26 del Febrero - Pucon
Pucon is a town in Chile that has a lake with a black sand beach, natural thermal baths, and an active volcano that you can hike to the top of. Hiking the volcano sounds like it would be extremely challenging, because it is steep and a far distance to the top (8 to 10 hours round trip). The top of the volcano is covered in snow, so you have to wear cramp-ons and use an ice pick to climb to the top in the snow. There are dangerous sulfur gases coming out of the volcano, so you have to wear a gas mask at the top, but you can look into the volcano and see the lava flowing inside. In retrospect, it`s probably best that we didn´t end up going there, but we were excited about it because it sounded like an experience that we might never encounter again.
After we left El Bolson, we split up with Pete and Rachel to go to Pucon while they made their way to Mendoza. We got on a bus to a small town just outside of Pucon (7 hours away by bus) called Junin Del Los Andes. The bus ride from El Bolson to Junin De Los Andes was beautiful. It looked like Canyonland in Utah, with strange formations of rock all around and beautiful silver and green rivers running beside the road. The evening air was cool and the orange light on the mountains and rivers made the surrounding sights very scenic.
We had our first sketchy experience traveling here in Argentina. We admit that we have become very comfortable in Argentina and we have let our guard down quite a bit. We arrived in this little town (Junin De Los Andes) at 9pm without any knowledge of the place and we figured that we could get into a cab and ask the driver to take us to one of the hostels listed in our guidebook. We have done this before and we have never had a problem.
We asked some people on the street for basic directions to one of the hostels and they pointed in one direction and told us it would be about 5 blocks or so. Since we didn`t have a map and it was getting late and dark, we jumped into a cab instead of walking there. The cab driver started driving in the opposite direction and we assumed that the people on the street were wrong about the location of the place.
Then we realized that we were going fairly far away from the center of town on a dirt road and we started asking where we were going. Jen got super nervous and pulled out our mace (we brought mace with us just for these types of situations) and gave it to Billy. The cab driver kept telling us that all the accomodations in town were booked, and he wanted to take us to some places outside of the center that might have rooms. We finally arrived at the hotel he had in mind and it turned out to be a super expensive fly fishing lodge that was booked. The whole time this taxi driver seemed like a really nice guy who was just trying to help us find a place to stay for the night.
So, then we get back into the taxi with him and he starts calling around on his radio and speaking really fast...we couldn´t tell what he was saying. He then tells us that he knows about a "casa particular" that his friend owns that he rents out to travelers. We end up at some guy`s house who asks us if we want to go and look at the place. The guy jumps into the car with us and we head over to this other house to take a look.
At this point, Billy and I just want this whole interaction to end. We agree to stay at this house and they tell us that it costs $100 pesos per night and the taxi ride was $50 pesos. This is ridiculous. The accomodations here cost about half that much and we have never paid more than $10 pesos for a cab ride. We are angry, but we want to get rid of these slimy guys, so we agree and pay them.
The house was so disgusting...it was beyond belief. It would be condemned if it were in the States. Granted, the standard of living here is much different, but this house was not livable. It was falling apart and it was so dirty, and there were bugs and spiders everywhere. The roof must have had serious leaks because all the walls had water damage (we were lucky it wasn`t raining). The bathroom ceiling was horribly moldy. There was a sound of dripping water coming from somewhere other than the bathroom or the kitchen. We actually cooked dinner in the kitchen because we were starving and there were no restaurants open. We wanted to pour bleach all over everything we had to touch in that kitchen. We choked down our meal and went straight to sleep. We didn´t even want to touch the bed in that place, so we slept in our sleeping bags on top of the bed. All night we noticed that there was a dim light shining through the ceiling, but we thought that it was some kind of ambient light from the street lamps outside. Jen had the worst nightmares. Jen woke us both in the middle of the night, because she was kicking someone in the face in her dream and she starting kicking while laying there in her sleep. She was afraid that someone was going to come to the house in the middle of the night and steal our money or something...as if this whole situation was part of an elaborate plan to continue ripping us off.
