Day 88 - 96. Bike dreams should form a sub branch called hike dreams

Day 88 Puerto Ibanez

111km with 1201m of climbing is the plan.

Given my back was made a little worse during our rest day in Coyhaique when I had decided to ride into town from the campsite, I was still walking rather than riding.

I'd left straight after breakfast, and everyone on their bikes passed me after I'd done perhaps 4km. So I took some photos of them all as they went by, and I continued amongst some very beautiful landscape. I hated it, because when this trip is done, I won't be able to see it every day again.

Luckily Richard who was set to pick me up had warned me that they may take a couple of hours getting some of the shopping done before driving out of town. I'd walked without seeing anyone or any road signs for over 2 hours, and even with Richard's comment I had begun questioning if I'd missed a turn somewhere.

After lunch, the scenery was the best I'd seen up until then. Just stunning. The photos are good, but nowhere near as good as being there.

Day 89 Perito Moreno

111km with 1201m of climbing. Most of it unpaved. A standard issue day. We crossed back into Argentina from Chile. So there were comments about having the "dirty 2's" again, as Argentina uses paper notes, and the 2 peso notes are used very often. So they absorb all sorts of nastiness. Bit of a difference to Chile's plastic notes, where we were all carrying stacks of 10000 peso notes.

Given there was no real split in time between the 2 trucks due to the border crossing, I didn't walk on this day.

The ride for those who did ride was quite tough at the beginning, going steeply and constantly up and down.

The border crossings were uneventful, and then back in Argentina, we were back amongst the pampas. Boring, flat or low rolling hills, low shrubs and grass. Most of us aren't too keen on it.

Michelle, Tamsin, Gerdi (sorry Gerdi!), Richard, Adrian (UK) and Jaap

Sneaking up on the the wild people Didier, Jo and Arunas who roam the pampas setting up lunch spots. They're very shy.

Day 90 Bajo Caracoles

131km with 1310m of climbing on the bike. I walked 23km.

The day started with promise. When I woke, I found I was able to move without having to be extremely careful and slow when getting out of the tent. A good sign my back is on the mend. At this rate, I was hoping that I could be back on the bike within 3 or 4 days.

I fit in 16km of walking before I was picked up by Richard. The wind then started to really pickup. The forecast was for winds to reach up to 50km/h.

Very appropriate Patagonian wind sign!

The scenery wasn't worth mentioning, as we were among the pampas. Yawn.

After lunch, set off again and managed to score my first sighting of an armadillo  Shy little buggers. One sound and it ran away. Not that it mattered, I snuck in a few photos before it bolted.

5km into the walk after lunch, my left knee which started all the off bike grief came back to haunt me. Cheeky inconsiderate thing. I thought it was done complaining. I continued on for another 2km to see if it would get worse. It did, by which time Didier arrived from lunch and picked me up.

Day 91 Las Horquetas

109km with 551m of climbing, essentially flat.

With my knee still sore and my back still complaining, to try and prevent an ongoing cycle of injuries, I rested for the day. A pity, as the Patagonian winds were back...as a tailwind. We meet people on motorbikes or self supported cyclists with panniers on their mountain bikes along the way. One of the motorcyclists with us from Australia mentioned that during the day he was travelling at 80km/h and all he could hear was the engine and tyres of his bike. No wind in his face. So best guess was the wind was doing that speed as well!

We setup camp beside a building that is slowly being built over many years as to what appears will eventually be a restaurant. Bonus was the toilets worked. A luxurious bushcamp. Just no showers.

The wind was very strong, so everyone setup their tents beside the building to get some protection. Having confidence in my tent, I decided to take advantage of all the spare space and went to the back corner of the field. I prefer to have my tent by itself, so during the night I don't get woken by people walking around, tripping over my guy ropes, and the sound of tent zips. Human nature is a funny thing. I'd barely finished setting my tent up, then someone decides it must be a good spot and tried to setup right beside me. I was waiting for them to finish then I was going to move, but they discovered it was too difficult to setup with the strong wind and retreated back to being near the bunch of tents beside the building. Excellent. That often happens, 1 tent goes up, and despite all the space available, the other tents are clustered together.

Day 92 Estancia La Angostura

83km with 100m climbing. Still in pain, still resting.

The day starts with a time trial. The tail wind was still strong in the morning, and so everyone did a very good pace. Everyone covered the 48km to lunch in approximately an hour. Some a little less, some a little more. An average of 50km/h on a MOUNTAIN bike is ridiculously quick. Shows how much difference something as insubstantial as air can make.

