281 The final days in Beunos Aires

Sunday 2nd Feb 2014
Miles Today 0 Total  39,875
We spent today getting our gear and Wallace sorted out. I had to clear any non bike related stuff out of the panniers and do little things like remove the Post Office van headrest that Karen has been using for the last 10 month as a back rest. I also needed to figure out the best way to make Wallace's packed volume as small as possible. By this I mean lowering the screen etc and figuring the best way to make him (Her - sorry Karen !) as compact as possible. I will probably remove the screen, handle bars and front wheel when we take him to the airport for shipping on Tuesday. Wallace looks really small now compared to when he was loaded up.

Like Wallace only smaller.

Mid afternoon we went in search of food and sadly as it was Sunday and holiday season most places were shut but we did find this place but the name of the place had us worried.

The MUKY restaurant.....

However, the food was good and for some reason, after ordering barbecued ribs, when I had nearly finished the ribs another portion was served up. My Spanish was not good enough to figure out why but the meal ended up being enormous. Look at the pile of clean ribs in the middle and stack still to be eaten.

Mountains of food.

Still we finished most of it then drowned it in wine..

Wine makes you smile...

It was not too far from the river Plate so we walked another mile to the rivers edge. Where we in for a shock.....

The place was more like a garbage tip than a river bank.

Fortunately the bird life redeemed the place somewhat. Green Parrots everywhere.

These things are so noisy you cannot fail to spot them.

A long walk back via a bar and it was time for bed.

Monday 3rd Feb 2014
Miles Today 10 Total 39,885
I had to attend 'Dakar Motos' today to arrange Wallace's shipping. Dakar Motos is a small business that is well known in the adventure biking world for assisting bikers with shipments and just about anything else they may need.
I got there before the arranged time, met the owners, Sandra and Javier, and then decided it would probably be a good idea to ride back to the hotel to collect the paperwork I needed. God I can be stupid sometimes.

Javier, Sandra and the Gringo  -  thanks Javier ;-)

Anyway, with paperwork in hand Sandra checked that all was well. Apparently there is one border crossing where they accidentally or deliberately put the chassis or engine numbers on the import papers incorrectly and it causes mayhem when bikers try to get their bikes back out of the country. I paid them the appropriate fee, $1000 ARG, about  £77. For this they make all the arrangements and I just need to turn up to do the rest.

Once back at the hotel we went for some food to a very nice little restaurant where I asked for Lomo and Champinones (Beef steak and mushrooms).  The  beef that turned up was enormous, about 1+1/2" thick and 6x6" square. It was delicious and the fat boy ate the lot.

Not a cut of meat, a paving slab of it.

Tuesday 4th Feb 2014
Miles Today 58 Total miles 39,943
Today's main mission was to buy Karen some shoes to match her handbag. The other small matter that needed attending to was the need to take Wallace to the airport for his trip home. We decided to sort Wallace out first so we could spend the remainder of the day shoe shopping. 
We set off at around 9:30 and popped into Dakar Motos on the way to the airport. Sandra's directions and instructions were perfect and in no time we were in their cargo bay and Wallace was on the scales. With jackets and helmets he weighed 315kg.  
Once at the cargo bay there was another Indian Guy named Arun, sorting his BMW for shipping. I was aware he would be there and had been warned by Sandra that he may need some help. I was gob smacked at his lack of motorcycle mechanical knowledge. I am not being unkind, on the contrary. He is one brave guy to take on a trip from Alaska to Ushuaia with absolutely zero mechanical knowledge. He had tools but did not know how to use them. He did not even know how to remove the front wheel. The man had covered about 30 thousand miles on this bike with only being able to ride it. A nutter and a hero.
 
With the help of the shipping company we squeezed Wallace into the smallest space possible. Removing the front wheel, mudguard, screen and handlebars did the trick. he now looks pathetically small.... The smaller we can get him the cheaper the shipping cost is. Turns out that it was US $1,940 (15,560 pesos), to be paid tomorrow in the city center.

Where does this bit go ???

Check out the 'jobsworth' in the background griping about Karen taking photo's.

Oi, no photography....  Naughty Karen....

 Once Wallace was palleted he was scooped up by the forklift and taken away for 'scanning'. Apparently they test for drugs, explosives, the usual stuff.
He was then wrapped in plastic cling film - really, and then taken from us for the next few days. It was a sad and glad time for us. We were sorry to see our faithful and reliable friend handed over to people who will not care for him in the least and we are glad as the final (almost) step in our trip is complete and we can relax a bit.
We then caught a cab into town with Aaron and separated once there. We then went shopping for shoes. How I love doing this.....
After browsing in what seemed like a hundred shoe shops, we went back to the first shop and bought 2 pairs. Sadly I am not joking.
The city was, unsurprisingly, very colonial and their architecture is very similar to ours in the UK.

