Hi all from Ushuaia!
After I sent the last email, we went and picked up my repaired visor- great success and only 30 pesos (CAN$12). With 2 bolts on each side holding the old hinges to the new piece of polycarbonate, I call it the frankenvisor. It´ll work until we get home...
From Rio Gallegos (Santa Cruz province, Argentina) to Rio Grande (Tierra del Fuego province, Argentina), there are 4 border crossings and a ferry boat ride, because a chunk of the southern tip of the continent is Chile, like a big bite out of Argentina. We topped up the bikes and spare tank in Rio Gallegos and boycotted the Chilean gas (which is 2x as expensive) but had to have a meal at the ferry terminal. It is kind of crazy how much more expensive things are in Chile than Argentina, now that we are used to the Argentine prices. So for a days travel, we had an out of Argentine border crossing, then into Chile crossing (they aren´t simultaneous, or even in the same building for that matter), getting people and bike paperwork done at each stop, then a 30 minute ride on pavement, a 30 minute ferry ride, followed by 150 km dirt ride and then an out of Chile crossing and into Argentina crossing again. Lots of paperwork for a 4 hour passage through Chile. We´ll have to repeat again to get back as you cannot go overland to or from Tierra del Fuego without entering Chile. The ferry ride was very rough, but apparently this was a mild day with only 50 km/hr winds. The ferry sails in up to 90 km/hr winds. Glad we missed a rough day.... we wanted to stay on the deck to make sure the bikes didn´t fall over but had to get above the deck for some fresh air so we didn´t turn green. Saw these crazy little black and white dolphins- Commersons dolphins, I think they are called- swimming alongside the boat. We should see more on the east coast on our way North again.
The ride to Ushusia was great, but pretty chilly. A week ago, the temps here were in the 20s but a cold front came in and it was 3 degrees here when we arrived , but it warmed up to, and has stayed at, around 10-15 degrees since then. The mountain pass coming into town was beautiful- the mountains are so close and the air is so clear. Saw some unique Lenga forests that are covered by "old mans beard" moss. Ushuaia itself is kind of a wierd town. It is a large-ish city with a small touristy area downtown and milling about is a mix of a few locals and lots of tourists. There are 2 goups of tourists, devided roughly into those who have arrived overland (backpackers and, well, motorcyclists) and the cruise ship softies-the white puffy jackets give them away. The overlanders are dirtier, I mean, more rugged-looking in comparison. Prices here are very expensive for the cruise ship set, and also probably due to the remoteness of the place. The national park is filled with very easy walks off the main road, so that the tour buses can drop off the cruisers for a 200 meter hike to a viewpoint, but the park really can´t hold a candle to some of the other stuff (less accessible) that we´ve seen in Patagonia. Don´t get me wrong, the town is very pretty- mountains surround the town, which surrounds the harbour, but the best places we´ve seen in Patagonia are no where near as accessible as most of the sights we´ve seen in Ushuaia. This trip has befinitely been about the journey but still, the fact that it is the end of the road, after 10,000km and 2 months from Lima, makes it is a very special place for us. We made it!
We rested our first day here, toured the Park and surrounding area the next day and did bike maintenance and laundry and some travel planning today. The travel north through Patagonia should be faster as we are taking the paved road up the east coast.
Gotta pack up and get to bed for our big travel day tomorrow, so we´ll sign off.