In the morning when we woke up we noticed that the dim light was coming from the attic and you could actually see parts of the attic through the cracks in the ceiling. We couldn´t tell what was up there, but it freaked us out. There was one door in the house that was locked, which must´ve led up to the attic. As soon as we discovered this, we got out of there at practically a run until we were far enough away to take deep breaths and laugh about the calamity.
We went into town to the hostel that we asked the driver to take us to in the first place the night before and they told us that they had rooms. We felt totally swindled and bamboozled by these two guys. It turned out that we couldn`t even get to Pucon because all the buses were booked for 4 days and we didn´t want to be in that town for one more minute. So, as we were getting onto the bus to get the hell out of that town, we saw the cab driver in his taxi on the street. Jen ran over to him and told him that we knew that he lied to us and asked him why he did it. She was calling him a liar, but tried not to make a scene. She was yelling in Spanglish about how he stole our money, deceived us. All he could say was that he didn´t understand what she was talking about and he hit the gas peddle and sped away. We immediately jumped on the bus and were very happy to be leaving Junin De Los Andes.
Traveling like this has it`s good and bad moments. We are lucky that nothing really bad has happened to us so far. We are reminded to keep our wits about us and always be skeptical of situations and people. The whole transaction only cost us $150 pesos, which is $50. It made us realize that traveling is so much about the people that you encounter...good or bad...they frame the experience that you take away. Unfortunately, our memory of Junin De Los Andes will not be a good one, but we can look back on every other place we`ve been with fond memories.
25 del Febrero - Bohemian El Bolson
Bohemian El Bolson
We are two months into this trip now and our Spanish has improved so much since we arrived. We are feeling much more comfortable with the language now...of course, we are still in Argentina and we have about a week or so left here before we move on to Chile where they speak a very different version of Spanish, so we`ll be back to the drawing board again in a new country soon.
We`ve been traveling with Pete and Rachel for a little over a week now. It`s been nice to catch up with friends from home, reminisce about city living in SF, and speak in English about familiar things. We`ve spent many nights around the dinner table enjoying good food and good company. We are on our way to meet up with them again in Mendoza for a wine festival that kicks off the harvest here. How weird is it that harvest is in March here? That seems so odd to us. Things like that make us realize that we are not at home here. It is hotter than hades here in Febrero too...another anomaly. Anyway, we will have a few more days with Pete and Rachel in the Argentine wine country before they head home and we head to Chile to see Santiago and Valparaiso.
We loved El Bolson. The town`s name means big bag, because it is nestled in between two sets of steep mountains on opposite sides. We stayed at a really sweet little family home/hostel that was a bargain. The family that owns Los Helechos is three generations under one roof with cutest little black dog named Peter. They had a 3 day old baby the day we checked in, so the place felt really family-oriented and homey. In the hot afternoons we sat outside in the shade on the cool grass for siestas. El Bolson is a small town with a very bohemian feel and a lot of hippies live there. There are tons of good restaurants (vegetarian and otherwise), natural food stores, artisanal beers and other homemade products for sale in town. It has declared itself a non-nuclear zone.
Our first day in El Bolson was spent searching around town for a fly fishing guide. We finally found a tackle shop owned by this wonderful guy, Jose, who agreed to teach us the basic technique and take us fishing at Rio Chubut. The next morning we got up early to meet him at an empty field, where he had us practicing the casting technique for 2 hours. The language barrier was difficult at first (he didn´t speak very much English), but he was able to teach us without many words, just by showing us what to do. The motion of your arm when casting is very mechanical, contrary to what you might think if you´ve seen the movie A RIVER RUNS THROUGH IT. It is actually much more difficult than it appears. You keep your wrist straight (as if your arm is an extension of the fishing rod), with your arm extended away from your body, and you move your arm back and forth from 11 o`clock to 1 o`clock until your line has enough momentum to propel itself into the fishing hole 100 feet in front of you. Once you´ve casted the line, you use your other hand to reel the line back in and keep the hook constantly moving as if it were a real insect that moves organically in the water. When you are casting, your line flies around like a lasso in the air. After our lesson, our arms and wrists were tired and Pete even had a blister on his hand. Jen was worried about casting with a hook on the end of the line, because it seemed that the hook could easily fly into your face and take an eye out. Jose assured us that if we followed his guidelines, we would not hook ourselves or break his equipment and we were told to wear sunglasses as a safety precaution.