Congress Plaza.

When we had had enough, we caught a cab to the main train station and once on the platform, we saw this. There are marks on the platform that passengers queue up behind to enter the door in the right place. When the train pulled in the passengers getting off were unhindered and just filed off through the queues of those waiting to get on. It was surreal and could teach us a lesson.

The queues for the door. Brilliant.

Once off the train, it was a quick visit to the local Irish bar without Irish beer and then back to out hostel.

280 Across Argentina

Friday 31st Jan 2014
Miles Today 458 Total 39,646
Today we covered, if I recall correctly, the most miles we have done on Wallace. It was a bum numbing ride but the more we got done today, the less we had to finish the journey off tomorrow.

The day started out cloudy and quite cold and overcast, so much so that we put our jumpers on to start the day. A relatively cold 23C.  After the first 70 miles we found a petrol station and as we were going to cross so desolate areas, we filled up. Whist there this little fellow was bouncing around at our feet and Karen did what she does best and snapped him up.

We think this is a female Cowbird, she was certainly friendly enough.

After a couple of hours the clouds cleared and the day heated up. It was now jumpers off and the temperature rose to 34C. It was now hot...
At around 2pm we found a McDonalds and as appears to be the norm here, the burgers were like cardboard. Very dry and hard to digest. Sad really, we have a liking for them and I have a belly to prove it.

In Britain, it would be a few swans and some mallards, here flamingo's.

We stopped after about 400 miles and as it was still only about 5:30 decided to put some more miles in and pushed it to 458. We now needed to stop. Our bums were sore and we were tired. We ended up at a place called Pehuajo, and no, we can't pronounce it either. Probably something like "Peuaho" but who knows !

Still, it was a nice place and we found a hotel with a car park but sadly it was full, so we were able to park Wallace up outside and chain him to the hotel canopy post on the pavement. Oddly enough, this was with the blessing of the local traffic wardens. Can't imagine that happening in the UK anytime soon!
After settling in we went for a look around, and thenwandered back to the hotel for an early night in preparation  for our last ride in South America.

Saturday 1st Feb 2014
Miles Today  229 Total  39,875
Karen
I lost pinch and punch by default.  I had no watch on and pinched and punched Ray 10 minutes early at midnight.  So consequently, I got pinched and punched back.  Not good, need to get a watch.
Ray
The last days  riding in the Americas was awful. We awoke to an overcast sky and Google Earth showed us that rain - lots of it - was pending for the next few days. Luverly.
We set off and filled up before leaving town. As we were filling up the rain started. It stayed that way for most of the day.
Again, worn tyres, rain and uneven tarmac paid their toll and slowed us down a lot. Most of the day we were only riding at about 50mph. My attention level was at max and it was bloody hard work.
We did manage to get a couple of pics during a brief respite in the rain and the photo below shows that we could have been in Arkansas, USA. Pretty but sparse.

We had a turn around session to get this fellow. There was a pair of then on adjacent posts. They are Pygmy Owls and stand about 7" tall.

Austral Pygmy Owl.

We arrived in Buenas Aires at about 4pm and drove straight to our hostel for the next 6 days. It turned out to be fantastic. We were met by a lovely lady called Suzanna Just, the hostel owner. She showed us to our room which was in a beautiful Old English style country house in the suburbs.
After settling in, I went out to the shops for some food and drink and then to the bank to get some more cash to pay for Wallace's trip home. Sadly, the economy here is collapsing. In the last month the exchange rate has dropped by 22%.  Fortunately for us, the rate against the US Dollar has done the same and as everything big is priced in US$. So, although the numbers change, the value does not. It just means that things like fuel and food get cheaper for us.

Suzanna then let me wash Wallace in the yard and we settled in for an early night in front of the TV watching US crime dramas....again.
Karen
We have unpacked everything, in readiness for going home.  I am really excited now.  I have loved the trip, but the last few weeks have been hard, but worth it.
We have to leave 4 clear working days for the bike to be sorted and so hopefully we will get a flight on Friday 7th, back to the UK.  In the meantime, we still have a bit of exploring to do.

