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+ Log & Blog December / Dec 18

 Progress log and blog report

18 DECEMBER 2005 - Starting the long road to San Carlos de Bariloche

Thanks to the late start I had time to go into town and get onto the Internet. In South America floppy discs are on every computer, as are CD drives, but I have yet to find a working port for a memory stick. As my PC does not manage floppy discs I burn every update on a CD and use that to transfer to the Internet.

It was a great shame, but here we had to deviate from the route we had hoped to take (Rn40) from El Calafate to Lago Viedma and up to San Carlos de Bariloche. But all who had recent experience of this road, including the Brazilians a few days ago, told us the road was only suitable for 4 wheel drive cars or at least cars with much better ground clearance. A great pity as it is meant to be absolutely stunning. So we had to do something we all hate doing, and back-track on our selves. Go back the same way, Rn40 and Rn5, onto Rn3, back to Rio Gallegos, almost back up to Comodro Rivadavia! As we linked back to Rn3 we knew we had only about 80km of fuel left – but as this is the main North/South road through Argentina we thought there must be a fuel station soon. After 80km we started singing hymns ‘and did those feet in ancient times, stumble across a petrol station…’ And – guess what, a building appeared in the distance!

Petrol-stop-with-no-petrol

We got there and it had petrol pumps. As it was lunch time and it also had a restaurant we thought we would eat there too. It was very smart inside and a thin lady in her 50’s with an Irish accent and called ‘Auburn’ greeted us. Her English was not good though as a 2nd or 3rd generation Argentinean. But we worked out that there was no petrol. They had just opened and not got the license. So we ordered the dish of the day, the only dish I think, which was basically a plate of tagetelli with a large lump of bone with bits of lamb on in a kind of broth like sauce. It was actually very good.

Puerto-St-Julian-restaurant

When we had nearly finished a biker arrived on a Kawasaki 650cc motorbike wrapped up like some over large orange Michelin man. He had travelled round the world on his bike in 47 days – Houston to Houston and was now exploring South America. With a very charismatic personality and a thick Polish accent he told us he is looking for wife, someone thin. I gave him Cynthia’s name… He also gave us this teaser:

‘Finished files are the re
sults of years of scientif
ic study combined with the
experience of many years’

Count the ‘f’s. Answers on a postcard to Michael Marek ( michelmarek@yahoo.com)
He said it usually wins him many drinks. He also collects trucking jokes. He told us one about the Pope and a Nazi, definitely not one to repeat on the web!
 
We were then ready to brave the Ant artic winds and wrapped up well again. We had 3 spare cans of fuel between us. Julian had extended his fuel tank for the trip, so would just be Ok, as the next station was 105km away. We were worse off than Ivor, so we had two of the cans and Ivor one. Let’s just say the next 100km were driven very gently indeed, and we all made it! There are few places to re-fuel or to stay across this great expanse of country, and distance wise we found ourselves back at Puerto St Julian…. And because we know it was good and because we knew it was reasonably priced – we stayed again at Hotel Bahia.

This time we went to a different restaurant. The food was much better than the poor fish last time, and the waitress almost as nice! With a view over the bay we sat and ate as the sun lowered. We had an 8.30am start planned for the next morning so it was an early night. As we got back to the hotel the whist drive we had seen the week before was again in full swing. A large number of ladies of various ages and sizes were huddled round tables, while the men were round the TV watching the football.

Unfortunately there seems to have been some sort of celebration that night. We think it was to do with the football, because from 11.30pm cars took to the streets tearing round with horns held fully on. I can’t imagine it was the results of the whist drive. How long this went on for I have no idea, but it seemed like forever. Somehow Chris, Alan and Julian slept through it all. I am normally a heavy sleeper, but car horns on full blast outside the window were too much for me!

Proof-of-a-UFO

The-fashonable-streets-of-E

By the way, there are 6 ‘f’s. I was the only one to get that!
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