Left Aluminé after a leisurely breakfast, driving slowly up to Villa Pehuenia. The name comes from the Mapudungdun word ‘pehuén’, denoting the araucaria (monkey-puzzle) tree. As I got closer to Villa Penuenia these were increasingly in evidence.
The seeds of the pehuén tree. known as ‘piñones’, are a staple food for the indigenous people of the area, who grind them into flour and use it to make many food forms.
It was a very short and relaxing day’s driving, also taking in a side trip to Moquehué, a small town som twenty km from Pehuenia. Lots of lakes around here, and the tourist season just beginning to wake up.
Tomorrow I cross into Chile, through a new pass (Icalma, a crossing that I don’t know). I’ll be aiming for Temuco, a big city and quite a change after these idyllic little settlements.
Had an early breakfast and got on the road to see the Caves of the Painted Hands. Good light, good road (mostly) and got there by 09.40. Nice to be on fast flat roads instead of twisty mountain gravel.
Very different scenery to Chile: dry, and more desert-like.
I did well to leave early, as there was no one else there and I got the guide all to myself. She was excellent, and the whole tour was fascinating. As we finished I saw the next tour assembling – there must have been at least twenty-five people waiting.
The wall paintings are in a long cañadon (canyon) providing some protection from the elements.
As expected there were many painted hands, in a variety of natural pigments from different periods. dating back as early as 7350 BC. This figure has been arrived at through radio carbon dating, and is challenging earlier theories of migration times and patterns.
But more than hands: there were scenes of hunting guanaco and other animals. The guanaco provided the nomadic peoples with food, protective clothing, sinews and tendons, bones and grease. They also ate tuco-tuco, choique (lesser rhea), puma and other small animals.
And there are glyphs and artwork whose meaning we can only guess at.
I saw a lot of birds on the road: ducks, geese and swans in the many creeks the road crossed. But I had decided not to include wild life this time, so I’ll limit this to a couple of elegant black-necked swans.
And the road was littered with guanaco, hundreds of them.
Then back to Perito Moreno, where I stopped for Lunch. Then I watched the big football game (in Brazil, Boca against Fluminense). Sadly Boca lost 1-2, in extra time.
Tomorrow I drive back northwards, towards Esquel, breaking the journey in Gobernador Costa.
Up early and away, first stop Chile Chico. Which was only 111 km on the map but took almost four hours. Very, very steep and twisty and parts extremely potholed – some lakeside descents quite frightening and I did most of it in 4WD. But compensated for by some of the most spectacular scenery I’ve ever seen: the snowcapped Andes in all their glory and the sun reflected in gorgeous lakes.
The view leaving Puerto Guadal …
….. along the way ….
… until arriving at Chile Chico, where I had a coffee, bought some pisco and filled the tank (crazy thing to do with Chilean prices and so near the border, but petrol was scarce when I left Argentina).
Immigration and customs a breeze both sides, though the young gendarme seemed keen to have explanations for every item I was carrying. But it didn’t take long, he was friendly and chatty and keen to visit SM de los Andes and I wasn’t in a hurry.
Then through to Los Antiguos, where I was not tempted by the Ruta 41 where Tiso and I had such fun a few years back (see here). No desire to learn more about menucos.
I would have liked to drive along RP 41 a little but lunch seemed a more sensible option.
On to Perito Moreno, on some good (straight and flat) tarmac, and arrived in time for lunch and to check in at my best hotel so far. Yes, a proper hotel, and a comfy one – the favourable dollar exchange encouraged me to splash out a bit.
The name of the hotel refers to the Cave of the Painted Hands, a UNESCO world Heritage site which I hope to visit tomorrow. More here.
Left Coyhaique very early, hoping to get to the Cerro Castillo Reserve at dawn to see the huemules comedown to the water. Left at 04.30, grabbing a Copec coffee on the way. I kept my end of the bargain but the huemules failed me. Never mind.
