La Isla Pingüino

Yesterday we took an all day trip with Darwin Expeditions to the Isla Pingüino which is most well known for it’s colony of Rockhopper Penguins. Along the way we saw dolphins, sea lions, a variety of birds and of course penguins! It was a fantastic way to close out 2010 and a day we will likely not forget.

It was on the top of our list to see the Commerson's Dolphins and within 10 minutes of leaving the boat dock they showed up!

Commerson's dolphins thankfully swam pretty slow so we were able to get some good shots!

The Peale's dolphins were larger and sassier; they came up along our boat and smacked their fins agains the water splashing all of us with water. We thought it was good fun but they were probably telling us to get lost...

South American Sea Lions; the males are up to 400 kg and the females are 150 kg. The males also can have up to 15 ladies, that is a lot of ladies to listen to!

Magellanic penguins heading to the water!

A mama and her baby chic...awwww!

A Rockhopper penguin rockin' his hairdo in the wind

Rockhoppers don't seem to mind spending the day in the sun with us crazy tourists taking photos

She apparently had something important to say and he wanted none of it!

These two were pretty sweet hanging out together!

Dude!

The Blackish Oystercatcher was VERY chatty about us being on his island

Us!

We stayed in the little coastal town of Puerto Deseado for two nights, over the New Year’s holiday. It’s a quiet fishing town, with wide streets and not a lot happening. The steeple of the main church in town doubled as a lighthouse once in the past.

The town is quite a ways off the main Ruta 3 highway that runs up the east side of Argentina, so it was a bit of an effort to get here. The trip to Isla Pingüino, run by Darwin Expediciones, was well worth it, though.

Feliz Año Nuevo!

Scenes from a Bus

We’ve found that road travel in South America, at least in Peru, Bolivia and Argentina, is not as safe as in the States. People don’t wear seatbelts as much, the road conditions can be abysmal, and drivers drive more aggressively. During our time on the bicycles, we had to really pay attention if the road we were on didn’t have a good shoulder. It’s not all chaos all the time, though. We’ve generally felt safe while traveling through South America, but the differences between here and the States are enough to notice, and to keep us on our toes.

For the eight-hour bus ride from Río Gallegos to Caleta Olivia, we rode on a double-decker bus and got to sit in the front row of the top deck. The views were amazing, and we saw lots of roadside wildlife for most of the trip. The landscape was pretty bleak, though, just flat scrubby ranchland. Río Gallegos is located in southeast Argentina, on the Atlantic coast, and we made our way north from there to Caleta Olivia.

Front row seat for today’s trip

The clouds gave some texture to the flat, scrubby landscape

Right out of Río Gallegos, we saw many guanacos (wild llamas) and ñandús (birds that look like small ostriches) along the side of the road. We enjoyed seeing so much wildlife along the road, especially the baby ñandús, which were numerous.

‘Sup?

Most of the guanacos turned away from the road when they saw or heard us

Ñandús, about 1 m tall

Ñandú chicks abound. Most of the mamas had about 10 chicks in tow.

Fuzzy flamingoes. Taking photos from a speedy bus through a dirty window proved to be a challenge.

A ñandú on the move

Unfortunately, two hours into our journey, we hit and killed a guanaco along the way. It was tragic. Three adult guanacos walked across the road well ahead of us, but a fourth decided to saunter across, to join the others, and that’s the one we hit. Thankfully, it died instantly – it was a direct hit, and the driver side windshield was completely smashed from the impact. Prior to hitting the guanaco, the driver didn’t honk and didn’t slow much, which shocked us and left us wondering if the whole accident could’ve been avoided with a little more caution.

The rest of the way to Caleta Olivia, the driver had a smashed windshield to contend with. He braced it with a couple wood poles and a steel rod, to keep the wind from blowing it inside. Along the way he supplemented this with some duct tape (of course). When we stopped at the bus station in San Julian, the police took a look at the windshield and deemed it fit for continuing on to Caleta Olivia. Huh?

