Monday/Tuesday November 15 & 16, 2010 Bariloche, Argentina

 

 

 

 

This is NOT what I thought I had signed up for when I scheduled this trip almost a year ago.  This is WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY better than anything I could have possibly imagined!  This was not an inexpensive trip, but I’ve already used up my money’s worth of fun, and we’ve only been on the road for ONE day!!!!  I’m gonna wind up owing them more money if this keeps up.  The only unforeseen screw up had been entirely my doing.  I bought a helmet cam for this trip to take videos while on the road.   Well – I had the settings entirely wrong for the 1^st day.  I came back with “pictures” that were taken in 2 second intervals (about 2100 of them), and to top it all off, I had the lens in the wrong position, so all the picas were sideways!!  Once I put the SD card in the computer and realized my mistake, I was so PO’d that I just walked away in disgust.  I haven’t even seen them yet!  I’m sure there are some excellent pictures, but really, how dumb can you get?   Soy una persona muy estúpida.  (is that right Maddie?)

Our day from Pucon started en route to the border.  Crossing Chile was not a problem.  Getting into Argentina, on the other hand, seemed like crossing a time warp.  Everything in Chile is up to date with modern computers, satellite tracking, and friendly and efficient people.  The Argentine outpost is run with batteries, solar panels, and the military.  The internet is almost non-existent.  The problem arose with the support vehicle.  Our tour company had a new truck, and Argentina wanted to make sure the old unit hadn’t been sold in their country.  I guess I can understand that, but we shouldn’t have to be held up for 3 hours just because the tour company wants to upgrade their vehicles.  The old truck had already been sent back to Australia to be disposed of.  Oh well – we were warned the Argentine border crossing could be a problem.

We were 366 km from Pucon to Bariloche, and the road was either high class paved motorcycle twisties, or what is called the “ripio”, hard packed gravel that is a lot of cases wasn’t very hard packed.  Some of it almost felt like a motocross course it was so loose and rutted.  For a guy that hasn’t been on a dirt bike in some 40 years, I was very pleased with the way my limited skills returned to me.  The majority of the ripio was very dusty, and the only thing keeping you from going much more than about 45-50 was the dust almost created a “white-out” effect.  Other parts contained loose sand and gravel, with some very technical turns going hard up or down hills.  It was all a lot of fun for about 100 km.  After that, I was ready to say “no mas”.  BUT – the hard pavement was all clean of debris with some of the best curves I’ve ever encountered.  Put that together with a good group that really knew how to handle it all at about 120kph, and the most scenic landscapes you’ll ever come across.  We were traveling what is known as the “7 lakes drive”.  I can’t even begin to describe how beautiful it is with the green forests and fields sandwiched in between the dark blue lakes and the snow capped mountains.  The roads just zig-zagged the shores until we reached Bariloche.  And then we came to our cabins!  Even if the cabins were just OK, the views would have made up for it, but the accommodations were 1^st rate in every aspect.  Wait till you see the pictures.

….and I could go on, but it’s getting late, and we have a semi-early start tomorrow, so I must say “Buenos noches”