the mountains beyond bathed in sunshine I am looking back on our short but jam packed few weeks we have had in this continent.
Our flight from Sydney to Santiago was 16 hours with a 14 hour time difference, meaning we left Australia at 0900 on 3rd January and arrived in Chile at 1100 on 3rd January!! Suffice to say jet lag hit us like a powerful moss. However, thanks to some poor planning we had less than 2 days to take in the sights of Santiago before a 0430 flight to Argentina. We had to put our riduclous fatigue one side and explore the city. I'd like to say that we took in as much as she had to offer over those few days but aside from a walk through a beautiful park with fantastic views of the city and sampling a few cafes we did very little. Sleep was far too much of a draw for us. In fact my personal highlight of our time there had nothing to do with south America at all: Before we left Australia Matan, our Israeli travelling companion, gave us a present sent to him from his mum; packet mixes of latkes and falafels, which we enjoyed on both of our nights in Santiago. Delicious.
Still in the grips of fatigue we flew to Beunos Aires international airport, bussed it across the city to the domestic airport, and caught a plane down to El Calafate in Patagonia. In a way it was similar to the start of our Oz expedition as our first hostel there, Travellers Oasis in Cairnes, set the bar very high for the hostels to come and our first hostel here, America Del Sur, was up there with the best. We even extended our stay with them as the staff were so friendly and helpful and the atmosphere was excellent. On arrival at this hostel I was so tired I'm not even sure I could string a sentence together in English let alone in spanish, fortunately they were very patient and allowed us to just hit the sack. During our week in calafate we did one of the best activities we have done so far on our trip and I make no apologies as to how snap happy I got when we encountered the magnificent glacier, Perito Moreno. It dwarfed anything we saw in New Zealand both by size and beauty. We could have sat and stared at it all week. We were lucky enough to have booked an ice trekking tour on one of the few completely clear days which made it look even more impressive. We were witness to 40 metre blocks of ice crashing down into the water making almighty thundering sounds as they did so. Walking on the ice itself was an amazing experience with the glacier creaking and moaning all around us. We were even treated to a glass of whisky poured over ice chipped from the glacier itself. An incredible day.
Someone told us that jet lag lasts the same number of days as the number of time lines you have crossed. I'm not sure how true this is as it would mean 2 weeks of it for us, but tiredness was still following us round throughout the week. I can't say we helped ourselves much either as the day after our glacier expedition we took a day trip to the famous Patagonian National Park across the border in Chile, Torres Del Paine, with a 0500 start time (with the hostel very kindly laying on a free breakfast at that time just for us!). Unfortunately, due to some horrendous bush fires in the park most of the famous 'W' trek was closed off and so to see any of it a day trip had to be done. We were less lucky with the weather that day but our guide and the beauty of the park more than made up for the cloudy skies. We got back to our hostel at around 2200 and rather than heading to bed we stayed up drinking some very tasty Argentinian Malbec with a Parisian called Olivier and a Hullite (someone from Hull?!.. Hullean?!) called Jayne until around 3am when Jayne had to get her bus bound for the end of the world, Ushuaia. Safe to say, when we did finally hit the bunks we slept well
past breakfast and awoke in time for a late lunch. Our last day in El Calafate was a restful one of walking, wine drinking and card playing all with our Parisian ami. One last point of praise for our hostel and that is for their BBQ. For less than a tenner their magician of a chef would cook up a meat and vegetable, all you can eat feast which we gorged ourselves on on our last night. They even throw in a healthy helping of vino tinto. Beuno.
A short 4 hour bus to our next stop El Chalten, and we were in completely different climates yet again. During our first few days there it was bitterly cold with everyone walking round in their full winter gear, but no sooner had I dusted off my Mighty Quins hat, the sun had come out and we were all walking round in tshirts again. We spent a fantastic week in this tiny town, trekking our little legs off on 7 and 8 hour walks in blazing sunshine and galeforce winds to get to some of the most fantastic view points that Patagonia has to offer. As a reward to ourselves after each of these hard fought climbs we settled down for a vary tasty beer and some excellent grub in a friendly micro brewery called La Cervezeria. We also had an absolute touch of good luck on our first night when we checked into a phenomenally cramped 6 man dorm only to be told later that they had double booked and would have to upgrade us to a double room, which was larger than our dorm, in a luxury hotel down the road, with a free breakfast. Good times. Made even better knowing that had the couple who got there after us gone to complain to the reception instead of rudely removing all our belongings from the bed, they would be enjoying the luxury instead.
To get to our current destination we had to take 2 bus journeys of 12 and 13 hours respectively with a stop off in a small town called Perito Moreno. Very close to this town there is the attraction known as Cueva de Las Manos, the cave of hands, which displays rock art created by the earliest human societies of South America. In order to be able to take the time to see this amazing artwork we had to stay 3 nights at Hotel Belgrano. If you were happy to skip the caves, due to buses only running on certain days, you only had to endure 1 night in this place stuck in the 1960's (both decor, people and cleanliness). We ended up rather enjoying our trip back in time, once we got over the perpetual blocked drain smell in the bedroom. In fact we stumbled on a very well stocked bakery, and filled our boots. I can't say I was sorry to leave that town and the large, permanently angry looking Argentinian owner of the hotel but I'd recommend people going there for sheer fun of it! The cave of hands was beautiful and very interesting, marred slightly by a skeptical Australian lady (who said she wrote for the lonely planet, but we're not so sure!) who didn't believe that these paintings were the original, believing that they had been touched up to draw in more tourists. It's widely accepted that she is wrong!
We will be spending at least 10 days here in Bariloche, depending on how our spanish course goes and if we get get itchy feet or not. As yet, our route up through South America is still pretty undecided and so this next week or so will also be spent trying to balance seeing as much of this continent as we can with an increasingly tight budget! I can't wait.
I am currently waiting to see if the quins have made the knockout stages of the heineken cup after an uncharacteristic loss last night. I'm sure it is in the bag.