Cheers all,
Scott and Pam
Hi all,
Okay, got a bit of time to finish off the last update. We were heading to El Chalten, which is around 100 km off of Ruta 40. When we arrived at the junction, it was really blowing quite hard, as much as it had been blowing the whole time we´d been on 40. To get to El Chalten, we need to turn west, into a 60-80 km/hr headwind. But we were pleasantly surprised to find that the road was freshly paved! What a treat. So we blast down the road at 70 km/hr and the headwind is much easier to deal with with good pavement under our tires, but is still quite tricky. However, about 40 km along, we find that they are actually still in the process of paving the road and we find ourselves directly downwind of the sand pit they are excavating for the road work and there is sand blowing across the road in this ripping wind!! Now, we have run into these little sandy bits before and I usually take a deep breath and exhale as I ride through- the sand blows inside your helmet so breathing in is not a good idea. But as I finish exhaling, I still can´t see the end of the sand!!!! So I stop to put my head down and take a breath and look behind me, under my arm, and Scott is doing the same. Since this is so unexpected, and the visibility is so bad, I decide to turn around and retreat and as I ride by Scott, who is maneuvering to do the same, a huge gust of wind comes along and blows him right over!!! With our bikes fully loaded, neither of us can pick our bikes up on our own so I need to go back on foot but the only place to park the bike is on the pavement (the shoulder is sandy and unstable and my bike would blow over too). So I flag down a SUV heading towards us on the road and he puts his flashers on, so hopefully no one else will drive into the sand storm and into the KLR and I run back to help Scott pick up his bike. Then the poor guy in the SUV gets out in T-shirt and shorts to try to help us (at least we have kevlar and helmets on). We get the bike upright before he can get there, so we holler “gracias” at him but I would be surprised if he could hear us through our helmets and the wind. We retreated to a hut for the construction workers (actually an ashphalt testing lab in a portable container) and evaluate the situation.... The guys in the testing lab are laughing at us but like the bikes so they let us stay for a while.
We ended up wrapping t-shirts and hankerchiefs around our necks and mouths, sealing the helmet so hopefully sand can´t get inside and we set off again, but after Scott takes off, I go to leave and I have got sand inside the sidestand kill switch cable (bike won´t go forward with sidestand down, for safety) and it thinks the stand is down when it is up so I stall about 5 times before figuring it out and shaking/rattling the cable to let it release the kill switch. By now, Scott has figured out that I haven followed him and tries to turn around to come back for me and guess what, the wind blows him over again!!! Its pretty comical as I type it now but at the time, I was like “why are we braving this hostile environment to go to this place again???”. Ah right, Mt. Fitzroy, the Holy Grail for a climber like Scott and the only place he said he really wanted to see in all of South America. So, once we are both upright and mobile again, we head back into the sandstorm and ride through the other side, both of us keeping a close eye out for each other blowing over. And we made it to the other side. But then, another 15 km down the road, the pavements runs out and there is a crappy desvio with deep gravel. Very difficult to ride in under good conditions and virtually impossible with this crazy wind. We are beat. So close and yet so far away but it is 7 pm and we aren´t sure whether we can make it, period, never mind making it before dark. We gave up and went back to Ruta 40 to a yucky-looking hotel near the junction but they had no rooms but he let us camp in their backyard, which was surrounded by trees for a wind-break. By this time, the sun is low in the sky and our visors are difficult to see through. But not because they are dirty, per usual, but because they are SANDBLASTED!!!! As are the fronts of our bikes and our teeth as well. Problem is that we only have one replacement visor for our helmets. We made an easy cheesy pasta dinner and fell fast asleep. Next day is –surprise, surprise- high winds again. The road we had to travel on between the junction and the place we stayed is actually one big desvio too with large round pebbles for the bikes to swim through and since we don´t even want to face that chunk of road, never mind the road to El Chalten, so we carry on down Ruta 40 to the turn off to El Calafate and we.... rented a car. Yes, we completely gave up and rented a car and went to El Chalten on 4 wheels. The rental company stored the bikes in the warehouse and we hit the road in the evening, after the wind died down and we kicked ourselves the whole way for not trying it again on bikes. Ah well, it was nice to travel and talk and not have to pack up everything so carefully and the only accomodation we could find was in a hostal where we had to share a room with a couple of Irish girls so the secure car was a nice change. Get this, the car was a Volkwagon Gol, not a Golf, but a smally and crummier sibling, the Gol. Hilarious.
