A week in Buenos Aires!!

Buenos Aires was one of the cities we were most excited to come to but after staying a while we both decided that we hated big cities and wanted to get out. We had a lot to get done though, one of which was a Brazilian visa.  We thought we would be smart and head to BA on a Monday giving us the entire work week to get our Visas taken care of so we could carry onto Brazil.  It might have been a good idea for us to check the calendar before going with this plan as upon arrival to the embassy on Monday AM we realized that both Monday and Tuesday were state holidays!!  Perfect!!  That left us with only 3 days to get our Visas, a process which in Canada takes 3 weeks.  Much to our surprise the process only took 1 day and it was half the price that it would have cost in Canada. Sure happy we got it done here!   One thing that cheered us up on Monday was that we were able to catch up with our English travelling companions one last time.  Knowing it would likely be the last time we’d meet up we decided to head out for a big dinner which landed us at an all you can eat Asado (BBQ) restaurant called “Siga la Vaca” or follow the cow! It was pretty great to catch up with them one last time and the food was pretty good too!!   

During the week we thought we might as well spend some time visiting the sights and with Tuesday another holiday, traffic was pretty light so we decided to rent bikes to see the city. We started in La Boca which is one of the poorer parts of the city. We actually met a guy who went off of the tourist street and came back to the hostel with two black eyes! Having David as the map reader we definitely spent a ton of time off of the touristy streets and were really lucky that we didn’t come back with a few shiners of our own! We saw one of the Boca Juniors soccer stadium (home to Maradona) in this area and tons of colourful buildings, tango dancers, artwork and lovely outdoor restaurants situated along the famous “Caminito” walking street.  We biked around for a few more hours visiting a pile of the city’s main attractions like the ritzy neighbourhood of Recoleta, the lush green parks in Palermo, as well as the “Floralis Generica” (a giant metal flower, which closes at night like a real flower!!  Wow, huh?) and the incredible buildings of the faculty of law and engineering before heading back to the hostel to get geared up for the Tango show we were planning to see. 

The Tango show was pretty pectacular as well.  It was a combination of a dinner, tango lesson and show in much the same setting as a dinner theater back home.  The lesson was David’s favourite part seeing as there we 3 times more girls than guys there, so the rule was that guys had to switch partners every few minutes to involve those girls that didn’t have partners!!!  The dancing in the show was great to see, but both of us were just as intrigued (if not more) by the member of the instrumental group playing a type of accordion every so enthusiastically.  All in all it was a wonderful evening.

After the first few days in BA we were ready to move on from the big city and hit the quiet beaches of Uruguay.  We had our Brazilian Visas in hand but there was still one thing holding us back… taking in a soccer match, which we held on the weekends. We ruled in favour of spending a couple of extra days waiting for the big game on Sunday.  We spent some time back on the subway (where David was the victim of 2 pickpocket attempts within 5 mintutes, once for the wallet, the other for the camera!!) revisiting some of the neighborhoods.   Dawne had a great time shopping at the trendy independent designer clothing shops in Palermo and along the busy street of Avenida Florida (where we were both suckered into buying new leather jackets!!). 

We also stopped in at the Cemetario de la Recoleta , which the final resting place of many of Argentina’s most prominent people, including Evita.  The place is a city of giant tombs and marble statues with walking streets allowing the people to weave their way through the sarcophagi.  Beunos Aires really has a ton to do and wasting time is not really much of an issue.  In addition to the city, we stayed in a massive hostel with plenty of activities and lots of tons of other travellers.  One of those travellers who happened to be a university friend of David’s from back home, Katheryn Christopher.  They were both pretty surprised to run into each other in BA!!  Seriously, what are the chances??

The last night out in BA we took in a Futbol game.  Unfortunately the city’s most well know team Boca Juniors were out of town, so we had to settle for their city rivals “River Plate”.  For our safety and simplicity of getting tickets we decided to go with a tour group from the hostel and Kate came along as well.  The stadium was pretty massive and the atmosphere was amazing.  The crowd sang songs and waved banners, flags and flares all game.  It was especially wild when River Plate scored on a penalty shot, giving the crowd something to actually go wild about.  Unfortunately River Plate lost 3-1, mostly thanks to their goaltender completely missing the ball as he attempted to kick it, and the opposing striker tapping it towards the empty goal.  Oooops!  Hopefully no crazy fans track him down later on!! 

