Sleeping on a bed of rocks

Dear future me,

Nothing is what it seems, not on ‘Who is the mole’ (which is a Dutch program that I still follow, even when I am 14.000 km from home), and not on my journey. Before I started to conquer the Carretera Austral to the South, I visited Chiloë Island. As all islands it has its own vibe. You can feel that vibe if the sun is out and turns it into an open museum full of adorable churches, fishing harbors, fortresses, lighthouses and souvenirs made out of wool. I practically kept myself busy every single day, however it felt as the peaceful hours before the storm comes. Not literally though, as Chile experiences a serious heat wave and I haven’t seen a drop of rain until the very last day. Somehow, I leave a trail of bad things behind me, but it fits the pattern so far: as soon as I left there were landslides in Colombia and Ecuador, political unrest in Peru and in Bolivia and to top it off, huge forest fires in Chile. And all I can say is…Argentina, here I come! I hope they will not close the border for me.

But to get there, I first have to deal with the famous Carretera Austral, leading towards Patagonia. In 2019 I did parts of this route in a group, so most of my time on the road has been one big Déjà Vu. Not the beginning though, starting in Puerto Montt and taking two ferries to cross the water. That is a challenge on its own, because the second ferry is one that you have to book 3 months in advance. Obviously, that is a no go if you are a timeless traveler like me, so I just had to show up and try my luck. I arrived the day before, so I could influence my luck a little bit more and it worked. I got to cross from Hornopirén to Caleta Gonzalo! Which means you spend about 4 hours on a ferry cruising through a magical landscape. Only to find that I still had the keys of my hostal in my pockets. Luckily, I found a nice Park ranger who could take the keys on the ferry back to Hornopirén. Problem solved! The next challenge turned out to be a full hour of dust riding on a sandy road in a line of trucks and cars coming from the same ferry. The lady of my new hostel couldn’t hold her laugh when she saw my face, as I could easily being mistaken for a chimney sweeper. Now I found myself in country that resembles the feel and looks of the northern remote areas in Canada and Alaska. Small villages at a bay with broad lanes, wooden stores, messy houses and in true South American style guard dogs at every single house plus street dogs to cover neighborhoods. You can easily spend a whole day watching the hierarchy of the dogs who sleep during the day and get active when the sun sets. I also expected the nights to be cooler, heading to Antarctica, but in these parts the summer is still lingering in the night.

I follow the Carretera Austral down south to Puyuhaupi, a peaceful German village at a bay where I slept in 2019 as well. How different a place can be when the weather is the opposite: back then it was cold and dark, now it is sunny and warm. Mind you, it was in exactly the same period of time. This was the place I certainly could relax for a day. So, I decided to….do a hike. And believe me, except from the stunning view on a glacier, the waterfalls and the turquoise lake, nothing was relaxed on that walk. I met two other bikers and joined them, just to find myself running uphill for an hour and a half and running down again. They were from Spain and Argentina and very well trained in hiking. As a Dutch girl, my climbing muscles are pretty non-existent. I did like their company though, so it was all worth the pain and exhaustion at the end of the day. From there the road and its environment got more and more dramatic and gorgeous. I would say that the International book of language should add a new word to its dictionary: Australicious. It stands for an unbelievable stunning, panoramic, peaceful and grand environment where people feel humble and happy to be part of it.  Coihaque was my last stop before I had to say goodbye to pavement for a while and I got myself energized by eating pizzas with some fellow bikers. Because now you meet them everywhere: bikers and bicyclists whose dream is to follow the Carretera Australicious down south. They all share this crazy adventurous feeling, just to find themselves buried in deep gravel and facing washboards that never ends. Hmmm, it didn’t take me long to decide not to follow the road all the way to Villa O’Higgins, because with a heavy bike like mine, the uncomfortableness of riding exceeds the fun of embracing the landscape. So Cochrane was to be my final destination before I start to head north again via Argentina. Not before I visited the marble caves near Puerto Rio Tranquillo (at the second largest lake of South America) and the wild azul Confluencia Rio Baker with its crazy beautiful streams.

Normally this is the end of my two-weekly story, that I would finish with mentioning that I took the Paso Roballos out of Chile into Argentina. To get there I had to cross Park Patagonia, which people recommended me to take. They also said that the road on Chilean side would be comfortable, not so on Argentina side. I must admit that the weather suddenly stopped helping me and gave me this constant blurry vision by watering my visor. I must also say that the word ‘comfortable’ is a weirdly chosen word to describe the current road conditions. Some heavy sections of gravel and sand, in combination with the rain and very fierce winds, didn’t quiet meet my standards of comfortable. But I guess the main factor that turned this last part of my journey into a living hell was the fact that my radiator got pinched. My goodbye to Chile was leaving a trail of water behind (I guess they won’t have any forest fires on that part of the park). And although I kept refilling my radiator every 16 km to try to cool my motorcycle down, the whole ordeal was a huge challenge. Fortunately for me, I did meet wonderful fellow travelers on the border who were waiting to cross and could help me with some extra water. But from there it is another 120 km to the main road and remember that the road at Argentinan side was not ‘comfortable’ anymore. A beautiful couple named Steve and Anni helped me at the first stretch by comforting me with some coffee, nuts and extra water and giving me mental support. But our ways parted and I was faced with another 90 km to pavement. As it was already 19.00 hrs., I knew I was not gonna make it before midnight. And I also new that camping here was not an option anymore, because of the winds and the bare stoney lands. So I kept on pushing, to get to the pavement. From there I still had no place to go, but a least I would have had more chance of people moving by. Now I found myself on a deserted rough pista in the middle of nowhere at night in the dark. Just 8km before I would hit the pavement, I stopped to rest for a while and to encourage myself. My bike felt tired too and decided to lay down also, after being pushed by the wind. Trying to get it back up, I strained my back and couldn’t do nothing more than to decide to lay down next to my machine and call it a night. On a bed of rocks I listened to the fierce winds, looked at the stunning stars in the sky and found that being sola in these circumstances was not the best situation to be in. Without batteries and water. What a great entrance to Argentina!

To be continued…………

See ya later,

Annemieke