We were extremely lucky the next day and awoke to no wind and clear blue skies in El Chalten. We could see the peak of Mt. Fitzroy from town and we hiked 10 km into the glaciar at the foot of Cerro Torre and it was perfectly clear too- from the people we have talked to on the road, it is a very rare ocurrence for Cerro Torre not to be cloaked in clouds. By 3:30 the clouds rolled in and covered the mountains up but by then we had been staring at them all day. People wait weeks for a glimpse, so we felt very privileged to spend the whole day staring at it. Really an awesome day, but to do a 20 km hike in running shoes (we have no room for hiking boots) on a rugged trail after 2 months of little/no excercise (except for picking up tipped over bkes, that is) is not the best idea. But a little pain for a great gain, we´d do it all over again for the experience. Next day, we did a little walk into a waterfall near town before heading back to El Calafate to return the car and pick up the bikes and head to a campsite nearby the Perito Moreno Glaciar. Next am, we get to the glaciar, expecting to spend a couple of hours then head to Rio Gallegos the same day, but it is so awesome that we ended up staying pretty much all day. The glaciar is one of the few advancing glaciars in the world, which means that more snow and ice feeds into it each year than melts or sublimates away. It looks to be 4 different valleys pushing glaciars into this one canal, which then pushed out into an arm of Lago Argentino. Every so often, the glaciar completely dams the arm of the river until dam can no longer support the weight of the lake behind it and it collapses. This has only happened 15 times since 1917 and I think the last time was in 1988, but the glaciar has now pushed across to the near shore and there is only a small opening under an icy bridge allowing water to pass, so the next time could be soon.... something for you all to think about for next year?? While we were there, we saw the glaciar “calve” a couple of times- this is when large chunks break off from the glaciar and crash into the water. The glaciar is so huge and very blue so the sight in amazing but equally as impressive is the sound of the ice cracking and groaning as it flows imperceptibly towards you. Very awesome experience. So we only made it back to El Calafate that night where we sent the last email and ate some great parrilla- El Calafate is quite an incredible collection of conveniences after the desolation of Ruta 40 for several days.
Next day, our arrival in Rio Gallegos (connected to El Calafate by paved roads) was somewhat delayed by our 3rd flat tire of the trip, this time it was Scotts though. I can tell you that we are getting very efficient at changing these things now and I was only too happy to have a flat in a place where there were no sandstorms, even if there was a bit of rain. Today is meant to be “change the oil” day but here we are at the internet place as it is kinda rainy and we are trying to hold out for better weather. We also went to a motorcycle shop to find out that Shoei (brand of our helmets) does not seem to have an Argentinian distributor, so we took it to a glass/plastic shop the motorcycle guy recommended and they are going to try to screw a new piece of plexi to the hinges of my existing visor after the cut out the center part (we have only 1 replacement visor with us and now have 2 equally wrecked sandblasted visors so if they completely mess it up, we are no worse off than before). If this doesn´t work, we´ll have to figure out getting one shipped to us from Canada.
S, we should be in Ushuaia within 2 travel days, if all goes according to plan. My mom looked up our latitude in El Calafate and it is as far south as Smithers is north. It starts to get dark around 10:30 and there is still some light in the sky around 11pm. It isn´t very warm, although it is summer here, but you can expect 4 seasons in one day. Yesterday it was hot, then poured rain for an hour then cleared up and was overcast. Would you believe that I bought a bikini here, only 600 km away from the most southern-most town in South America, as close as you can get to the South pole in the continent? There is a factory here that makes them and I figure I will need to work on my tan (i.e. grow my freckles together) when we get back to Vina del Mar for the couple of days after the bikes ship out, before we come home. Clothes like the type we would buy at home (non-local style) is about half the price of similar clothes at home, although this is still quite pricey for most Argentinians (expensive compared to the cost of living here). We like Argentina, it is cheaper and seems to be more friendly than Chile, although we haven´t been north of Patagonia yet. Our plan after we make it to Ushuaia is to zip north up the east coast of Patagonia via paved Ruta 3 and then cross back to the west side of the country to see this side of the Andes in the Argentinian Lake district before crossing back to Chile just before the bikes ship home from Vina del Mar.
Okay, the oil changes await and we can´t put it off any longer.... Cheers all!
Scott and Pam
Hi all,
We have arrived in the Patagonian oasis of El Calafate where there is plentiful restaurants, banks and internet/call centers so we can bring you up to date a bit, but I don´t know if I can do it all in one sitting. See how it goes….