Monday rolled around and we were happy to be back on the move.  We’ve certainly got into the travelling groove where staying in one place for too long just doesn’t do  it !!

The Wheels on the Bus...

So far on our travels we have spent well over 200 hours riding on buses of all shapes and sizes, ranging anything from old, wildly painted school buses to double decker’s with fully reclining seats that are much like beds and everything in between.  We’ve been on short 1 hour rides and also endured long 20 hours trips. We’ve had great service and poor service, tasty food and food poisoning…. But the one thing that we’ve never had was a breakdown or an event that didn’t allow the bus to pass.  Considering the amount of time we’ve been on the road, it is really amazing to think that all of the routes worked out.  We’ve heard plenty of stories of robberies,  floods, political roadblocks, strikes and breakdowns, but somehow avoided all…. Until everything fell apart on our journey from Bariloche to Puerto Madryn. 

It all started off quite well!   Our bus departed Bariloche around 7pm and was scheduled to arrive in Puerto Madryn at around 2pm the next day after a short stop in El Bolson around 11pm.  The “Don Otto” bus company coach rolled up to platform and we all boarded. It was one of the nicer buses we’d been on yet.  Fully reclining leather seats would come in handy for the long overnight journey!   Everything was going great and we were right on time until we looked out the window of bus and noticed giant plumes of smoke rising from the forest just past the town of El Bolson.  We were both hoping that we weren’t heading in that direction, but it soon became clear that the massive smoke clouds were exactly where we were heading!!  About 10 minutes past El Bolson the bus finally came to a stop where the highway was shut down by military patrol.  Looking out the window we could see flames a few hundred meters away rapidly incinerating all the trees and homes in its path.  It was pretty crazy that we were able to get so close, it would have seemed like a better idea to close the road in El Bolson several km’s back.  As the fire progressed all the traffic, including our bus was told to return to El Bolson and stay there until the road was opened.  We waited for an hour in town before our bus driver decided that they were heading back to Bariloche…. So back on the bus we went to return to where we started.  It was turning out to be a 6 hour round trip bus ride to no where!  Nice!!   We fired up the laptop and started watching a movie, and after about an hour and a half we noticed we were now parked on the side of the road, not going anywhere.  We thought maybe the drivers were switching, but after half hour we suspected something else must be up.  Unfortunately none of the bus staff would come up to tell us what was going on.  I think they really didn’t want to deal with the situation.  Finally one guy walked past and mentioned that there was now a mechanical problem with the bus and we had to wait for a new one to come from Bariloche.  The situation sounds pretty crappy, but it really wasn’t that bad thanks to the blooper videos and “Just for Laughs Gags!” they kept playing on the television! It was pretty funny stuff, perhaps more so than it should have been thanks to the fact we were so tired and frustrated.  At 3 am we were finally back in Bariloche walking down the street looking for a hostel after the bus company dropped us all off at the terminal and quickly fled the parking lot without saying a word. 

In the morning we headed back to the terminal to figure out what our new plan was.  We thought surely they must offer us some sort of refund or something due to all the issues the night before and additional costs of taxis, and hotels that we all encountered, but soon found out how customer service is in South America.   Clearly we weren’t getting anything out of them.  The office new nothing about the breakdown which added 3 hours to our trip to nowhere, and the best they would offer was a seat on the next bus at 7pm again.  The lady mentioned to us that we could talk to the head office in Puerto Madryn and maybe they could help us out.  That sounded pretty promising!! Haha!!  They’ll tell you anything to get rid of you and avoid conflict!!

We spent the rainy day chilling out at the hostel watching a few movies and enjoyed a massage.  At 7pm we were back on the road, Round #2!!  We made it slightly further than the night before when the bus slipped out of gear heading up a hill and came to a rest on the side of the road again!  Seriously?  2 nights in a row??   Something went wrong with the gear box and the driver was unable to get out of neutral without stalling.  We waited for a while before a few other bus lines stopped and put us in all the empty seats.  We made it to the next terminal where a new “Don Otto” bus was waiting to take carry us for the remaining 14 hours.