I did see three rabbits, a fox and a skunk. And picked up a French ski instructor who kept me company on some very indifferent roads. After Coyhaique there are few stretches of tarmac, but the gravel is mostly good, with a few bad patches. But twisty, so slow driving.
Got to Puerto Guadal, quite near the border with Argentina, at midday and down to exam reviewing. Can’t complain – the work pays for these trips.. Still finding Chile expensive, but that ends tomorrow, and my dollars will go further in Argentina.
I was tired last night and went to bed reasonably early, but not before celebrating my arrival in Coyhaique with a refreshing mojito. As I took my first sip I realised it should have been a Pisco Sour, but that can wait for the next one.
The streets were full of bizarrely dressed kids trick or treating, what with itt being Halloween. Strange [to me] to see this Irish American tradition in southern Chile, but guess it’s all over the world now. Including the women who served me my [unexpectedly expensive] supper.
This is the hostel I stayed in last night and will stay in tonight. Friendly and comfortable but only powdered instant coffee. Like all travellers I carry essentials, so broke out some Cabrales coffee bags and peace was restored.
It was a working day for me. Fortified by coffee and sweet breads (not sweetbreads) I worked till lunchtime reviewing exam questions and then went out to find sustenance. Which I found in then shape of, what else, a Peruvian restaurant.
Rather than beer or wine I opted for a jug of chicha, refreshing and nostalgic. The menu was extensive (you can check with the optical code) – I had bird and surf, chopped slices of chicken with assorted shellfish served with rice and chips. Good, filling stuff, as my lunches are tending to be.
So I needed to walk it off a bit. Coyhaique is a beautiful little town, and no doubt because of tourists doing the Carretera Austral has developed more sophisticated infrastructure than other neighbouring community centres. It even has a casino, which –even if they had let me in in my dishevelled travelling gear– I was able to resist.
Above is the street corner of my hotel, a quiet area with the mountains in the background. Below, part of the Plaza de Armas, central square, where they were getting together for celebrations at the weekend. Lots of artesania there, which I did succumb to, including a nice hand-woven mat for my new house.
Back to the hotel for a short siesta and some more item reviewing, and out for my promised Pisco sour with supper.
Tomorrow an early start and south down Ruta 7 as far as Puerto Guadal. If I’m lucky I may see some huemules along the way, but I dare not hope.
Woke up at my usual 06.00 to a freezing room in a freezing building. Ice in the bedroom. All ideas of a morning shower evaporated, as did the prospect of waiting in the cold until breakfast at 08.00 so I decided to cut my losses and drove off in the dawn.
It was actually nice at that time of the morning – all a little crisp, and improvable with a coffee but nothing was open in Puyuhuapi or indeed down the Carretera Austral for more than a hundred miles. But I had some juice and biscuits in the car, and the views were again stunning.
I was puzzled by what seemed to be rhubarb growing abundantly on the roadside – must be some other local plant.
I stopped to admire the view a few miles along my way and chatted with some cyclists who were just striking camp. Hardier than me, they were cheerful enough and seemingly not bothered by the cold. Oh, to be young again.
The road was partly paved with excellent asphalt, partly made up gravel and partly nightmare through some of the hilly sections, where there were small amounts of snow and very twisty pot-holed roads that made me grateful there was no ice by the time I reached them. But most of the road hugged lakesides and was mesmerisingly beautiful …
… and in the absence of heavy slow good to drive on.
Had coffee and a sandwich along the way, in a town called Amengual which had one of the beautiful chapels you see in southern Chile. Apparently this was built in the 1880s by one man, with no building or architectural knowledge, who carved every wooden pantile* by hand (if that’s the word?). Reminded me of the chapels Caroline and I saw in Chiloe.
Stopped for another coffee at a COPEC in Mañihuales, and remet some fellow travellers. It’s inevitable when you’re all doing the same long route over several days that you’ll meet up, and kind of fun too.
Got to the days’s destination, Coyhaique, in the early afternoon ready for my delayed shower. Nice comfy hostal, good shower (hot, good water pressure). Coyhaique is a sizeable town so I’ll hope to find a decent restaurant for supper tonight.