We last left you in Coyhaique. After relaxing there for a few days, we headed back out onto the Carretera Austral. The first day back on the road was pretty much clear, definitely less rain than we had been having before but very cold. In fact, I was wearing all my warm clothing and was concerned that I would need to get more to go further south. I understand that this is a “La Nina” year and so the temps are lower than is normal all over. We have also seen pics of the snow in Vancouver so this seems to confirm it (snow in Van???? Quick, everybody drive their cars with their summer tires on….) Anyways, we drove around the Lago General Carerra instead of taking the ferry, this takes a few more days but was well worth it! The lake is hard to stop staring at, it is turquoise. We stopped in Puerto Tranquilo to see the Marble Caves- lots of natural marble in this area and there are islands of marble in the lake that have caverns underneath them, seemingly caused by erosion from waves on the lake (fairly windy across the lake. I didn´t know that marble was soft enough to be eroded by water in this way…. Anyways, for 3 bucks each, we took a small boat (coach boat size for the reference of the rowers receiving this email) out to several small islands with huge cathedral-like openings underneath them. Very neat, especially with the amazing turquoise-blue water surrounding you. The next day we completed the trip around the lake, leaving the Carretera Austral for the road over the Paso de Los Llaves, the road to Chile Chico, a town next to the Argentine border. The road is very narrow, very twisty and was very fun, high above the far side of the huge lake, which turns from turquoise to darker blue as it approaches the Argentine border. The colour change is fitting as it also changes names to Lago Buenos Aires over the border in Argentina. This was also our first taste of wind on dirt roads. And this wind, it turns out, wasn´t even that strong….
The next morning, not knowing what the facilities would be like on the other side of the border, we did some banking in Chile Chico and headed to Argentina. Turns out there was nothing to worry about though, a bank machine that was happy to take our cards and dispense Argentine pesos greeted us at the first small town, Los Antiguos. The border crossing was very simple, one line-up for people papers and one line-up for bike papers and we were on our way (stamp, stamp, gracias, ciau). We loaded up with some groceries in the town of Perito Moreno and started out in the early evening on Ruta 40 to an estancia 25km from town, where we camped. The first 25 km were not very easy- very high winds and construction to pave the road meant we had to travel on the terrible “desvio” or detour road for 15 km or so. We figure they get some Bolivian road engineers to come down and build the desvios for them as they are almost as bad as the roads (or lack thereof) that we encountered in Bolivia- invariably, there is some deep gravel and sand and with the high winds, it is a bit unnerving. But the regular Ruta 40 dirt road was fine.
All along Ruta 40 we found estancias open for tourism. These seem to all be working farms, usually sheep farms, that have rooms in the house and camping in the yard and serve dinners, breakfasts, etc. They aren´t hotels and restaurants, they´re farm houses where you can eat the dinner meal with everyone else, or make your own if you prefer.
The second day, we stopped in Bajo Caracoles at the gas station (and by this I mean the only gas station that reliably has gas for the next 350km of Ruta 40). There were a couple of Swiss guys there on a XR650 and KLR600 when we arrived and by the time we finished lunch, there were a total of 7 bikes out front, including an old BMW with Beautiful BC plates! This was ridden by a guy from Williams Lake- he rode it all the way down (minus Darien Gap, of course). Very nice guy, heading North again after having spent Christmas and New Years in Ushuaia. He is a photographer and has some amazing pics from his trip at http://www.amaradosphoto.com/GallGen.htm, if you feel like surfing. He said it was weird to be heading North after heading South for so long-all the way down, he could tell people he was going ”South, all the way”, but now he isn´t sure where to tell people where he is heading when they ask….
That night, we stayed at an estancia recommended by the Swiss guys and had dinner there- roast lamb and potatoes and several salads and veggie casserole and a fruit salad with at least 10 different fruits in it for dessert. Really, really good, and as much as we could eat, it was put in front of us. There was a French family staying at the estancia that night too and I found that I can no longer speak French properly. My French vocabulary is now hopelessly mixed up with my new Spanish vocab that I have been trying desperately to expand over the last 2 months. I will be enlisting the help of my French-speaking friends to help straighten this back out when I get home. But the funny thing is that we were hanging out with an Italian guy touring Argentina on a rented Honda Transalp the other day and he spoke some French, some Spanish, but only a little English, so when we were talking, it wasn´t a big deal to speak in half-French-half-Spanish, because he was doing the same thing too…..