We finally made it to Puerto Madryn after plenty of issues, but I suppose it was bound to happen sometime.  A couple of days later we asked at the head office for a discount on our tickets to Buenos Aires which was perhaps the most ridiculous conversation we’ve ever had.  “Don Otto” bus company blamed it on their sister company (even though we bought the tickets at a Don Otto ticket stand) and told us they’d be happy to give us a discount on the next bus ride, but unfortunately they didn’t go to Buenos Aires!!!  Very crafty, haha!!!  We asked the man several questions such as…. “Is this just an excuse to get rid of us?” or “Are you telling us to go to the other company because you know they can’t help us?” or “Are you just telling us a bunch of lies right now?”….  To which we replied with a big smile “Yes” to everything we asked him.  We had a pretty good laugh, but it was pretty clear that even though he spoke great English he must not have understood everything we were saying.  We finally told him that if he wasn’t prepared to give us a discount that we would book tickets with the other company right next to his stand.  His answer was “No problem, go ahead… no discount”.  I don’t really understand because the completion for buses appears pretty stiff, but the people clearly could care less…  Spread the word folks!!  I suggest a boycott of “Don Otto”!!!  Haha.  Oh well….  I suppose the one good thing that came from all the delays is that it gave us a little extra time to actually think about where we were heading and how much time we had left.  After giving it some thought we realized that we would not have time to head all the way south to Ushuia (the most southern city in the world), particularly if we wanted to see some of Brazil and the Amazon (The real question was more like… +3 degrees or +33 degrees?).  I think this is something we both kinda knew seeing as were running about 1 month behind where we had expected to be by now, but now it was actually time to face it.   The new plan is to head directly to Buenos Aires after Puerto Madryn rather than continuing further south to Patagonia. 

Bariloche, Argentina

We were happy to be back on the Argentinian side of the border, particularily because $$ seems to go much further here than in Chile.  For example, a hostel for one night in Chile is $20 - $25 per night and a burger and fries will run about $7-$9… While in Argentina you can sleep for $10-$12 per night, and for $7-$9 you can be eating steak!!!  Bariloche is set in the mountains near to many ski resorts and all the Euros say it reminds them of being in the Alps, for it seemed a bit like Canmore with a lot more chocolate shops!!.  Corne had gone a couple of days earlier and scoped out a place for us to stay, and gave us a guided tour of all the things to see in the city center. 

Dawne was mostly interested in the chocolate and ice cream shops which were absolutely everywhere.  Eventually we got some ice cream and walked down to lake to enjoy the scenery.  We ended up heading out later that night for a few drinks and didn’t end up getting back to the hostel until around 3 or 4am.  That would have been no issue except for the fact that we had a car rental confirmed the next day for 8:30am.  Before heading to bed, we reminded Corne that breakfast was at 8:00am and that if he wasn’t ready to go for 9am we were leaving without him.  In the morning, I headed off around 9am to pick up the car and left Dawne to pack up our things.  When I returned back to the hostel at 10am with the car, Corne was sitting in the lobby waiting to leave, still with no sign of Dawne.  I felt a little bad when he said he was for us at breakfast since 8:00am.  Oooops!! 

The three of us hopped into our sweet 2 door VW Golf and set off on a 2 day adventure along a 400 km stretch of highway known as the “Ruta de Siete Lagos” (7 lakes road).  It was a good feeling to be in a vehicle of our own on the open road!  A sense of freedom that we’d been missing for quite some time.  We stopped at several lakes along the way to skip rocks, go for a quick swim or just to lie in the sun and take a nap. 

 The 1^st lake and the last lake of the day were definitely the highlites.  The first lake was one of the biggest on the trip and was likely the clearest lake I have ever come across.  The rocks along the beach and in the water were a light granite.  It was incredible to watch them sparkle in the crystal clear calm waters.  The last one was near to the town of San Martin,  where we planned to stay for the night.  We had a great few hours sitting there relaxing and watching the sun reflect off the lake as it set beyond the hills.  After driving a few more km’s to San Martin we found a great place to stay, had dinner and called it a day! 

