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| El Chalten is one amazing mountain town... |
I chatted with Betrina as she was in the front seat. Her friend slept in the back on the bed. The road never seemed to end as we every so slowly passed the lake near El Chalten.
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| Ruta 40 Norte (Route 40 North) is like no other road I have driven in my life. Its like something out of a dream world |
We finally arrived at Gigure Gregores (sp?) and filled up the tank. The road was hot as death and dusty as the Wild Wild. They also happen to have hot showers! Holy shit yeah! I got to take another shower, but while the shower was not that hot it still felt very good to get cleaned up. The girls took a shower together first. They took forever! or so it would seem so! A couple from Holland where at their RV beside where I had parked the van. The guy in line before me to get a shower was getting pissed off. He was friendly, but getting pissed that the girls were taking their sweet time. He banged on the door and said, “are you ever going to get outta there?! Please there are other people here who want to get a shower!”. I heard the girls mutter something back through the door. I think it was a profanity in Portuguese.
8 minutes later, the girls FINALLY got out of the shower. He and the girls exchanged a few pleasantries (LOL!) if you get my drift. Wink wink! He jumped into the shower and 3 - 4 minutes later was done. I then jumped in the shower. It was not hot, but felt good. The door had NO LOCK, so there was a chance someone could see a showering person naked. LOL! I don't expect anything else in a 3rd world country, but hey at least a jerry rigged lock would suffice-- eh??
After I got shower, I see that the girls made some bread with butter, tomatoes, herbs, and etc. They made about 20 pieces which tasted good. Wow healhy food-- who would have though in the barren landscapes of Patagonia. Even though I was very appreciative of their food and etc, I sorted wanted to be alone now . I was lucky to traded a few WhatsApp messages with Rebecca. I miss her very much now.
We hit the road and it got really fucking hot in the van for my driving efforts. The winds were nasty from the left (from the West). At one point I was driving a straight line for about 90-100kms! Holy shit was a long tiring drive this has become. The girls are giggling and talking not even realising I am dead tired and etc. They thought it was an easy thing I am doing or so it seemed. The wind you cannot see, but trust me it was there and in full force too. This is just mere sample of the one of the only NON-straight roads we had.
We eventully reached the gravel road to the Parque National Perito Moreno. I looked down at the trip odometer. It was 420.5 km. Uggh. According to the map it was like 90 KMs or more to the park on a gravel road. I said to myself out loud, “fuck that, I am parking this van in this ditch beside the road.” The girls said, “what??”. I said, “we are camping down here (and pointed down to the ditch)”. They said OK and smiled.
They offered to cook dinner since I made dinner the night before so she said, “we cook dinner”. I said, “muchas gracias!!!”. I then parked the van. They got out the cooking stuff, the stove, etc. I then got into writing mode for my blog here. They had to chop up veggies so dinner took a while to cook.
By the time I was done my blog entry for the prior day, and then in an hour or so dinner was ready. They made a yummy rice, tomato, onion, and spice mix meal. It was a wee bit bland in taste, but it filled my belly.
I got my van bed ready which took a few minutes. They pitched their old ratty (used) and partially broken-duct tapped tent up behind the van to get shelter from the relentless Patagonia winds. The sky was clear, and I said that we’d have a good night for star gazing. After they got their tent up and sorted out, I settled in for the night. I did some more writing here on my offline blog but then forgot to brush my teeth. It was dark very dark and starry out when I was brushing my teeth.
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| It's going to be a clear night in the middle of nowhere Argentina |
I stopped brushing my teeth and looked up. WOW! I can see even more stars than from home in New Zealand in a place called Lake Tekapo. Sadly my infrared remote for my Canon DSLR seemed to be broken so I was unable to get any star photography from that lovely night, I got back into the van and maybe 20 minutes later I peeked outside again for the look at the stars. Nice indeed. Very nice. I then turned off all my stuff, and went to sleep. Zzzz this was around like 11pm…
Daily Summary:
I'm definitely feeling that I would like some time alone now. While having company is good from time to time, it feels that these current hitchhikers are beginning to take advantage of my generosity. There's a fine line between being socially reasonable vs experiencing solo exploration. The stars above are amazing and no words from my vocabulary can even describe it.
Daily Summary:
I'm definitely feeling that I would like some time alone now. While having company is good from time to time, it feels that these current hitchhikers are beginning to take advantage of my generosity. There's a fine line between being socially reasonable vs experiencing solo exploration. The stars above are amazing and no words from my vocabulary can even describe it.
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