279 Back to Bariloche and off to BA

Tuesday 28^th Jan 2014

Miles Today 233  Total  38,891

We spent last night at a very pleasant campsite in an town called Esquel that allowed us to have a decent shower and clean up. Also internet access let us post the previous blog. Internet access around here is patchy. Many places only use a satellite link and it is seriously crap and is on and off all the time.

We set off for our final ride in the hire car and ended up back in Bariloche around 1pm. We booked into the same hotel as last time. The difference now is that the place is deserted. The hotel and the streets outside are virtually deserted.

We managed to get our laundry put in at the local 'Lavanderia'. £7 for a full service - nice.

Our main job for the day was to take the car back and rescue Wallace. We drove the 14km to the airport only to find the AVIS kiosk shut till 8:30 pm. We hugged Wallace and promised to be back for him ('her' if Karen reads this) and drove back into town for dinner. 

We eventually dumped the car and the AVIS rep did not bat an eyelid at the mileage or the state of the car. Wallace breathed a sigh of relief when I hit the starter and he was re-united with his family. We drove back into town and started to sort our kit out for the ride towards Buenas Aires tomorrow.

Wednesday 29^th Jan 2014

Miles Today 0 Total  38,891

We awoke later than we intended today. I suppose 4 nights sleeping in the front seats of a Chevrolet Corsa had taken their toll on our bodies.

It did not take long for us to decide to stay another day at this hotel. Some would say we were just plain lazy. I would have to agree !

It did give us the opportunity to do some e-mails and research into our departure from South America. We managed to pencil in some flights for us but need to finalise the arrangements for Wallace before we book them. We finished the day off with some shopping and I bought a rather fetching Indiana Jones hat to replace the one I left in the motorhome we rented in California 6 years ago.

Thursday 30th Jan 2014

Miles Today 297 Total  39,188

We had just over 1000 miles to ride to Buenas Aires and 3 days to do it in so being clever we divided the journey roughly into 3. We wanted to do a bit more that 300 miles but there was nowhere to stay after our days stop at  a place called 'General Roca'.

The journey was a nightmare. Our rear tyre is badly worn (but not illegal I hasten to add). A bike tyre starts out round and squares off with wear. This gives some unusual handling on roads that are rutted from big trucks. Add to this the wind that had us riding sideways virtually all day and as you can imagine, it was hard work.

Besides this the scenery was very pleasant and made the trip more enjoyable (when I could look at it). 

We stopped eventually in General Roca and found a smashing little hotel for what we thought was about forty pounds, which overnight changed to 32 pounds.  Argentina's peso is going through a financial crisis, and it is working in our favour at the moment.

278 More Patagonia

One thing we forgot to put in the last post was an incident at the hotel in Bariloche. When we went out into the town, I realized we had forgotten the camera so nipped back to the hotel to collect it. As I got out of the lift I saw our room was open and I could hear the cleaners giggling away inside. I walked in to find 4 of them in there and 2 of them had our helmets on. They did not see me immediately so I shouted WAAAAA.....

They all collapsed with embarrassed laughter and one took the helmet off, hid her face in her hands and ran out. It was hilarious. They were so embarrassed but hysterical at the same time. Needless to say I did not help them get over the embarrassment too quick, I was having far too much fun myself. They soon got the message that I really did not mind all and we all laughed it off in the end.

Saturday 25^th Jan 2013

Miles Today  513  Total  37,731

After a very uncomfortable night’s sleep in the car we set off for another long slog South. Patagonia is an unbelievably large expanse of very little but low mountains and scrub. What does surprise us is the volume of wildlife (not the variation). There are llamas absolutely everywhere. On top of that we have now come across whole families of Darwin’s Rhea’s. They are like small ostriches but for some reason they seen to gravitate to the only strip of tarmac for hundreds of miles around, much like the llamas really !

However we cannot grumble at the scenery, although bare it had a strange beauty of it own in its rawness. Our reason for coming here was to see the Perito Moreno Glacier. Sadly we arrived a bit late and on arrival at the National Park gates only had an hour before closing and with an entry fee of £12 each decided to wait till the next day and drove back 50km to the only town in the region, El Calafate. We found the second most crappy campsite in the known universe, picked a spot and went out for some food. After grub we went in search of a local bar, to mix it with the locals and found one on the lake shore. We spent £4 each on a local liquid that the barman said was beer but we suspect it was brewed from llamas poo. It was disgusting, even for us beer monsters. Then it was off to seat, by this I mean ‘bed’ but as we were sleeping in the car, it was ‘seat’.