Hitting guanacos on this stretch of Ruta 3 is pretty common, as we saw lots of dead guanacos right alongside the road. And there’s just thousands of guanacos peacefully hanging out along the road, munching on the grasses, so it’s not hard to imagine that eventually a guanaco will see greener grass on the other side of the road and mosey on over.

That wasn’t the only accident of the day, though. Thankfully, we weren’t a part of the next one we saw. Just before reaching Caleta Olivia, traffic slowed to a crawl, and we came upon one mess of an accident. There were two semis, with their cabs completely smashed in and parts of their trailers torn away. It looked as if they had a head-on collision. It was brutal – there was hardly anything left of the engines.

The next day, as we were waiting for the bus to Puerto Deseado, we glanced at the paper and saw a photo of the accident. Rescue workers were pulling one of the drivers, still alive, out of his cab. Amazing that someone could survive such an accident!

We hope that y’all are traveling safe this holiday season!

Perito Moreno Glacier

Our first big glacier did not disappoint!  We took a plethora of photos but we can only share so many.  The glacier is 30km long, 5km wide, 60m above water, 100m below, and moves at about 2m per day. Pretty impressive.

Icebergs bobbing in the chilly lake

Look left, there is a tiny tour boat that is not so tiny

Us...at the glacier

Glacier wall and little chunkers (as we like to call the icebergs)

Southern face of the glacier

Looking straight down on the glacier

Northern side of the glacier

More of the northern with lots of little chunkers

Spiky ice

Glaciertastic

A windy bus ride to El Calafate

Another day in the Patagonian windswept land

We left El Chalten and continued our journey south to El Calafate.  It was an incredibly windy bus ride. All on pavement (thankfully) but the bus was swaying all over the place which was a bit nerve-racking. Dave and I sat in the front so we could look out the windshield and see what the driver sees.  We even saw some bike tourers!!  All of them looked like they were moving pretty slow (and likely using a lot of profanity) as they had an insanely strong headwind.

Struggling bike tourers

We got to El Calafate, settled into our hostel and went back out in search of, you guessed it, food. We have had a lot of pizza on this trip and in general the pizza has been awful. As Dave says, it is as if they cook the ingredients separate from each other and then assemble them at the end making it so nothing sticks together and the cheese has an awful rubbery texture. I had smelled a pizza place on our way from the bus station to the hostel and was convinced it would be good. I also convinced Dave that our next good pizza (we have had two so far) was just around the corner. Luckily, I was right!  The pizza was great and they had a whole wall of Argentinian license plates which reminded me of my dad since he collects old license plates.  I asked if I could buy them somewhere in town but they said “no”.

This ones for you dad!

We have spent a few days here in El Calafate and have enjoyed it despite its very strong touristy vibe. We even went to see a glacier but there will be more on that later as I have 200 photos to sort through…

The Best Medicine

British animal voiceovers, good stuff.

Patagonia for Christmas

We have started our long journey through Patagonia. This involves hours of bus time. We spent a total of 22 hours on a bus traveling south down the legendary Ruta 40, from Bariloche to El Chaltén, over two days (thankfully). We left Bariloche in the early a.m., with the city still asleep. Right out of Bariloche, the scenery was dramatic. Big mountains, deep blue lakes, rushing rivers, that sort of thing. We were treated to that scenery for a few hours, then things changed. It got flat.

An early morning leaving Bariloche

Mountain peaks greet us as we head south

Dirt roads and mountain tops...we felt fortunate for the cloudy sky since it made things more interesting to look at

And the flat begins!

Our charriot for the day, complete with angry eyes on the front!

Big sky Patagonia

Turns out that Patagonia isn’t just the landscape that you see in the Patagonia clothing company catalogs, with craggy peaks and thick forests. Most of Patagonia is flat and windswept. It’s a lot like Bolivia and Peru’s Altiplano, but at lower elevation and a bit more vegetation. The stuff that tourists visit is along the edges. On the west side, mountains and glaciers. On the east side, marine preserves. In between, it’s windy BFE, baby.