The next day, we tried to go to El Chalten, to see Mt Fitzroy. We eventually got there…. I have to save that story for my next update though as this report is getting far too long and it is dinner time (10 pm in Argentina). We should be in Ushuaia within a few days and I´ll be sure to send an email from the most Southern city….
Cheers all,
Scott and Pam
P.S. Happy Birthday Dad!!
Hi All,
Happy New Year!
We hung out for a while in the Villarrica/Pucon area and had clear, warm weather on New Years day for a ride up volcano Villarrica to the ski area there. Very fun riding around in the dirt and we had great views of the lake and the surrounding mountains in the area. Getting air at the gas station back in Pucon, a German guy came up to check out Scotts bike- turns out he is touring on a DR800 (Scotts DR600´s big brother) with his girlfriend on a Honda Tenere. He has been travelling for 4 years and she with he for 2. So 3 months is a cakewalk in this context. We compared notes about crossing SW Bolivia and they had a crazy time of it too. It sounds like she is completely through with the whole off-road scene and leaning towards trading the bikes in on a minivan or something to keep travelling in. It isn´t Bolivia fault, they´ve just been at it for so long and I can see where they are coming from. After a while, it is tiring to have to find a new cranny for every new thing you pick up on the road, like a battery charger or a pair of flip flops and when you are travelling for a long time, you need more of these little creature comforts than you can do without on a shorter trip like ours. Easier to pack stuff in a 4-wheel vehicle for sure. Other than chatting with them over beers, ours was a pretty quiet New Years. There were a few fireworks at the beach and a band, but pretty mellow all in all.
Next day, we loaded up and headed out of town for the nearby National Park and a trail starting in it that passes between the volcano we were on the other day and another one nearby with several hot spring areas along the way. The 8 km of the trail that was within the park was quiet challenging, particularly with the bikes fully loaded and the new oil in Scotts bike messing with his clutch a bit, but a fun satisfying ride with the road all to ourselves as everyone else slept off New Years hangovers. We stopped at one of the hotsprings with a beautiful waterfall and a family there invited us to have some of their asado (BBQ). Janet and other vegetarians will want to stop reading until the astrix below*. The asado was a half a goat on a stake over an open fire. How do we know it was goat? Well, the other half of the goat was hanging from a nearby tree by his rear hoof and his innards and head were under the tree, around the corner from the picnic area. Poor little goat was probably alive when he got to the picnic area and thought he was on an outing with the family. But before we noticed the rest of him, we were offered some of his cooked half and he was actually pretty yummy. We smelled like BBQ afterwards though and the smell of him combined with the memory of him looking up at us from under the tree was a bit much. 2005 did not treat him well.
*Next day we poked around the Lake District some more, lots of roads off the highways and cool dirt roads around the backside of beautiful lakes surrounded by amazing mountains. We had fantastic weather too and it was hot. We camped right on the shores of Lake Llanquihue and next day headed for Puerto Montt to suss out the Chiloe-Chaiten ferry situation. You never know if you are getting the right info at tourist info places, but if you ask at 3 or 4 places and get pretty much the same answer each time, you have a 90% chance of it actually being correct. And Puerto Montt had…. MacDonalds! One more familiar lunch before we head off the beaten track. A 20 minute ferry ride from a port 60 km outside of Puerto Montt took us to the northern end of Chiloe Island. This ferry was more like the Albion ferry and less like the Titicaca ferry, thank goodness. We stayed in Castro, in the middle of Chiloe Island. The highway from the northern tip was completely overgrown on both sides of the road with tons of flowering English Broom. Who spreads that stuff around the world, I wonder? Anyways, it was a bit of a shame because you couldn’t even see over it.
