Northern Patagonia II

It´s only 120km South from Bariloche to El Bolson, these ¨low milage¨ days are a luxury, I´m able to have a long stop for a coffee, and a bun, with no worries ! There is a superb looking timber framed hostel in El Bolson but it was, surprisingly, full. They re-directed me to a manquy hostel in town. In the best traditions of manquy hostels a drunk guy arrives at midnight and spends the whole night, on his back, snoring very loudly...
I´m not particularly charmed by El Bolson, the town itself is ugly, there is little sign of the hippy community mentioned in my guidebook, there seem to be a million teenagers prowling about.

El Bolson with it´s mountainous ¨wall¨

To the East of town is a high "wall" of rock, Mount Piltriquitron. Next day I ride my bike half way up this ¨wall¨, it´s quite a ride, 13km up a steep bumpy track, I probably should not have done it, but once started, it´s hard to stop...  At the top there is one hour´s further walk, through the snow, to Refugio Piltriquitron. Where I have lunch, enjoy the view and turn around and bump all the way back.

Hostel cat at Esquel...

I ride the 160km to Esquel down Ruta 40. This time there is nowhere to stop, there is nothing there, except ¨Pampas¨. The forecast says there is a 40% chance of rain, it gets ominously dark but does not rain. At one point I can actually see the westerley weather ¨throwing itself¨ against the western andes, but not getting through. There is a comfortable HI hostel in Esquel, just as I arrive an Argentinian Classic Car Ralley pulls into town and completes their daily stage, it´s fairly noisy for a few hours but a great spectator event. In Argentina, generally, there is no MOT (or annual inspection) which means that there is a really eclectic collection of old crocs still on the road !, I´ve seen several (unsafe at any speed) Ford Falcons, Ford Taurinos, Renault(s) 4,6,12  (1000s of these),18, Citroen 2CV, 3CV (never made it to UK) Visas, Ami 8´s and loads more, cars not seen in the UK since the 70´s, and all mixed up with the enormous latest generation Toyota Hilux´s (sadly, everyones car of choice here, it seems, literally double the size of the old ones...).

Next day I head to the "Parc National Los Alerces" to the West. The road peters out into ripio (gravel), so I bounce up this, inside the park, for 25km. There are free campsites here (they turn out to be the only ones "open" anyway). I find a site with a superb view (below) amd camp by myself, by the time it gets dark there is no-one else there, anywhere, even on the track nearby.
I realise that I´m allowed to have a fire, there is dry, dead, wood everywhere from the Winter storms, so I do. The wood goes up like a bomb and I soon have a roaring fire to sit next to for warmth and gaze at...

On the way back I stop for a night at Trevelin, this is one of those peculiar Patagonian towns which was founded by Welsh people and they still speak Welsh in the town ! (orginally founded for religious freedom). It´s a very rural little town, very quiet, but in any direction there is a fantastic mountainous backdrop. There is also the best hostel I think I´ve ever stayed in, it´s like a 4* hotel, wonderful, and for the first time of the entire trip they accept my HI hostel card (YHA card), great !, but it is valid for just 2 days more....

After a lazy day it´s back to Esquel for a day´s skiing !! Something I feel has to be done so that I can say I skiied on this continent. Remarkably a day´s skiing, lift pass, equipment hire, and transfer comes to just $45 US !! It has to be done.   The resort is "La Hoya", it´s not half bad, it´s the last 10 days of the season so the snow is pretty sketchy, but at the top there is enough, and when the sun has melted it a bit in the afternoon, it´s really good. After a few hours, my level is back where I was 3 years ago, so I´m chuffed with it.

When I get back to the hostel I´m knackered so I make the perrenial mistake, I ¨lie down for a bit¨. I wake up at 8.30ish (I thought) and go into town for some food. Strangely, nothing is open, not even the supermarket, so I return to the hostel, frustrated, and find the kitchen is locked. Then I check the time, it´s 01:30am, oops.....

Northern Patagonia I

The first thing I do (in Villa Angostura) is visit the Tourist Office and ask about purchasing mandatory bike insurance in Argentina. "Oh, you can´t do that" they say... But in the Yellow Pages for the town are 3 "Seguro" offices. I visit the first one and they say "No Problem",   doh !  So I buy 4 months for US $78, pretty good I thought. Incredibly all motorbikes pay the same whether a "Triumph Rocket III" or a tiny Chinese 150cc, nuts !!  Annoyingly, this insurance is also valid for Peru / Bolivia & Chile, if only I could have bought it in the first place....(my expensive Peruvian policy, still valid time wise, is not valid outside Peru borders).