That afternoon we went to the outdoor market in the center of town, where all the artisans set up booths to sell their wares. We feasted on roquefort cheese pizza, homemade beer, belgian waffles topped with creme and raspberries, licuados (which are like smoothies blended with fresh fruit, milk and ice), and chocolate covered cherries. We walked around for hours looking at handmade jewelry, leather wallets, purses, and belts, wood carvings, candles, incense, toys, liqueurs...just about every kind of good that you can imagine. There was music in the center of the square and various types of entertainers.
The next day we woke up at 6am and embarked on our first fly fishing adventure at the river. I can see why fisherman fall in love with fly fishing. The method is more artful than trolling and it`s an incredible feeling to be in the water up to your waist as you try to fool a fish into thinking that the faux fly on your hook is a savory insect. It was early in the morning and the wind and the river were cold, but we jumped right in and tried our hand at this strange sport. Jose was decked out in all of his gear with a wetsuit, waders, and boots, while the three of us were in tennis shoes and shorts. Billy caught the first fish, reeled it in and released it. This river was full of rainbow trout, but they were small. Jose said that if our fly fishing skill level was more advanced, he would have taken us to another river (Rio Mansa). Rio Mansa is much more difficult to fish, with faster moving water, rapids and rocks to negotiate...but the fish there are much larger and harder to catch. We all enjoyed the experience and we needed the practice anywhere we could get it. Pete caught the next fish and released it. Jen accidentally hooked two baby fish and let them go. She got one other bite, but the trout got away. We continued walking downstream and casting into various holes as we advanced. Jose was catching fish left and right and soon hooked a beautiful rainbow trout that was about 35 centimeters long...big enough to take home.
The surrounding area was gorgeous. There was nothing around for miles except for green grass and rolling hills with sheep and horses roaming the land. Jose told us that the area around this river is owned by the Mapuche Indians who are currently tangled up in a land dispute with the Italian clothing company, Benetton. We had heard that Benetton purchased a huge plot of land in Patagonia from the Argentine government, but we didn´t realize that the money that exchanged hands was not given to it`s rightful owners. Jose told us that many wealthy British and American citizens have purchased huge plots of land in Patagonia over the past decade, which has helped fund the political corruption of the government. Very sad, and not unlike how we drove the Native Americans off of their land under the guise of manifest destiny. After several hours of fishing, we had lunch with Jose under the shade of a tree and we talked with him about his life in Argentina and his passion for fly fishing.
That evening at sunset we went paragliding off of the mountain at the foot of El Bolson...Pete`s idea. The hard parts were taking off and landing, but the time spent in flight was peaceful and calming. Como pájaros (like birds). We went two at a time with a guide who did all the work, while we enjoyed the ride. We had to run down the mountain to get our sails to fly, and once we were up in the air, it was amazing to look down at the town below. All the buildings and houses looked like little toys at that height. We touched down as the sun was setting on a small green field on the outskirts of town. It was a unique ending to our time in El Bolson.
20 de Febrero - Bariloche and El Bolson, Argentina
We took a 36 hour bus ride from El Chalten up to Bariloche, which is in the Lake Region of Argentina. The bus ride was not that bad, we stopped every few hours and we could get out and stretch our legs and get something to eat or drink at the gas station or restaurant before we had to jump back on the bus. It was another long journey through the pampas of Argentina, and we must admit that we have seen our share of desert out the window of the bus, so the last 4 hours of the journey through the mountainous lake region was a nice change of atmosphere.
Bariloche is a big tourist center spectacularly set on a large lake completely surrounded by mountains. It is also a big ski resort area in the winter, so there are two main seasons for tourism, and that is why it supports such a huge tourist population. They call it the San Francisco of Argentina, but its hills are modest compared to the streets of San Francisco. However Bariloche does have its very own Lombard Street that looks very similar to the one in SF. The town is scattered with chocolate shops (which are very good), and German and Swiss hotels, restaurants and cafes. Many Germans settled here after WWII and they have built a community that looks and feels very similar to the Alps. There are lots of chalets and beer houses, and the building design is mostly Tudor style, so the town looks very German.