We had a day to spare before the first ferry of the year from Chiloe to Chaiten, the start of the Carretera Austral, so we took a day trip to a tiny little nearby Island, Isle Lemuy, which only has dirt roads and very hilly terrain- true rolling hills. And it poured rain, so that turned out to be good training for the CA- our training so far has mostly consisted of drinking Austral beer, which we also did that night, for good measure. The next day, after all our hard “training”, we woke up at noon and did a bit of shopping and got down to the port for our ferry ride at 4pm. The ferry was late and crossing was a full 7 or so hours and we arrived in Chaiten around midnight to find a hostal just as the rain started to POUR. I mean hard. Next day was better though and we took a ride up to Park Pumalin, just north of Chaiten. This park is privately owned by the guy who founded Esprit and North Face. I guess he got sick of the business world, started cashing in his options and buying up chunks of pristine forest land from farmers who were having marginal success at farming and contemplating selling the land and timber to the logging companies. After a while, he has amassed hundreds of thousands of hectares and the government starts getting worried about the fact that a gringo is holding all this land and starts questioning his intentions. Never mind that he is trying to give the land back to the government to preserve as a sanctuary. Anyways, he ends up realizing that Conaf (Chile´s park and forest department) doesn’t really have the resources to do with this land what he wants to see happen, so he turns it into a private park with amazing amenities like beautiful carved wooden signage and trail systems and beautiful private campsites (reasonably priced) and a high class café serving organic meals (less reasonably priced but a treat). Very different than any other Chilean park we have been to so far. I also suspect that his ownership of this massive amount of land, including any areas that would be suitable for a highway to connect Puerto Montt with Chaiten and the Carretera Austral is the reason why a ferry from PM or Chiloe is the only way to get there. Interesting story and beautiful area, but under threat of another heavy rainfall that night, we decided to have lunch and continue back on south, back through Chaiten and to La Junta. We also skipped a planned side trip to Futaleufu and river rafting for now as it is a bit cold and rainy and we hope to be coming back across from the eastern side of Argentina nearby Futaleufu so hopefully we´ll catch it then, on our way back north. Next day we had a long day to get to Coihaique on some paved but mostly dirt roads, some steep and wet through stunning mountains and beautiful lakes and inlets- the terrain varied a lot throughout the day. It is really gorgeous and rugged here, we only wish the weather was a bit more clear because we can tell how beautiful it must be-I mean, it is pretty amazing with the cloud cover so is probably breathtaking on a clear day. However, judging by the geography and the size and numbers of rivers in the area, I doubt there are too many clear days. This is a true rainforest, similar to home but with bamboo and monkey puzzle trees growing in the woods with the pines and alerces.
We did have a couple of minor mishaps on this leg of the trip, but nothing serious. In one place towards the end of the day before we arrived in Coihaique, they are doing some work on the sketchier bits of the Carretera Austral and a flag person waved us through but her partner sort of leapt up to wave at us and say “hola” and Scott though she was shouting at him to stop, so he jams on the brakes and stops short just as I am turning to wave at them. I looked back in time to swerve and avoid him with my bike but I took off a saddle bag in the process, right in the middle of the road. Quite comical actually that the only run-in we´ve had so far is with each other (knocking on wood as I type this). Anyways, we velcro the sucker back on and no harm done. We also noticed that I was losing air in my rear tire at a increasing rate. We made it through the last leg of the trip to Coihaique by stopping about 5 or 6 times, every 40, then 30 then 20 km to pump it back up. Changing out the tube at the hostal the next day, I am tightening everything up at the end of the job and manage to slip with an allen wrench and rip a fingernail off. Shockingly ugly and painful- I almost fainted, which I have never done in my life (I am not really the fainting type, as you all know). Not so bad now that we have it cleaned up but I had greasy bike filth all over my hands and nails at the time and had to clean it. So we are just chilling and enjoying Las Salamandras hostal (http://www.salamandras.cl/hosteria.htm) for a few days. It is a couple of kms out of town in a cozy log building in the middle of a pine forest with a bunch of bedrooms and a loft filled with pillows and movies to watch, computer for internet and a communal kitchen- very laid back and comfortable place to rest before we head out again.
So, we plan to get to Chile Chico in a couple of days where we will cross over into Argentina at the start of Ruta 40 through Patagonia. Ruta 40 will take another couple of days to get us to El Chalten at the base of Mt. Fitzroy where Scott wants to hike into the Jim Bridwell base camp. Really not sure how much internet we will have for the next couple of weeks, but we´ll keep you posted!!
Cheers all,
Scott and Pam