The second thing that I notice is that Argentina (even compared with Chile) is VERY expensive, my 2007 LP guidebook is completely wrong. Friends and family have all told me over the past 10 years how fantastically cheap it is, huge steak and wine restaurant meals for a few dollars.  Well it WAS, they have had skyrocket inflation of about 20% a year since the cheap years (2001 - 2006). A cursorary price inspection shows it to be roughly the same as the UK (some things more, some less) ! I am disappointed with this as I was hoping to improve my living standards down here, I will have to continue living like a skanky backpacker for a while yet....

Next day I ride along the scenic 90km lakeside road to Bariloche (pic left). Here (for the first time of my entire trip) I stay with a couple who are contacts of my father´s, Diana and Roberto. They make me extremely welcome in their lovely wooden house, it has a superb view of the surrounding lakes and mountains. It is indescribably pleasant to stay in a real house for a few days, after 11 months of hotels / hostels / hospedajes etc...and they produce a superb cheese fondue for supper. Next day I get the oil changed on the bike and use Roberto`s tools to tighten the chain, the "lube center" gives me a huge dollop of grease (for free) to lube it with. In the afternoon I ride around the "Chicuito Circuit" a scenic tourist circuit with a Panoramic view, at one point, that is close to perfect (pic below).

People in this part of the world can still just buy a plot of land and build a house on it, all around Bariloche this is happening, really cute timber houses going up everywhere. This really should be possible in the UK as well, there is plenty of land, it`s a normal aspiration (or it ought to be). Bariloche is not as touristy as I thought it would be, it´s a real town "under the covers" and so useful for the few things that I need. They have the padded trousers that I wanted (at an industrial clotheing shop) but not at a price I want to pay....

On the last day I join Roberto and Diana for a kite flying afternoon that they have organised. Diana was an English teacher (her English is perfect) but now teaches kite making to teachers (so they can make kites in the classroom). This part of town is quite poor, the houses are little more than shacks, this is surprising as Bariloche seems to be wealthy (it is a ski town after all and mostly looks like it, very snazzy in parts). The kite flying is to promote children`s rights, the kids are really enthusiastic but there is not too much wind to start with.

On the road to El Bolsen - watch out for GORT !!

The second "big push" South, to the Argentine border

The first day that I head out of Santiago I realise I`m making a mistake with my route, but it seems too late to amend it. I really should have gone East from Santiago, over the Andes to Mendoza then down the famous Argentine Ruta 40. The Panamerica South (in Chile) is a proper two lane highway, and at 55kph I`m going far too slow for this road (like riding a moped down the M1....). Also, since La Serena I`ve had to pay tolls to use it (up until then motorbikes had been free on toll roads). There`s not too much to say about this 5 day trip down to Osorno, the weather was fairly bad and so I did not take ANY photos at all.

The first night I make it 267km to Talca with a very hairy start in Santiago`s subterranean expressways (I was in the way of dozens of buses and trucks and got hooted at, a lot !). I find a little guesthouse run by a Muslim family, the first that I`ve met in Central/South America. That evening while watching the news on TV a Catholic priest was explaining that February`s earthquake and some recent freak waves in La Serena (a few fishermen lost their cars...) were the result of the legalisation of abortion !!! (not in Chile...), instead of challenging this crackpot opinion the ¨anchorpeople¨ just nodded sagely (as if listening to pearls of wisdom...).

The second night is in Chillan. It starts to rain 5 minutes before I get there, so I have to stop and don waterproofs, which takes 20 minutes, and makes me swear. That night I try and find gloves and warm padded trousers in the shops there. I find some thick PVC gloves meant for unblocking drains (serial killer's gloves !) big enough to fit right over my normal gloves, but I can`t find the trousers.

The third night is in Victoria, where it again starts to rain 5 minutes before I get in. All the accomodation I`m staying in is Summer accomodation. I'm usually the only person there and there is never a heater, which means it's always cold and damp. Coming from Britain I'm used to it to a degree ! but it makes it hard going, I'm wearing ALL my layers almost ALL the time.