In the AM we were back in the car heading back in the direction of Bariloche.  The map indicated 2 ways to get back, so we decided that we would take a different road than the one we previously travelled. Great idea, except for the fact that the first 85kms were extremely rough gravel.  Most would think this isn’t much of an issue, but 3 people and 3 heavy backpacks in a VW Golf would disagree!!  Poor car!!  We thought we were going to make it back no problem until we could feel the hard pull to the left and a thump, thump, thump, thump sound starting!  Sweet …..  FLAT TIRE!!!  I guess this would help to answer Dawne’s question from the previous day, “What happens if we get a flat tire?”.  My answer was still the same… “We change it!”  We knew it was going to be a bit tougher than we hoped when we pulled out the rusty jack, with no crank to lift vehicle.  We set the jack and were able to slowly twist the jack with the tire wrench… ¼ turn at a time!!  Wow, this was going to take all day!  One group of tourists in a rental vehicle stopped, but it turned out they were running late for a bus and needed to carry on.  Well, back to the slow turning.  We got it nearly all the way up, just before the jack slipped out and we had to start over!! 

 Lucky for us another fellow who was heading home from visiting his brother stopped and was able to lend us the jack from his rental car.  It’s sure easy to change a tire when you have the right tools!!  After about 10 minutes both us and the friendly Argentian fellow were all back on the road.  We were a little weary that we would encounter a second flat with no spare, but luckily we made it back into town with no problems.   Thank goodness!!  Hopefully our bus ride to Puerto Madryn goes more smoothly!!! 

Pucon, Chile

In high need of some adventure we travelled 738km south to the city of Pucon.  Pucon is located between an ice cold lake and a beautifully shaped active volcano.  This city is known as having quite stable weather and is loaded with students and Chilean families during the months of Jan and Feb. Somehow our luck followed us yet again… and when we arrived in the city at 8am in the morning the weather was crap! It was so cloudy you couldn’t even tell that we were in the mountains! We walked around to look for a hostel but apparently the weather hadn’t scared people off because everything seemed  to be booked up… until we came across Sylvia… a sweet little lady waiting to take us off to her home! The only problem was that her home was like a 3km walk from the town center! It was really cute though and made Corne, David and I feel like we were off at Grandma’s lake cottage! All of the homes in the area are cabins made of logs, which is quite a difference from all of the tin and cement homes we were used to seeing. It was beautiful! Later in the day the sun began to peak through and the wind started to push the clouds away.  We went for a long journey into the town center and had to reassure each other that we were in Pucon and had not taken an overnight bus ride to Banff! 

We set off to booking a tour up the gorgeous Villarrica Volcano. The photos at all of the tourist agencies looked amazing with lava and molten rock gashing out the top!  After talking to a few agencies we booked our 7hr trek for the following morning  and spent the rest of that day touring the city in style, on a pedal bike. I ran into a few curbs avoiding busses and Dave ended up getting pretty dirty having to fix my bike... OPPPS!

Waking up at 6:30am proved to be incredibly difficult for David and I as we have broken our last electronic item that we brought on our trip and haven’t had an alarm clock for a couple of weeks…. Which means that we’ve slept in every single day since then! I have no idea what we’re going to do when we get home!  We did manage to drag ourselves to the tourist agency though and got all geared up for our trek.  I’ve never been on a hike where you needed an ice pic, cramp ons, gaiters, snowpants, a winter jacket , gloves and a helmet, so I started to get a tiny bit intimidated.  Once again our tour group consisted of a bunch of Chilean boys so we knew that we would be entertained throughout the entire upward battle! The drive out to the base of the volcano took about 40mins and I wish I could tell you about the scenery on the way there but we were both so tired that we completely slept through the entire trip!