The area has one main lake, and another 5 or 6 lakes within a few miles of town. All are perfectly blue with mountains all around them. We met our friends Pete and Rachel here and have spent the past 3 days exploring the different lakes. All the lakes are all accessible by bus, and perfect for packing a picnic and hiking around, then cooling off in the water. We found one small, green lake inside the National Park that we had almost all to ourselves. There were only a few other people anywhere to be seen. We dove in from a little wooden pier and the water was a perfect temperature. While swimming in the middle of that lake, you could see nothing but green all around and the peaceful surrounding mountains. It was another amazing setting that we felt lucky not to have to share with many other people. The area is very spectacular, and it is the first truly developed tourist spot that we have been to in Argentina. Bariloche is a popular summer vacation spot for Argentines as well as foreigners.
We stayed at a very nice little Hosteria in Bariloche named Piuke. The owner was an 81 year old Hungarian guy who came to Argetnina after WWII. He was incredibly nice, and told us where to go and what to see around Bariloche. He was very excited that our names were Blau and that Billy´s family is from Romania, and kept repeating to us, ¨Aaah Blau, muy bueno.¨ We took to calling him Pappy, as he was like a grandfather to us. Jen got sick for a day which was probably food poisoning, and Pappy wanted to take care of her, and made sure she only ate the right things to get well. He would not even let her put sugar in her tea in the morning, but we snuck some in when he wasn´t looking. We took a few pictures with him before we left, and he made sure that his rose garden was featured in all the shots. The buildings of his hosteria were surrounded by the most beautiful flower gardens, which have won awards from the Horticulture Society in Bariloche. He made our experience in Bariloche very special and memorable.
After 4 days of good meals and walking to almost all the lakes around Bariloche, we headed to El Bolson, which is about 2 hours away from Bariloche by bus. We hope to do some fly fishing here in El Bolson, as this is one of the best places in the world to fly fish (pesca con mosca). El Bolson is also an artisan community, but Pappy insisted it was a hippie colony. He told us to go to the city center and look at all the hippies. We thought that was very funny, as he was describing it like it was a zoo. Maybe we don´t think that hippies are much of a spectacle since we see them all the time in the Haight at home. We haven´t found too many hippies here so far, but we will keep and eye out for them, just in case.
14 del Febrero - El Calafate & El Chalten
Patagonia is a surreal and dramatic place (even eerie at times). Where else can you find towers of stone jutting out of the otherwise flat landscape of the pampas at a steepness that defies the stickiest of snow? Or amazing shapes in blue ice that hover like skyscrapers over milky turquoise lakes?
We have been out of touch for a few days as the internet access in El Chalten was super expensive and slow, and we´ve both been nursing ourselves back to health after coming down with colds. Estamos resfriado. So, since our last blog entry, we have been to El Calafate to see the Perito Moreno glacier and then on to El Chalten to hike around the great Fitzroy mountain. Now we are in Rio Gallegos waiting for a morning bus tomorrow to the lake region in Bariloche (a 26 hour bus ride from here...life in the slow lane), where we will meet Pete and Rachel for a much needed dose of friends from home to help fend off homesickness.
In El Calafate our visit to the Perito Moreno glacier was well worth it. The glacier that we saw in Torres del Paine was spectacular, but we were only able to admire it from a distance. We saw Perito Moreno from a fenced in viewing area where we were able to see the detail in it´s impressive icy spires. After that, we got a look at it from water level in a boat on the lake. Perito Moreno is tall. It towers 70 meters above water and reaches down beneath to the bottom of the lake. It is composed of many hues of blue ice that melt into sculpture-like peaks or break off as the glacier advances. You can hear the ice cracking and moaning under constant pressure. If you are lucky, you will see a huge chunk break off of the glacier and create a mini avalanche as ice falls into the water below. We witnessed this roaring phenomenon a couple of times...lucky us. Apparently, the glacier was named for the man who created the borders around it, which include it in Argentina´s territory instead of in Chile. Although the National Park that houses the glacier is a bit too touristy for our taste, we enjoyed the day as we marveled at this very surreal site.