Day 2 starts and ends with more flat scenery

The bus ride was a mix of paved road and gravel road. Argentina has big plans for paving all of Ruta 40, and construction has begun on that. It shouldn’t be too long before it’s paved. The fact that the president of Argentina is from this area is definitely helping push construction along.

Going south!

The bus was pretty empty, probably only half capacity. And all tourists. We get the impression that most Argentinians think it silly to travel so far on a bus, just to gawk at some mountains and glaciers in the deep southwest. We kept ourselves occupied during the ride by reading books (Dave – “The Story of Edgar Sawtelle”, a good one; Morgan  – “A Fine Balance”, engaging but not a page turner), staring out the window, listening to podcasts, munching on Christmas cookies, that sort of thing.

We stopped in Siberia (see truck) for a while. It could have been Siberia for all we knew.

We got to the Rancho Grande hostel at around 11:30 pm on Christmas Eve, and the place was hopping. Tourists of all ages were eating dinner, drinking wine, talking loudly – it was a really festive scene. We joined in for a bit, then retired for the evening with visions of sugar plums dancing in our heads.

El Chaltén is a teeny town that seems to be solely devoted to trekkers, or as we call them in the States, backpackers. Not the town-to-town-on-trains style of backpacking, though, but wilderness backpacking. El Chaltén is nestled in a river valley among gobs of mountains, with gobs of trails to hike. The scenery is breathtaking, and the hiking possibilities seem endless.

This dog belonged to the hostel and was well received by everyone staying there!

We celebrated Christmas by joining in the spirit and going on a little hike, up towards Laguna Torre. We’re sure more than one backpacker was scratching their head when they saw us leave the hostel for the hike wearing Crocs. But, they held up well for our three hour tour – they didn’t slip too much, and our feet felt fine afterwards. Our hike led us to a mirador (lookout) just north of the hostel, where we gawked at a glacier and mountains for a bit.

Dave modeling his Patagonia clothes IN Patagonia!

A lovely view on Christmas day

Views through the valley to the mountains were breathtaking in El Chalten

Morgan was unable to model as she was mostly wearing Icebreaker...

The snow-domed Cerro Solo (2,248 m) on the left, Glaciar Grande in center, the rocky Cerro Fitz Roy (3,405 m) on the right.

Our first glacial sighting in Patagonia

More gorgeous valley views as we hiked back down to El Chalten

The view over El Chalten

Food carts aren't just for Portland it seems!

It’s Dec 26^th, at about noon, and we’re about to board a bus to head south to El Calafate, a small town that sees lots of tourists due to the nearby glaciers. Patagonia’s glaciers have not retreated as much as most other glaciers in the world in recent times – they’re still going strong.

Villa la Angotura to Bariloche

Dave did a great summary of the day from Villa la Angostura to Bariloche on CrazyGuy so head there if you want to hear about our day and see some pictures!

We did a lot of “TCB” (taking care of business) while in Bariloche; getting a bike box, sending Dave’s bike to Buenos Aires, booking our trip through Patagonia, and researching the remaining 5 weeks of our trip.  We did manage to squeeze in some chocolate sampling, a small hike, and a nice walk around the city while we were there as well.  Bariloche is a great city for getting things done as well as heading out for treks.  We couldn’t do much trekking since we aren’t really equipped for that but we heard of a lot of great hikes around the area so it seems like a great place to come if you like to hike.

mmmmm....so many choices!!!

We took a nice hike to a lookout over the lakes...have we mentioned it is windy here?

Gorgeous views abound in the Lake District

The blue color of the lakes is incredible!

Dave’s mom, Sally, sent us a Christmas package stuffed with cookies, chex mix and some presents!  We had a big hostel dinner and shared the cookies with our hostel guests and they loved them!  We will be munching on the cookies through Patagonia and thinking of all of you back home celebrating with your friends and families.

Holiday cheer with Sally's cookies!