Once at the base camp we were told that we could either take a gondola up the first part of the volcano and then begin our trek a couple meters up.. naturally I was completely against that idea but when everyone else in our group nodded their heads we were forced into take the trip up as well. As soon as I got on though and peered down at other groups that had decided to make the journey I knew that we had made the right choice! So I would just like to comment on David and my physical conditions at this moment in our trip. We sleep in everyday, wake up, have a big breaky, walk around cities, eat street food snacks all day, have a few ice creams, make our way to a restaurant that then  eat nice big dinners, drink lots of wine and for David, at least 2ltrs of beer each day. We are fat messes and totally out of shape!!! The Chilean boys were pretty much completely opposite of us! The only plus side was that they had gone out the night before and only had one hour of sleep! Back to the hike though. 

The beginning of the hike was dry, on rock and we zig zagged our way up until we hit an old chair lift that was destroyed when the volcano erupted in the 70’s. The view from here was amazing! As we continued upwards the guide forced me to lead the pack with him which slowed down the group, making me feel terrible. Apparently no matter how many beers or ice creams Dave eats he can power through anything, I, on the other hand, found it quite difficult! The hike was straight up with absolutely no flat break parts and our guide refused to take any breaks on the way up. Once we hit the glacier it was even more difficult as you were walking through snow and had to jab your foot in every step to ensure you don’t slip! Man on man did I want to die!

I stopped once and let the boys pass and when the guide turned around and didn’t see my face behind him he was livid and then screamed at me for ten minutes. I then thought about hiring him on as my new personal trainer! Almost as good as Louie back home! We continued up the steep incline for 4.5 persistent hours.  Pretty sure we passed every other tour group on the way up as well! Once we were nearly at the top, the glacier cleared and our climb was then on volcanic rock. The guide explained that if we were to step on a rock and it lost it’s grip we had to scream, “PIERDE” so the groups below could clear the way.  A few times this happened and we watched in amazement at how quickly the rocks flew down the volcano! COOL! Until some idiot from a group coming back down stepped on a rock, forgot to call it and just peered down at us as a huge rock come directly in our pathway, scream at the last second, I looked up, see this rock 3 times the size of me, throw myself on the guide ahead of me as the huge rock hit another rock above me, split into 3, one comes straight for me, another to a Chilean boy and the other down the volcano. Haha sooo much fun!!! Knocked the wind out of both of us but made the adventure so much better! After about another 45mins of trekking, we made it to the crater at the top.

Unfortunately there was way too much sulphur rising and we couldn’t really see into the crater at all but it was still really cool! The views from the top were amazing as well, we were able to see the beautiful mountain range,  3 lakes that were in the area and the town of Pucon and Villarica. After having lunch at the top it was time to make it back down. As the climb was incredibly steep we were starting to get worried as to how we would be able to make it down. The first part was a little bit sketchy edging our way down the molten rock but once we got through that and back on the glacier we noticed these huge cracks in the ice. Our guide then instructed us all to sit in them and slide down! It was insane! The seat of my pants had ripped the previous time so like anyone would do they mended it with some duck tape. Boy was I happy they had that brilliant idea cause I flew down those slides!!! Sometimes it was a bit scary when you would round a corner and there would be an exposed rock that would knock you pretty hard but it made up for it with all the air you caught right afterwards! The ride down only took us about 2hrs. It was pretty awesome! Don’t know if I’ll be climbing any volcanos in the next couple of days (have to let my bum heal) but I would for sure do it again! I’m also pumped that we’re back in adventure mode, it should only get better from here!!!

Santiago and Valparaiso, Chile

We were sad to leave Mendoza and the friendly Argentinian people but excited to experience more of Chile.  We were expecting to arrive in Santiago at 5:00am (with no accommodation booked, as per usual), but luckily we had to wait at the border crossing for an extra 3 hours delaying the journey allowing for a few extra hours of sleep and daylight when we arrived.  The city of Santiago was even more developed and ‘North American’ than the previous cities in northern Argentina. 

Modern skyscrapers dominated the city, while hazy smog hung over the city obscuring the views of the snow capped mountains just outside the city.   Apparently the views from the city are spectacular outside the months of January and February when the heat and smog are at their worst.  We hit the streets again for our usual wonder around to scope out the usual points of interest.  Exciting again for us, but not so much for you readers I suppose.   Sorry about the lack of adventure stories lately!! 

One of our favourite stops in Santiago was the Mercado Central, as well as the Mercado de Flores. 

