"El Boludo" In Argentina: August 2005

Colonia , Uruguay

We finally got back to BsAs, though it wasn`t easy; the road between Santiago and Mendoza (i.e. the only road back to Argentina, less travelling 24 hours back to Bariloche and then cutting back another 24 hours on ourselves to get back to BsAs) was closed due to heavy snowfall for two days; we had no clean clothes to wear; and barely any money - dah!

But we finally got there and within 2 days Ed and I had sailed off (literally) to spend a couple of days in Colonia de Sacramento, Uruguay.

Colonia is an historic town on the South West coast of Uruguay, lying well within the boundaries of the river plate which also engulfs BsAs - its been through Spanish and Portuguese colonisation a few times in its history before becoming independent. The quarter containing the port is the real historic part, and every street is either cobbled or paved with slate. To be honest we pretty much covered everything there is to do in the first day, so we ended up spending the second day relaxing at the beach.

This bullring has an interesting if macabre story. A young Spanish entrepreneur built it along with the entire beach-side promenade, with visions of an exclusive resort for rich Argentinian holidaymakers - unfortunately for him bullfighting was banned in Uruguay not long after, and so 8 fights were had in the first two months, after which it was left to crumble.

The beaches were fantastic

The main thing that struck me about Uruguay was that the people were so friendly and laid back - I mean, I`m used to that in Argentina, but these guys?

For example, the cars would stop and let you cross the road, even if you weren't necessarily intending to (I`ve never witnessed anything like this in South America - ever). Or for another example, the girl running our hostel gave us free internet and use of bikes, even on the second day when we weren`t even paying customers. And all on our word - no deposits paid, no forms filled out - madness ...

* most of the Colonia pics are stolen from Ed - I forgot me camera!

Pelicanos!

These pelicans (although I prefer the spanish pronunciation of "peleecanohs"!) were fascinating, a bit daunting if you got a bit too close mind - they`re huge, I reckon they must stand at least 2 1/2 ft tall and have a wingspan of about 6 ft!

Even the dogs (I`ve realised that there are just street dogs everywhere in South America) wouldn`t mess - and considering they will attack any given moving car, thats impressive.

Papudo

Well we saw Graham off to the airport - its always bad going a man down whilst travelling but we dug deep and kept going - and headed further north up the coast to the town of Papudo.

This place was a proper wee fishing village, serenely beautiful, and we were lucky enough to have 20C odd, blue skies, perfect beaches, and all to ourselves - South American winter is a little bit different ...

Saw some proper fishing types, eh, fishing too.

Eating was actually a bit of a nightmare for me (fishing village - lots of fish) but I just about got by. We found a great restaraunt the last night, with a proper chef and more than one vegetarian option on the menu. Oh the choice.

We also got a perfect sunset ...

... then went on exploring the coastline the next day, doing a bit of hiking up one of the smaller hills.

The walk back down the hill was through a half and half eucaliptus and pine forest. Eucaliptus grows like nobodies business here - its great.

Our hostel (totally empty apart from us) also had a certain "charm".

Biggest Smile Yet

I had to add this.

This is the happiest Adri (and probably any of us) looked the whole trip. I don`t know, 90 hours of coach trips and all we had to do was find a stupid puppy ...

Valparaiso

We spent a day at the "Paradise Valley", the nearest coastal town to Santiago.

Apparently this place was very prosperous at the turn of last century but has slowly fallen into a state of decline. I later met a guy in Uruguay who was from here - he explained to me that, as Chiles main port, it was impacted greatly by the opening of the strait of Panama. Obviously a lot of business was lost practically overnight.

Its still generally very pleasant and, like Esquel, is actually huge. We spent most of the day walking around the west bay area, keeping out of the centre as much as possible in our quest to avoid the "urban" scene.

You can see the size of the town in the background in this pic.

We found this really pleasant (though seemingly abandoned) little plaza with paths up the hill, right at the west end of town.

And I noticed this guy cleaning the beach - surely there has to be a more energy efficient method than this? Possibly the hardest working Chilean we saw the entire trip (most brickies we encountered were lying on the pavement, having a siesta, next to their pile of cement mix).

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But the most interesting thing about this place for me were the ascensors, or funicular lifts - being situated in a really steep valley, the only way to get to the back end of town is to take one of a series of rickety old sheds that drag slowly (and noisily) up rusty old rails to reach the high ground. Great fun for 4 vertigo sufferers.

Not the best picture (didn`t get one with the sheds in) but you can imagine the peril of the short trip.

Santiago de Chile

Okay so we had to get to Santiago as that was where Grahams flight to New Zealand was departing from. We weren`t too fussed about visiting big cities (we`d come from Buenos Aires) but spent a couple of days there anyway, with a view to head to the coast after Graham got his flight.

I got the impression that its not as vibrant a place as BsAs or (I`ve read) Rio De Janiero - its definitely not a 24 / 7 city and the locals definitely seemed a lot more reserved. Having said that quite they were on the whole quite friendly (despite the Chilean - Argentinian issues) and there are some fantastic views to be had from the various hills within the city centre.

Theres also some impressive architecture, despite the city having been damaged repeatedly by earthquakes - so much so that there were emergency instructions in most of the hostels we stayed at on what to do if one took place. Standing under a doorway is apparently the safest place to be ...

This ones the Museo Nacional de las Bellas Artes.

This is a cathedral in the central Plaza de las Armas, adjacent to the Correo Central.

And heres the Correo Central de Santiago - Look familiar? For me its a "mini-me" to its BsAs counterpart.

In this last photo, picturesque as it may be, the low sitting cloud over the city we later found out to be smog - apparently Santiago has one of the worst pollution problems in all of South America.

Road to Santiago

Coming down the mountains towards Santiago, its really striking how lush and green the countryside is - a strong contrast to the red, rocky terrain of Mendoza (as in the pic below).

Los Andes

We travelled 24 hours north to Mendoza province, where Adri and I had been in January. Then we had to take an 8 hour coach ride pretty much straight away to cross the border to Santiago de Chile.

Sore arses but the views were, like last time, fantastic. And we ended up taking an almost identical route, swinging right at the junction to Las Cuevas to take the tunnel to Chilean immigration. Who told me I may have some difficulties getting back in to Argentina. What fun.

Check the road coming back down the mountains in Chile after immigration - windy enough, but we also had the random element of our South American coach driver thrown in to make it a pretty ropey descent.

Parque Nacional Los Alerces

Adri and I took a day off from boarding (which I found a very difficult decision may I add!) to visit the National Park - this is a huge expanse of protected land which contains 5 or 6 vast lakes, hectare upon hectare of forest, and is named after the Alerce tree which is apparently one of the slowest growing on earth - we saw a couple of 7 / 800 year old examples which I could still easily stretch my arms around. There are some as old as 4,000 years but at this time of year they are inaccessible as they are in an area of the park which is closed due to excessive snowfall.

Anyway instead of blabber on about it I`ll just post a few photos, in chronological order, to try and portray how vast and changeable the scenery was in this fantastic place throughout the day.