Our trip is all planned (pretty much) through Patagonia so stay tuned for more of that!

San Martin to Villa la Angostura

Dave pushed off this morning with Hugh and Pauline to start the journey through the seven lakes (Ruta de los Siete Lagos); there were errands to be done before they left so they didn’t actually get out of town till around 1o AM (a late start for Dave…). I packed up my bags and drug myself to the tourist office to ask when the bus was to Villa la Angostura. I had heard that there were multiple trips a day so I wasn’t in a rush to get to the bus station assuming I would have options but this proved to be a mistake. There was a bus at 10 AM or 5:15 PM. DOH! So I had a whole day to spend in San Martin, again.

Being tied to my bags I can’t travel far as they weigh far too much for my shoulders to bare for any length of time. I am not blessed with a comfy backpack but instead with an over-sized duffel bag I bought in Mendoza to get me through the rest of this trip.  I chose to go to the bus station to buy my ticket and then I went to the lake to read my book.

My view for the day while I read my book and waited for the bus

The wind here is unrelenting so I didn’t last long before I was looking around for a cafe to take shelter in. I found one right near by complete with wifi and a warm sunroom!  Argentina has extremely mediocre food service which is frustrating when you are hungry and can’t get a waiters attention but when you want to sit and drink tea for hours in a warm cafe it is perfect!!

I went back out to the lake a couple hours later and this time put my down jacket and a hat on and was perfectly content sitting on the boardwalk listening to the breaking of the waves on the shore. I had my book (Atonement by Ian McEwan) to keep me company and set about burning time until my bus would depart.

The time came to leave and I was on my bus.  This was the stinkiest bus I have ever been on but my window was super clean so I would have unobstructed views of the lakes along our drive. You win some you lose some.

Looking back on San Martin de los Andes

I spent the first hour of the trip mad at myself for not riding this part of the trip. The road was nice, the climbing wasn’t that bad, and the scenery was absolutely stunning. I spent the next two hours congratulating myself for not riding as it was dusty gravel roads that I can guarantee would have had me in tears and taken days to get through (whereas it will take Dave a day to get here).

A lucky shot of a waterfall from the bus window!

Deep blue lakes peppered the landscape we traveled along

An unremarkable photo only to show that the road through the lakes was surrounded by purple lupins; you will have to use your imagination to complete the picture (blue lakes, mountain peaks, clear rivers, valleys of grass complete with sheep etc)

Arriving in Villa la Angostura I set about finding my hostel, Italian Hostel, and locating food as I was starving. The town itself is adorable and I think I am going to have a good time wandering around here!

San Martin de los Andes

I spent some time on my own in San Martin on Thursday patiently waiting for Dave to arrive.  Based on my estimations I expected him to arrive around 2pm.  He arrived around 5pm; guess I was off a bit. In the meantime Hugh and Pauline, a British couple riding through South America who are also on Crazy Guy On A Bike, rode by and ended up staying at the same hostel as us!

San Martin is a very pretty little town with lots of hikes around. Problem is all I have is a pair of crocs to get me around which are not exactly hiking shoes.  I could buy something more appropriate but shelling out $100 for shoes to wear for a few weeks seems crazy at the moment so I will stay bound to pavement instead of dirt trails.  I am sure I am missing out by making this choice.

Once Dave arrived we took a nice stroll around town and went down to the lake to see what there was to see.  It has been super windy here so we were quickly blown from the wind back into town into the warmth of the hostel.

The photo before this one is hysterical which is why we are laughing. It might be revealed as our Chirstmas card sometime soon 🙂

More bike tourers arrived at the hostel and by the end of the day on Friday there were 8 bike nerds hanging out swapping stories in the hostel. Dave and I organized a group dinner for Friday night and all of us hung out together for the evening.  It was good fun to be around everyone and hear their stories! Only downside for me was I felt a bit out of place; people kept asking where my bike was and how come I stopped riding and I was generally met with blank stares when I explained my general hatred of giant climbs and rocky roads. I am bummed to not be riding this area, it is absolutely the best scenery we have had this whole trip, but I also know I would be one very unhappy girl if I was on my bike. It sucks.