I’n staying two nights in Coyhaique as I have some Peer Review work to catch up on and the Internet connection is good. Another good thing is I don’t have to think about the route, hotels, diesel, etc for another twenty-four hours.
A good day, despite the naysayers in Esquel who tried to convince me the Futaleufú Pass was closed. It wasn’t. But first things first.
Very heavy overnight snow in Esquel had caused the town’s electricity supply to fail, and with it Internet and mobile phone signals. So I waited until 10.00 and went along to Vialidad who told me that there was no problem at all with the road to Chile so I set off with a cheerful wave to the naysayers in the hotel.
And Vialidad were right. Despite the heavy snow in Esquel it was the only falling snow I saw in the day and there was precious little on the roads until I got to Villa Santa Lucia, in Chile and on the ruta 7. But I’m getting ahead of myself.
First stop, Trevelin, the mill town. Welsh country here, with a dragon perched precariously on the roof of the information office. I know the town quite well and will be returning later in the trip so drove straight through the town towards the border with Chile. The Tulip festival is getting underway in Trevelin, but the fields are covered in mud and snow with few tulips visible. When I come back next week they should be in full flower.
So, lots of snow around but the road to Chile was clear. Mostly gravel, and very twisty in parts, which made the journey slow but we passed through some beautiful country.
The road from Esquel to Puyuhuapi was the road taken by the Top Gear team back in 2014. They were not especially complimentary about the route, nor my destination, Puyuhuapi. Pearls before swine, I reckon.
So many rivers and bridges ..
Until finally I reached the Ruta 7 (Carretera Austral) at Villa Santa Lucía.
And to prove it …
Filled car with diesel and self with coffee at La Junta, at a COPEC service station, the equivalent of Argentina’s YPF.
And finally arrived in the sleepy little town of Puyuhuapi ….
…. which now has a huge number of hosterías and restaurants to cater for passing tourists ‘doing the Carretera Austral’.
The sun was up now, and it was lovely to walk around a little after being stuck in a snow bound car for so long.
A modest little village really, whose old houses record a life before the tourists arrive.
I arrived a little ahead of schedule and my host was not at home so I went for a welcome beer at Scarlet’s cafe …
…. before checking in for the night. An evening fish supper and a glass of wine, and was ready for bed. Tomorrow, to Coyhaique.
It was still snowing. when I got up this morning – ocular proof if required in the photo below, taken from my bedroom window.
Breakfast was provided, but I was more interested in the stag who overlooked the diners: not sure, but the horns seem wrong for a red deer, and fallow it ain’t. I think perhaps a male Pampas Deer (Ozotoceros bezoarticus). The Marsh Deer (Blastocerus dichotomus) has similar antlers but has a black nose as I remember. Either way, a little way from home, but I may be wrong.
Villa Angostura early Sunday morning was quiet as I drove through, and the roads not too bad for the first ten miles or so.
Then of course we had to go up – lots of mountains round here, and it was yesterday again. There must be better ways of spending a quiet Sunday than battling snow storms in the pre-Cordillera.
We were briefly held up by. a lorry that had skidded and shed his load, but by the time I arrived enough had been cleared to go through single file.
The whole day was an alternation between driving snow and driving rain as we switchbacked our way to Esquel, interspersed with the occasional flash of sun which was actually even less welcome because of its reflection on all the white snow.
Stopped at a service station for an inedible media luna and an undrinkable coffee, which increased my desire for lunch inEl Bolsón. I had been looking forward to pizza and a raspberry beer in a place I know, but sadly it was shut midday. Photo included for Caroline.
I did end up in a trendy modern place where I had a very welcome guiso de lentajas (lentil stew), and a good local beer.
The second part of the journey was better, with less snow as the roads flattened and straightened out and I drove by some familiar places: the great museum at Leleque and Butch Cassidy’s ranch house near Cholilla but I was running late (the first half of the day I was averaging 30 mph) so I cracked on to Esquel.
