Celebrating the New Year in San Carlos de Bariloche!

It is the last day of 2008, and today we travel to San Carlos de Bariloche

Last coffee of 2008, in Aeroparque airport in Buenos Aires.....!!

Upon arrival at the local airport in Bariloche, there is a special delivery!

Adorable!

We are staying at Hostel 41 Below, in the centre of town. The weather is fantastic, we stroll around town and down to the lake shore. 

A bite to eat in La Marmite for lunch....hmmmm, steak!

And desert? Chocolate from La Abuela Goya - my favorite is the white chocolate dulce de leche sandwich! Que rico!

Playing 'Sorry' during a welcome rest in the afternoon

Tonight, there is a party at the hostel where everybody cooks a dish from their country of origin. We debate various possiblities - Irish stew, colcannon, frites, waffles....but all seem rather complicated. we compromise.....we will make breakfast on New Year's Day!

The evening is fun - lots of cooking, eating, drinking and answering the usual list of questions in hostels (What's your name? Where are you from? How long have you been travelling? Where are you going next?)

It get's rather tedious, so I'm considering printing a t-shirt with 'Elaine, 25, Irish, here for 6 months... now buzz off!!!' ;-)

Our pancakes with Dulce de Leche & bananas go down a treat!

First pint of 2009 (Quilmes) in Wilkenny, the popular Irish pub

We set off on this 4 trek on New Year's Day. Except we (embarassingly) miss the turn and walk 10 kilometres in the wrong direction. Then, we have to turn around and walk all the way back.... It's 27 degrees, and will the sun beating down upon us we are pretty frustrated!! Well at least we got our exercise for the day!

This is the road that never ends...

The sign we missed....

Cerro Otto (another try)

Our sense of pride gets the better of us...so we set off for Cerro Otto once more the following day, this time with a clear sense of where we are going! 

We trek for 2 hours and almost reach the summit when we come across a security guard who tells us we need to pay 20 pesos each to continue. We feel this is a bit of a rip-off, given that the summit is only metres ahead. So we find a nice picnic spot instead and enjoy the view.

And I receive a phone call near the sumit on my new Argentine number (very exciting!)- we have been invited to a typical Argentina BBQ (un asado) by Eduardo, a friend of Pali, who lives in Bariloche.

We run most of the way back down due being chased by vast numbers of antagonistic wasps and horse-flies....

Eduardo picks us up at 8pm and we drive to the suburbs where Juan, the host, lives. En route we discover that Friday night is men's only night - every Friday a group of between 10-20 guys

get together at each other's house to cook up a feast - how very priviledged we are! :-P

The locals are rather fond of this stuff, for me it bears a strong resemblance to cough syrup

Steak & potatoes, not a vegetable in sight

During the course of the evening we discover that our ability to decipher Argentine spanish is somewhat lacking - especially in a large group like this! We do our best to converse, but as the night progresses we are glad that Eduardo and his friend, Lucas are both fluent English speakers! Cheating, but a relief all the same. We do not eat until 12am, and at about 3am we head to our favourite bar in Bariloche, Patanuk for a a drink by the lake before retiring for the evening (a respectable 4.30am).

Patanuk, our favourite bar in Bariloche

Three treks, two tired chicas, one big white mountain

A busy day lies ahead.  We are on a bus to Nahuel Huapi National Park where we will do three 1.5 hour treks in various places of interest.

Locals pay 7 pesos, foreigners pay 20 pesos (a rather short-sighted view of making money from tourists perhaps?)

The ever-changing colours of the lakes are amazing!

Los Alerces Cascade

First trek, is to the very pretty waterfalls of Los Alercers. It is ridiculously hot, and I fear I may fall in (or chose to jump in if it gets any warmer round here). We get our first glimpse of Tronador, the thunderous mountain, where it is possible to hear big chunks of ice crumbling down the side of this impressive mountain.

Tronador (thunder) mountain

Ah, shade at last!

Black Glacier

We scrape and scramble across the loose stones in the blistering heat, and reach the very interesting Black Glacier beside Tronador (they reckon in 15 years it will have melted completely). We sit in absolute silence for a few minutes, listening to the movement of the ice and water. We wash our hands (numb within seconds) and faces in the white water.

A walk through the woods, to get to another waterfall. Thank goodness for the shade of the trees. 

Exhausted by the time we get home, we just about manage to cook ourselves an omelete before falling into a state of comtatose sleep!

Another day, another trek

Today, we get a bus to Llao Llao National Park, where go for a stoll. Every direction is postcard perfect. 

We then get a boat from Puerto Panelo to Bosque de los Arrayanes, the place where we are most excited to visit.

The trees in this wood are a rare species which can only be found here in Argentina and in Tokyo. There are not many left, and it is unusual to find a forest of them. To touch the bark always feels cold, and the branches knarl and twistin many directions. The colours glow under the rays of the sun. A very special place. From there we walk 13 kilometres through the woods, to Puerto. This walk is so lovely, there are not so many tourists are here. 

We walk from there to Villa Angostura, with just minutes to spare before the last bus departs to Barliloche (more than 70 kilometres from here!). Phew! We get back to the hostel at 11.30pm - cook some steak and veg & sleep soundly...

Until 7 am when the girl sharing the bed opposite starts banging her lockers and rearranging all her belongings. Grrrr, not a happy camper. 

Today is our last day in Bariloche, we considered cycling the 60km Circo Chico this morning at the crack of dawn. However, the rigorous exercise regime that has been performed over the past four days is beginning to ache and stiffen each muscle. So, we decide it is a much better idea to get a lympatic drainage massage in the salon down the road for a mere 70 pesos. Believe me,  it was worth every centavos! We get a haircut for 30 pesos, pick up a few bits in the shops for the next part of our adventure....

We are headed to the heart of La Pampa!  We bid our farewells to the folks at the hostel, get the bus to the station (about 4km outside of the town). Mid conversation, I realise that I have left my phone charging back at the hostel!! Aaargh, I run to the nearest taxi and explain the situation - he thinks we can make it.....

Luckily, I get the phone and arrive back at the station with 10 minutes to spare. However, the taxi journey was a little daunting, to say the very least.....17 hours on a bus, and we need to watch out for a police check point on the road, an hour outside of Santa Rosa....and, if all goes according to plan, Pali will be waiting for us at 6am tomorrow morning by the roadside!