The Mercado Central was set up indoors with (mainly) seafood/fish vending stalls surrounding an interior area were loads of restaurants served up fresh meals.   Neither one of us are big seafood fans, but the food looked so fresh and appetizing that we were a bit disappointed that we had just eaten before we arrived.   The Mercado de Flores was located on the opposite side of the river and was home to an incredible fruit and vegetable market!  We’ve never seen so much incredible looking produce under one roof anywhere before.    Good thing our hostel had a nice kitchen, as there is no way we were able to leave without stocking up on items to prepare a nice fresh dinner!!

Day 2 in the Capital we ventured out on the cities well developed metro to check out some of the areas too far to walk.  We ended up lost on the way to the mall and stopped in at the nearby Hyatt to ask for a map.  I think we should have stayed there!!!  Wow, perhaps the nicest hotel I’ve ever stepped into.  We looked a little out of place with our flip flops and daypack, but they were still happy to help us out.  After Dawne got her shopping fix at the mega mall we visited an artesian market on the edge of the city.  It was a really cool place which was set up like an old town with shops selling jewellery, crafts, art and other artisanal items.  After we retired back to hostel for the evening to chill out on the rooftop patio for the rest of the evening.   In the am we decided that it was about time that we shed some weight in our bags, as they were getting to be impossible to lift anymore.  We sorted through our items and headed to the post office.  Lucky for us it turned out that Correo Chile was the cheapest mail service so far in South America !!  Hooooray!  You can sure feel when your bag is 12 lbs lighter!  We definitely should have sent a box home ages ago!!  Hopefully it all makes it! 

After lightening the load we ventured up the hill at Parque Metropolitano to the gorgeous outdoor pool overlooking the city.  It was a nice relaxing day and the pool was great to cool off in the hot afternoon sun (sorry  about the crappy winter back home!).   Afterwards we went back to the hostel to look for our Dutch amigo Corneleo, who should have arrived that morning but didn’t show.  We found him and it turns out that he wasn’t as lucky as us in Mendoza, and ended up missing his bus altogether!  God bless that crazy taxi driver we had!! 

In the morning we checked out and headed to the terminal to catch a bus to bus to the nearby ocean town of Valparaiso.  The couple hour bus ride was very pretty as we passed by many wineries through the mountains making our way to the sea.  At the terminal Dawne began talking to a local tour agent who talked for about an hour before we were able to leave.  Nice work!!  

The city of Valparaiso was absolutely amazing!!  It’s an old port town with colourful houses stacked steeply up 40+ hills along the ocean.  In the cities heyday (between 1883 to 1916)they built elevators up the steep hillsides to connect the walking pathways.  The elevators are still in place and many of them still functioning!!  In order to get a better vantage point of the city we headed out in a small boat on a harbour. 

 I was a great way to see the city, however, the highlight of the ride was not the view of the city, but rather that of an angry sea lion roaring and charging towards another tour boat which got too close to the pier where the animals were sleeping. 

 I’ve never seen anything like that in my life and now fully understand why they are called sea ‘Lions’.  Wow!!  We also passed by the Chilean navy ships which were just beyond the harbour.  We spent the evening eating along the beachside and enjoying the sunset. 

The next day we had some time to kill before departing in the evening to our next stop.  We spent the day walking around the city, riding on the elevators and also enjoying the incredible “art” plastered throughout the city.  I use “art” very loosely as it is actually graffiti, some clearly contracted by the companies or homeowners and others clearly not.   I could tell I’m getting old, as I viewed all the works as vandalism, while the youngians (Dawne and Corne) thought they were amazing works of art…. What a lost and confused generation!!  Either way, there’s no doubt that the painters who created the murals were very very talented, particularly SR. Gomez , who was painting by brush for Hostel Bella Vista.  He had painted all the walls, each stair, and even the gutters with sights from the city, complete with waterfalls where the water ran from the top of the stairs to the bottom!!  It was incredible!!!  We were blown away by the character and charm of Valparaiso and would certainly recommend this little gem to anyone ever in nearby Santiago!!

(These are just some of my (Dawne) fav's)