Dave and I cooked up a big burrito feast!

I wish we had done this part of the trip first. I used to think it was better that we did Peru and Bolivia first since they were the most challenging…in theory saving the best for last. I have decided this is the wrong way of thinking. If we had done the Lake District (just north of Patagonia) first I would have pushed myself through it and then would have been able to fast forward or skip the portions of Peru and Bolivia that I struggled through in order to get here.

Today I head on to Villa la Angostua where I will hang out for 2 nights waiting to meet back up with Dave. From there we head to Bariloche, land of chocolate and garden gnomes!!!

Curarrehue to San Martin de los Andes, Argentina

I bought my ticket to San Martin de los Andes in Curarrehue so I would be traveling across the border and into Argentina by bus again. I was a lot less nervous about this border crossing than the one into Chile because Argentina is much less strict about food and people than Chile is.

View from the bus going up to the pass

Dave will be taking two days to get to San Martin so we agreed to meet at a hostel recommended by bike tourers (Hostel Bike). After he pushed off to start the climb over the pass I waited at the bus station in the sun for about an hour and a half for the bus to come. I was sure I would see Dave while on the bus so I kept my eyes peeled and was lucky to come across him on a very steep section so we were going slow enough for me to open the window and yell out at him.  I am sure my fellow bus passengers thought I was crazy but who cares! I figured that would be the last of seeing Dave but I was wrong!

More volcano action!

It takes FOREVER to get through customs when you are on a bus. They herd you all in as one group and you have to wait for everyone to go through before they herd us all back on the bus to drive 100m to the next customs station (one to leave Chile, one to enter Argentina).  While standing around at the Argentina customs I had a feeling Dave would catch up with us. I know he is a fast rider and we had been there for at least an hour. I was right!  About 5 minutes before we pushed off Dave arrived 🙂  It was great to get to see him one more time too!

Standing around at customs in Chile...

The one time where going by bus is not faster than going by bike

The bus ride was pretty quick after that into San Martin. The pass goes through a Araucaria (monkey puzzle trees) forest which is pretty crazy.  We have these in Portland but they are more used as ornamentals, even though they are huge, but to see them in a forest is quite a site!

Forest of monkey puzzle trees...if only there were monkeys too!

Heading down into Argentina

San Martin is like a mountain lodge town.  All the buildings are built with wood to look like we are in a european mountain town. It is odd. BUT one thing I am especially excited about is that I am now in the land of chocolate!  Bariloche is know for its chocolate shops and it is has clearly spread to the area.  Ice cream shops are signed with BOTH ice cream and chocolate.  I think I am going to be very happy in this part of Argentina.

Hostel Bike is as one would expect. There are bikes everywhere and the culture of the hostel is obviously catering towards bike tourers.  It is odd to be here without my bike; I feel like I shouldn’t be able to stay here.  I had to explain that I was on a bike tour for most of the trip just to validate my reason for being at this specific hostel.  The guy running the joint for the owner is from Britian so I don’t have to torture him with my bad spanish and am free to speak in rapid fire english.

I wandered around town for the evening and spent some time on a rooftop deck watching life go by while I had a small bottle of wine and some food. I left the restaurant slightly drunk from too much wine and hit up the ice cream shop.  The girl who helped me with the ice cream was adorable. I kept asking what certain flavors were and she would just give me samples. I settled on what I believe to be dark chocolate…mmmmmm….She asked me where I was from and I told her the United States and she asked me where so I told her Oregon (always followed by “just north of California” since no one knows where Oregon is). She said a bunch of stuff to me about visiting the United States that I couldn’t really understand but I so wish that I could have; her facial expression was as if she was confiding some deep secret to me about her wishes to travel but I couldn’t get what she was saying. Damnit.

The green building houses ice cream and chocolate! Mmmmmmm!