Sunday 26^th Jan 2013

Miles  Today 353 Total  38,084

The sun was our alarm this morning but it allowed us to get an early start for the glacier. We spotted this beast on a fence post on the way there. We think it is a Black Chested Buzzard Eagle but as you can see it is not black but it’s our best guess. It was however huge and around 2 feet tall.

It was then on to the park and glacier. The glacier is one of the few in the world that is not shrinking and at several places reaches the moraine lake formed from shrinkage after the last ice age. This is good because you can sit and watch chunks of it fall off into the lake. It is absolutely incredible to watch and as you do you can hear the ice cracking inside the glacier. The blue colours in the ice are amazing and I hope the photos below show it.

We decided to leave the park early to do some bird watching in El Calafate and as we were leaving the park we came across this beast.

An Andean Condor. Now it is not a good photo as these things are a long way off but this bird has a 10 foot wingspan and when we first saw it, it was just above us. It was like a WW2 bomber. We were just a bit chuffed.

Then it was down to the glacial lake for some bird watching.

A family of geese.

Flamingo bums.

An Andean Ibis.

A local Lapwing.

At around 3 we went for some lunch and then it was the start of the long haul North and back to a lonely Wallace. Now imagine this. Virtually all of our 1000 mile route was on Ruta 40 (road 40) except the last 20 miles to/from El Calafete. Karen set off and although I usually navigate, this time I took the opportunity to look at some of the photos on the lap top. After a while I became annoyed at the sun streaming straight through the window and realized we were going South. Not a good idea. We stopped and I figured out that we had missed the only turn off in the whole journey and had covered an extra 20 miles. What a pair of muppets. That added an extra 40 miles to our return trip. Just what we needed – not !

I did not tell Karen how far we had gone astray till it was over. The view from our 'extra' mountain.

Our target for the day was a place called Gobernador Gregores. It was a long haul but there is not too much choice around these parts for fuel etc. It was another 300 or so km and just under half was dirt road. It was going to be a long drive and end up in the dark thanks to our cock up missing the turn off.

(Karen) Good grief he does go on, it added about half an hour to the journey, and we would still have arrived in the dark!

These roads are real bone shakers and the car rattled like mad.

Imagine driving from London to Birmingham on this as a main road. It is in Argentina.

We arrived at Gregores just after complete darkness at around 11pm. We filled up with fuel, got some dry food and drinks and settled down for the night in the petrol station car park along with another 7 various vehicles doing the same thing.

Monday 27^th Jan 2014

Miles Today 574  Total  38,658

The sun got us out of ‘seat’ again and after using the petrol stations services we set off again. It was only 7:30 am. What is happening to us ?

We then drove in the early morning sunshine to the next sign of habitation (aside from the odd house) 150 miles away. In this distance we only saw 14 other vehicles and this was Monday morning rush hour.

Vast openness.

Doesn't he blend in well.  He just sat there ready for his public.

We stopped for breakfast of dried bread wrapped around a few microns of ham and cheese. The birds got the lions share after we left, as is Karen’s want. This place had a fuel pump that was working today, unlike when we stopped here 2 days ago.   Life is not easy or to be taken for granted out here.

I think I have mentioned it before but the wind here is a serious issue. In the UK we usually associate wind with anti-cyclones and hence bad weather, rain etc. Here it is a part of life. The wind is constant, extremely strong and a general pain in the butt. We have had a few brief spells of strong breeze strength wind but most of the time it is approaching gale force. The odd thing is that it is virtually always from the same direction and this dictates the direction many of their buildings face out of the cities. I posted a picture of a motorcycle coming towards us in the last post and aside from it also being a Yamaha Super Tenere like Wallace, you can see the rider fighting with the wind. He will be doing this all day, every day he is in Patagonia. This place has a fearsome reputation among adventure bikers for this reason, which along with the dirt roads that gives Ruta 40 it’s notoriety.

Some of you may remember Nick Sanders, an English guy who we met in Monument Valley, USA. He did the trip 3 times, back to back from the bottom of Argentina to Alaska in 3 months. One word: ‘Nutter’ !

Again... lots of this.

One of the churches we passed on our dash through.

It was like this all the time.

As I write this, Karen and I are agreeing that given our circumstances and time restraints we did the best thing in hiring a car. I think had we done it on the bike, it would likely have terminated any future trips on the bike, but who knows ?

Some people may think we are wimps. DILLIGAF. Google it.

On part of the dirt road today, we came across this little fellow. We had seen larger ones in Florida but never managed to get a photo. This little guy is just so cute.