400km south of Santiago and there are plenty of signs of severe earthquake damage. In Chillan the very contemporary concrete cathedral is closed and the surface is covered in large cracks. Strangely, the worst effect seems to be on the overhead power lines to the main rail line that runs alongside the road. For about 300km they have been totally destroyed, just a tangled mess of steel spagetti !! I saw a couple of diesel trains on this route but nothing else, everyone & thing is going by road. But then a lot of road bridges had been destroyed as well, I crossed at least 5 or more temporary steel "Bailey" type bridges while nearby workers were swarming like ants over new concrete bridges. The earthquake was only in February, so I consider this to be quite impressive !!! It must be a little soul destroying working in an area like this, so much work and effort, destroyed in minutes...

Fourth night is in Mafil. I'm lucky to find anywhere here as it is a tiny town, but the people are friendly. Someone, who knows someone, finds me yet another outhouse to live in for the night !

On the fifth day I make it to Osorno, where I turn East towards Argentina. It`s now the first day of a 4 day national holiday (to celebrate Chile's bicenntenial). The flora has turned progressively greener on my way South from Santiago, it became UK like for a while, now it`s positively Scandiwegian ! Close to Osorno is an extraordinary site, the "perfect" white cone of the top of a volcano, "Volcan Osorno" (I thought at that point I'd see it again....but the weather had other ideas).....it's very evocative and has been compared, for splendour, with Mount Fuji, I wish I had a photo...

Next day, in Osorno, everything is closed and I have scurry about to find enough to eat. Just as I am packing up the bike it starts to rain. I mentally "fold" and decide to stay on another day. I watch the celebrations in Santiago on TV, they looked very spectacular, they do a lot of "projectors on buildings" displays over here, they are really brilliant, so creative, plus fab fireworks . That night there is a power cut all evening and I'm the only one in the hostel, the hostel lady has given me her daughter`s netbook to keep me busy (very trusting of her), but no power, no wi-fi, so not too much use...

I was not so impressed with Chile when I first arrived (I think now it was only because it was not Bolivia) but it has grown on me to a large extent. I like this "lakes area" it`s a place where there is plenty of space and people just quietly get on with their lives, largely unaccosted by government or other constraints. I complained, before, when I was not "picked-up" when I broke down, unfair really, as if I tried the same in the UK I´d have probably been stuck on the roadside for days !!  So I´m sad to be leaving Chile.

I head for Argentina !  Stamping out of Chile takes 5 minutes ! Then I have to cross a pass. It's quite a low one at 1500m but it does not feel that way. Half way up it starts to rain, then the rain turns to snow, then heavy snow. I get colder and colder and I am close to praying that the bike does not conk out up here. At the top there is banked up thick snow (pictured), it seems incredible I was in the Atacama desert just 3 weeks before...

In Argentina, at the border, the bike gets 6 months (temp import) and I get 3 months (tourist visa), it gets to stay longer than I do !!  They ask for my bike insurance as it is mandatory in Argentina, but as I don`t have any, they allow me to transit to the next town to buy it. It's 20, very wet, kilometers to Villa Angostura, a ski resort !! While I´m riding around town, in the rain and the dark, I don´t see a Monster pothole, I fall into it, and bang goes the final luggage rack weld ! By luck I find a hostel that accepts my dollar bills (I tried all the cashpoints in town but no cigar), and joy of joy, they have central heating ! the room is beautifully warm with just me in it, I hang up everything and dry out, heaven !

Valparaiso & Santiago

Valparaiso is all steep narrow streets, steps, and old run-down buildings. Because of this I cannot find a hostel with a secure place for my bike, for the first time it has to say out on the street (which I was expecting at some point). In fact, the streets are a Byzantine Maze of hills and one-way systems, so finding anything is an accomplishment !  Every morning there is a thick fog until about 11am and the ships in the harbour all toot their horns, it really adds to the atmosphere. And that atmosphere is one of faded glory, Valparaiso is one of the few decent ports on this entire Western coast of South America. Before the Panama canal opened in 1914 it saw most of the tall ships before, or after, they rounded Cape Horn. The gently muldering tin buildings are mostly under a protected status, so the whole city has a run down air. It´s now the "cultural centre" of Chile, which appears to mean a lot of students and musicians live here, there is also a lot of talented graffiti around. There is a whole street dedicated to Salvadore Allende (there appears to be in Chile a sense of "collective guilt" about what happened to Salvadore Allende (he was the left-leaning president of Chile who "apparently" commited suicide just after Pinochet´s (CIA backed....) coup in 1973), his image is everywhere represented in sculpture and murals etc...). The horrible irony of it all is that Pinochet`s regime was very sucessful for Chile`s economy, which is still doing well.