The riding for most was completed by around midday, and we were treated to something quite out of place.

The estancia/station/ranch was in a narrow long valley. Whereas the rest of the area was barren, this valley had grass, and some trees near the buildings. Horses and sheep wandering around. The sheep were very friendly, as the young ones were still bottle fed. Not to mention the dogs and cats. A sanctuary or oasis. A very beautiful place, which became even better at sunset.

Day 93 Estancia La Siberia

67km with 553m of climbing. Whereas I was feeling better, and went for a casual 31km stroll.

The scenery was pampas. Not worth mentioning.

Michelle and myself had this silly idea to walk the complete distance from lunch to the campsite. So that's what we did, for 6 hours.

The start of a casual stroll

Michelle, Yolande joined us for a little while, and myself in what has been named my hobo pants. They have good pockets! 

Photo courtesy of Jaap - Bike Dreams crew

It wasn't entirely unamusing. There were quite a number of locusts on the dirt road. Of course, some were being run over by traffic, and the surrounding locusts jump in for a chow down on their unfortunate friends. So then there's a group of diners, who in turn get squished at the same time and so the cycle continues. It was also good to be able to chat for a bit while on the move, which is not something I normally do.

Our efforts were mentioned at dinner that night, although it's not something I'd choose to do on a daily basis. Cycle pace is slow enough, at walking pace in scenery that doesn't change will eventually challenge any remaining sanity I think!

Day 94 Tres Lagos

93km with 550m of climbing. Almost entirely unpaved.

Feeling a little more confident in my condition that it's on the mend, I decided to get back on the bike. Perhaps not the best day, but not a bad idea given it started with a climb straight away, and there was a head wind.

The ride was manageable, but my back was tightening up, so I used some discretion and stopped at lunch.

On arrival at Tres Lagos, which is a very small town, Didier drove the truck to the petrol station. Only to find like previous years, there was no fuel. No petrol, no diesel. So apparently they're consistent performers. This was expected, so it didn't cause any inconvenience, the extra fuel would have just left more spare.

I think it's really starting to sink in to all of us that there's so very little of this trip left. Only 2 weeks. People are taking more photos of all the silly things other people get up to. I know myself even though I struggle sometimes being amongst large groups, I've come to enjoy the company of each one of them. I hope after this that we meet again sometime.

Day 95 Parador Luz Divina

68km with 270m of climbing.

This time I rode the full day. What a relief. So glad to be riding again. Not that it wasn't uncomfortable, but it was tolerable after stopping every few km to stop, get off the bike and stand straight for a moment.

Most of the day again had a head wind. It was relatively mild. At a guess going by the few times when the road turned and the wind was a tailwind and I sped up until the point where I just felt a puff of air against my face, the wind was moving at perhaps 40km/h.

The ride was broken up by visiting a hotel 10km before camp for coffee, free wifi (haven't seen any connectivity for a week), and a silly but fun game. The game is where a metal ring is hung from the ceiling, and there's a hook on the wall. The idea is to swing the ring so that it lands and stays on the hook. Not so easy. Didier puts up the challenge that nobody can leave the hotel until they've won the game. Some people took many, many, MANY attempts to finally get it. When it was my turn, I tried once, got my eye in, then on the 2nd attempt I landed it which brought a round of applause. Total fluke, but shh.

The campsite was talked up as having hot showers and toilets, and a small store selling drinks. In previous visits, Rob and Didier had mentioned that the place is still being added to and growing. When we arrived however, it was abandoned and partially stripped. A pity to see this happen.

Still, we could still wash. There was a river running alongside the property which is fed by glaciers. Quite invigorating. In other words bloody freezing, but still worked!

Day 96 El Calafate. A rest day at the end after 9 days straight.

96km with 816m of climbing.

Most of the climbing was done going over undulating terrain. All paved. There was only 1 "mountain" that gave us a small climb of over 100m.

There was a little wind. At the beginning as a tailwind, so coasting along at 35km/h was easy, then later a headwind, but could still push through at around 20km/h. The scenery was MORE pampas. Except for a little quirk we hadn't seen before... icebergs in the lake beside El Calafate.

On the following rest day, a good portion of us went and visited the nearby glaciers either by going on a hike, or visiting by boat, or a combination of both.

Multiple minor glaciers feeding into a major one