My friend the snowman was waiting to greet me as I drove in to Esquel, and I found my bed for the night – a very comfortable hostería a couple of kilometres outside Esquel, on the road to Trevelin and Chile that I shall be following tomorrow. Once arrived I couldn’t find the energy to go back into town so dined on coffee, banana and biscuits. Cheap and healthy enough.
Tomorrow the plan is to cross back into Chile through the Futaleufú Pass. We’ll see.
Strange day altogether. First of all, a radical change of plan, as I couldn’t get a ferry reservation south to Chaitén. All ferries booked up for at least five days. Decided to cross back into Argentina and return to Chile through a pass further down (see map). Not ideal, but doable. Will teach me not to assume that in low season I can just drive on to a ferry. Adjustment route in orange below, as before from red X.
Left Puerto Varas at midday, after doing some local shopping and sightseeing. Got a call informing me that there were petrol shortages in Argentina; because of this petrol was being rationed in Chilean service stations near the border and it took ingenuity and Google map navigation to get the tank filled up – something I was loth to do as it cost me twice what it costs in Argentina. But necessary.
Incessant driving rain all the way to the Chilean border post made for boring driving, but alleviated inter alia by Lynyrd Skynyrd and the Grateful Dead. No photos for that reason. At the border they would only let drivers through who could show they had chains, as a snow storm was brewing. I had my snow sleeves which didn’t really convince them, but the traction controls on the SW4 did, so they let me through.
Fighting my way through an Andean pass in a snow storm is not really my idea of fun, and a first for me in the SW4 but I made friends with a couple of other drivers and we made a mini-convoy. Heavy snow falling, settling to half a metre or so at the very top, but we made it; we saw others who didn’t, scattered at strange angles in the snow drifts. On the way down into Argentina we saw the snow ploughs going up, accompanied by a two-blue ambulance so clearly help was on its way, although more heavy snow was forecast for the night and tomorrow.
So now I’m back in Argentina, in the lovely hundred-year old Hotel Angostura, looking forward to a hot shower and an evening meal. Not sure yet about tomorrow – will decide at breakfast time.
Left San Martín de los Andes on time – a cold, wet morning as I took the Siete Lagos road towards the Puyehue Pass into Chile.
Stopped for a pee at one of my favourite peeing places. An explanation may be necessary here. Lake Lacar, the lake on which San Martín de los Andes is located, is unusual in that it drains not into the Atlantic as one would expect but into the Pacific. This has been the cause of much discussion from Chile about ownership, which need not detain us here.
Anyway, at this particular spot on the Seven Lakes road the stream splits into two. One of these flows into Lake Lacar and thence to the Pacific, while the other drains into the Atlantic. So by peeing into the stream just before the bifurcation you can pee simultaneously into two oceans. Way to go.
Puyehue is the name of the pass, but also of a volcano which erupted a few years ago causing general inconvenience to the locals and also to international aviation. The sides of the road still bear evidence in the form of piles of volcanic ash.
There are many miles of neutral land between the Argentine and Chilean border posts, and at the top of the pass is the actual border, where the mist generously cleared long enough for me to take a photo.
I was the only traveller going westward and got through the two migration and customs posts in record time but coming the other way it was another story: a national holiday in Chile on a Friday meant huge numbers of Chileans coming over to Argentina, probably to Bariloche. The cars were backed up a good eight kilometres from the border.
Once in Chile it was time for a bite to eat and I stopped in Entre Lagos. I couldn’t find any particularly appetising places to stop at, but chose well with a tasty and nourishing stew of beans, spaghetti and sausages. Cheap and filling.
For some reason all the service stations on the Ruta 5 seem to have disappeared so I didn’t get my coffee until Puerto Varas, where I caught the last half hour of the Argentina-England World Cup rugby playoff for third place. Close game, with England scraping a win.
I got to my destination on time, a friendly family guest house with good wifi, lockup parking and a comfy bed. Good enough for a first day. `Didn’t feel like eating much after my huge lunch so bought some bread and cheese at a despensa and retired early. Tomorrow, Hornopirén.