I needed to get my bike serviced again, to this end I found a "Moto Shop" at the back of town. The old boy spent the whole time telling me about his bike racing days in the 60´s and 70´s, I get to see all the trophies but I don´t think he was really listening ! This was borne out later when I picked it up, it was beautifully clean ! but not much else seemed to have been done (he seemed to have slackened the chain instead of tightening it up, I put it down to my bad Spanish).




At the hostel I am the only one staying there. This has become the "norm" now as I realise I have gone far enough South enough for it to be the off season ! (late Winter / early Spring). After two days of "chores" I decide on a day of touristing. I take the harbour tour and go right past a RN frigate, it seems a bit odd, they are a long way from home !! Then I take a bus out to "Pablo Neruda´s favourite house". It would be anyone´s favourite house, an absolutely beautiful small scale timber house, in a perfect seaside spot, stuffed full of interesting antiques (like the various figureheads from wrecked wooden ships) and preserved, totally, since 1973. I could move in tomorrow !  In the garden is an old rusty steam tractor made by "Ransomes, Ipswich" (Amazing ! if your from Suffolk...).

The only picture I got of Santiago (weather was not too good)

I moved on to Santiago. It´s a huge, modern, metropolis with everything that goes with it...... Finding a hostel was again difficult, eventually I settled for the "Happy House Hostel" (they would not call it that in the UK !!). As, again, I´m almost the only person there I get to know the staff quite well and they are friendly (and a little bored). The original HHH was partially destroyed in February´s earthquake. Otherwise, there is not too much visible earthquake damage in Santiago, except for a few walls supported by scaffolding here and there. There is another English guy staying at the hostel of around the same age who, coincidentally enough, had the same plan ! and started in Mexico in November last year (though we had not met til now). It´s strangely reassuring when he tells me that, he also, has been plagued by health issues, parasites, the works. He is flying home having had enough (and giving up on Patagonia for now). I did not want to tell him but he had a distinctly yellowish tinge !

Everyone "Fly´s the Flag" in Chile, that flag is everywhere, on everything. I asked about this and it turns out that it´s an unrepealed law from the time of "the generals". You have to, by law, fly the flag. Sounds like a dodgy helping of patriotism to me. I´m also told that the fastest & easiest way to get a mortgage in Chile is to have a bad credit record, so you can prove a good chance of defaulting !! Sound familiar ? It seems the lessons of sub-prime have not been learnt....

I definitely liked Santiago, as cities go it had everything you could need. In 5 days it will be Chile´s Bicentennial (200 years since independence), this is going to be a huge event. I´m tempted to stay, but 5 more days in a rainy city, that seems a bit empty, does not really appeal. And I don´t want to be on the Panamericana Sur (South of Santiago) on a 4 day holiday (that will be the equivalent of Xmas, traffic wise).

Across the Atacama....

I kind of realise that I´m a bit "late", I wanted to be in Santiago the last week in August and I´m over 1700km away and there´s just 2 days of August left !!  I decide to go as far and "fast" as I can...

Wild camping in the desert, there's not too much else out there....

In 2 days I make it Antofagasta (back on the Panamericana, to the West of Chile), once again, camping in the desert overnight, and it was freezing !  At least -5 dec C, everything froze, including the dew on the inside of the tent which, when the sun is on the tent, immediately thaws and drips water on me, sort of an unpleasant alarm clock !
Antofagasta is a big busy  town and I don´t even bother stopping (which is a mistake) as the next stretch is the longest, hardest and most isolated. There is nowhere to buy food and I´m forced to have a cold night with no supper at all.

Next day I´m away early and pass a sign that says "Tropic of Capricorn", I´m out of the tropics !  Then something weird happens, I see a cloud ! , the temperature drops, more clouds, it starts to drizzle, a strong wind picks up & I´m suddenly very cold. It becomes WINTER !!! just hours after the leaving tropics !!  In retrospect I think it, possibly, had more to do with the Humboldt current, a cold water Antarctic current that closes the coast, right about here....
 

Beach at Chañaral

I´m forced to stop at Chañaral as I need a shower and a proper bed. This part of Chile is exactly the same as Western Australia to me, even the clapboard houses are identical, and, of course, the 100´s of open-cast mines around here (not sure what Chile is going to do when it runs out of the Chile that it can dig up and sell !!). Next day is a great run along the coast, in the afternoon I pass through Copiapo where 33 miners are currently stuck underground, but I don´t see the San Jose mine, where they are.