We also finally tried yerba mate for the first time. Our tour leader offered us sips from her mate cup, which is a special gesture, and we gladly accepted. It has a smoky, somewhat bitter taste...but it is very similar to te caliente (hot tea). People here drink yerba mate day and night. They carry around personal supplies of the leaves, sugar and a thermos of hot water to constantly refill their cups and they sip with these difficult to describe metal straws. When someone offers you a sip from their cup, it is a gesture of friendship.
The rest of our time spent in El Calafate was at our guesthouse. We had a room with a fully stocked kitchen and we were able to cook our own meals for the first time since we left home. Jen actually cooked AND enjoyed doing it. It was really nice to have a homebase for a few days to rest and get well.
The day we arrived in El Chalten was sunny and clear. Our bus stopped at the outskirts of the tiny frontier town, so that we could get a good look at Fitzroy and the surrounding mountains from a distance. Our first glance of the mountains looked like a backdrop on a movie set beyond the pampas. There is nothing but flat, arid landscape for miles around and suddenly out of nowhere the Andes sprout up tall and proud. El Chalten is a small, sprawling town surrounded by mountains. At dusk if you stand in the center of town and spin around to glimpse at the surrounding horizon, you see nothing but the majestic silhouettes of the jagged, enormous mountains and towers. The town itself has recently discovered it´s potential for tourism and is erecting hotels and restaurants accordingly at a break-neck pace. There are plenty of day hikes from town, so we rented a habitacion doble (double room) at one of the little hotels and planned to set off for two hikes from there.
Our first hike was very mellow. We hiked to Laguna Torres and met a guy from Barcelona on the way. It was great to practice Spanish with him and he agreed that the Argentine Spanish is very different and confusing (even to him). The entire hike took about 5 hours and was on a really easy-going trail and was not steep at all. We followed the river to a glacial lake where we could get a better look at the Cerro Torres that play a supporting role to Fitzroy, the star of the show. This was our first hike since our 5 day excursion in Torres del Paine, so we were happy to take it easy as we tested out our recently healed feet and tried to avoid getting any new blisters. We also learned the number one rule in hiking--wear two pairs of socks! Someone in Torres del Paine mentioned this technique and we put it to the test in El Chalten...we are happy to report that it works.
Our second hike was steep, but short. We hiked up to a mirador (vista point), where we could get a closer gander at Fitzroy. We sat for about an hour and watched as the mountain disappeared and reappeared behind wispy clouds. Our hiking outings in Torres del Paine were very rushed as we had a lot of ground to cover there everyday. In contrast, we had all the time in the world in El Chalten and were happy to take it all in at a slower pace.
Our last night in El Chalten, we treated ourselves to a really nice dinner at a new restaurant there called Malbec...perhaps for Valentine´s Day, although I admit that I didn´t even realize it was Feb 14th until I checked email today. At Malbec, we sat near the window and watched the sun set behind Fitzroy. The food was really good and the wine (Malbec) was wonderful. We sat there talking about how strange it will be to go to a restaurant at home and not see Malbec on the menu. We are savoring the life of luxury that Argentina offers.
7 de Febrero, Torres del Paine, Chile
Our last night in Ushuaia we went to an amazing resturaunt called Kuar. It is a bit outside of town, and is built overlooking the Channel. It is also a brewery, and the seating is built like an ampitheater, with the stage being the windows looking out over the channel. We went in time for sunset, at about 10:00 PM, and sat on the seats which were built like a greek theater out of stone, and were warmed from beneath. It was an amazing sight watching the sunset with the mountains in the background from such a cool spot, we really enjoyed our last night in Ushuaia.