South of Copiapo there is a fence running alongside the road on both sides, dammit ! how am I going to camp ?  They have only just finished making the fence so there are occasional holes where the fence workers can get through. I exploit one of these for the night, but realise, it´s not going to be so easy from now on....Not really sure why the fence is there ? who is it intended for ? me ?   It rains all night.

In the morning I take a pic of the desert in bloom, lots of Chileans are also taking pictures, so it must be quite a rare event. It´s 300km to La Serena, I want to get there in one day (it will be my longest day) and have a "day off". What a day though, so tiring & cold, at about 5pm it starts raining hard (for the first time), so I reach for my $15 Peruvian Trawlerman´s waterproofs (I´ve been carrying since Lima) and carry on. They are quite a good fit ! but my boots and gloves are not waterproof, and soon drenched. Then it gets dark, with 80km still to go....

My worst fear occurs ! In the driving rain, and dark, the engine cuts out !  I now have to assume that the bike is not weather tight !! (I hired a Russian made "Minsk", 6 years ago, in Vietnam, and it cut out in heavy rain as well....). I think there must be an electrical problem and I am not amused !! Fortunately, I´m on my way down a big pass, so I freewheel about 10-15km. When gravity runs out, there is a restaurant !! After a black coffee, with plenty of sugar (for me !) the bike starts and runs fine !! I then make a very poor decision, to ride the 57km to La Serena in the dark (as it´s stopped raining). A truely terrible trip, the road is busy with big lorries and buses, I can´t see a thing, I´m freezing cold and wet. After 10 minutes the engine problem returns, and returns very 10 minutes all the way to La Serena, where I sputter into 3 hours later. Fortunately I find a very welcoming guesthouse quite quickly, and thaw and dry out, I shall never attempt a dark, rainy night again. It takes 2 hours just to hang everything up, wet sleeping bag too ! Fortunately, the next day is sunny and dry.
In the morning when I show the "guesthouse guy" how to move my bike, should he need to (it´s in his workshop) I see he has already moved it and broken the luggage rack weld !!! I have to bite my tongue....

White sand beach just South of La Serena

I have a much needed day off in La Serena, and it´s now only 475km to Santiago. I change the oil on the bike.  I assume that as it´s been inside for 2 days it will have dried off and will work OK. So I set off down the road, again. After 40km it conks out !! I give it 10 mins then try again, it works for 5km and conks out. Then 1km. Then 800m. Then 300m. What is going wrong ??

 I assume water has got into the carburetter, so on the roadside (not easy!) I take it apart, clean it all, put it back together. There´s no fix. I take the tank and seat off and clean all the electrical cables (the bloody handbook says there is a magneto, I find that it´s electronic ignition !!). Still no fix, I am well and truley stuck !! What happens next is what I half expected. I make an attempt to flag down every pick-up that drives past with the intention of getting a ride back to La Serena (with the bike). I try this for 3 hours, all I get is sunburn !!! There were 100s of pick-ups, every second car.  I did not think Chileans would stop, and they don´t. I´m just about to give up when two fairly drunk fishermen in the worst, rustiest pickup I´ve seen all day, stop !! and pick me up, with the bike.  They give me a very hairey, fast ride back to Coqimbo, 8km short of La Serena (with 2 of us on the one passenger seat), I give them $10 for gasolina. They drop me off at a moto mechanic´s place.  After just 5 minutes, this excellent mechanic, spots the problem, and I CAN´T BELIEVE WHAT IT IS !!  Somehow, just as it started to rain, the filler cap had become air-tight  !!  All I would have had to do to fix the problem was open the tank, and release the vacuum !!  The rain was a red-herring all along.......I´m happy that´s it a simple problem, but very cross with myself too. I´d had the fuel tank right off the bike but had not opened the filler !!

Two more days going South and I finally arrive at Valparaiso, my destination. I was not able to camp anywhere, there was a strong fence running alongside the road, the whole way. During this time the desert becomes green and verdant, the Atacama is over !!. In the last few hours I ride over a high pass and the temperature rises dramatically and the sun comes out. There are vinyards !! I am, it seems, in a mediterranean micro-climate !!  Which is a relief as I thought it was just going to keep getting colder and wetter.