The next day we hopped on the bus to Puerto Natales, Chile, the border crossings between Argentina and Chile are very tedious, and when we got off the bus to go through customs, they rifled through all the bags on the bus, and confiscated our apples. We were not sure if we should be mad that they took our food, or happy we didn´t get fined, but we were definitely hungry later on. The next morning we took another short bus trip from Puerto Natales into Torres del Paine National Park to start a 5 day 4 night backpacking trip through the park. The park is the at the southern tip of the Chilean Andes, and filled with huge rock towers (Los Torres) that jet out of the patagonian landscape. The park is absolutley stunning. It is composed of huge mountains, glacial lakes, glaciers, waterfalls, rivers, and wildlife. Everyday as we hiked from place to place on the W circuit through the park we saw something completely different and totally amazing.
The first day we went to the mirador (look out) for Los Torres, which after a 3 hour hike, the last hour scrambling up rocks, you arrive at a lookout right over a beautiful lake with the 3 huge Torres jetting out above it. It was a breathtaking sight, and it felt like an intimate look at these huge towers. It was raining most of the way during the hike, and the Torres were only partially visibile, but once we got to the top the clouds cleared, and we got great views of the huge rock formations and their reflection on the lake. It is hard to describe their size, but they are about 10,000 feet hight all standing right next to eachother. It was a great way to start the journey with the most famous view of the park.
On the second day we had a very long hike from the camp site, up to the Valle Frances where there is another great view of a different set of large mountains called Los Cuernos. The hike up to the lookout was about 6 hours from our previous campsite, and involved one large river crossing that required us to remove our shoes and wade in up to our waists while hanging on to a rope as the river rushed past us out of the moutnains. Since the water is freshly melted glacier water, it was incredibly cold, and we had some fun just watching other people cross after we did, we couldn´t feel our feet for an hour afterwards anyway so we were forced to take a break there. We eventually made it up to a spot that felt like we were in Gods ampitheatre. From our viewpoint we were totally surrounded by these enormous sheer rock cliffs on all sides, and a huge waterfall was coming off of one of them that formed the river we followed up to the peak. It was another spectacular view. After we took some time to enjoy it, we headed back down and out to the next site to sleep. That was our most physically challenging day, it was 11 hours and 28 kilometers through some fairly technical terrain.
The next morning we woke and hiked up towards Glacier Grey. The entire time thus far the weather had been mostly hot, with light rain here and there. Once we turned the corner towards the glacier, the wind started howling and the temperature dropped 15 degrees. The site of the glacier was probably the highlight for both of us. It was the first glacier of it´s kind that we had ever seen. We had a peaceful, zen-like moment staring at the glacier from a distance. It is just enormous sitting on a lake, and you can see when you climb above it that it goes for miles and miles beyond where we could hike to. As we got closer, we could see the deep blue and purple hues in the glacier itself, and all the different jagged edges and shapes that it creates as it melts and breaks off. We continued to hike up to a spot overlooking the entire glacier where we sat and ate lunch with no one else in sight for an hour. It was a truly magical experience with a phenomonal backdrop. We could hear absolutely nothing except for the occasional sound of a chunck of ice cracking and breaking off into the lake, and that sounded like distant thunder rumbling. We stayed one more night directly in view of the glacier before we headed back to Puerto Natales the next day.
All in all, we covered almost 85k in 4 full days of hiking. Both of us were exhausted at the end of the excursion, and our feet sore and blistered. We got back to Puerto Natales in the afternoon, took a hot shower, and then went to a resturaunt where we had a good bottle of Chilean Cabernet and a huge steak, while we watched the Super Bowl. We felt like we deserved a little pampering, especially after such rigorous exercise that helped shed the extra weight we have both picked up eating steak and drinking wine over the past month in Argentina.
The next morning we jumped on a bus to El Calafate, Argentina where we are waiting to go see another glacier tomorrow. Torres del Paine was such an amazing experience, that it is hard to do it justice in words. We took over 200 pictures while in the park, and hope to put some up here soon. We were blown away by the all the different things we were able to see in the park, every day was a completely different adventure, and we saw something new and amazing every time we turned a corner or climbed to a peak. We suggest that anyone that likes backpacking make a point of going there sometime in their lives, it is incredible.
