Our road trip across Patagonia began in San Carlos de Bariloche. We arrived in Bariloche after yet another long distance bus ride from Buenos Aires, nearly 22 hours later. Two days and nights we spend in what we coined the Banff-of-the-south before deciding on a route for our road trip. Travelling south to El Calafate was the intended destination but once we realized it was 6000 some odd km return and at least 5-6 days driving, we opted out for a different route. That is when we decided to drive across the country from coast-to-coast to see the penguins! We'll not just the penguins, we made Valdez Peninsula our point of interest and anything else along the way that might intrigue us.
El Bolson (I kept calling El Boston which quite annoyed Shawn-lol) was our first stop day one of our 7 days car rental and camping excursion. El Bolson was a relaxing hippy village in the south of the Lake District surrounded by beautiful snow capped mountains. We toured through the artisan market which is held every Tues/Thurs/Sat and tasted some locally grow and made delicacies and of them, many cerveceria artisanals (microbrews!) - and they were plentiful! Remind me again why we don't do this in Canada?
Picnic in the park
After picking up some goodies in the market and having a picnic lunch in the park, we headed out to our first designated stop, Parque Nacional Los Alerces.
Parque Nacional Los Alerces
We enjoyed the camping and surroundings so much we stayed an extra day just to chill-and that we did! (Just ask Shawn about his best day ever hanging out at the campsite;))
Views from our campsite and nearby lake.
Argentinian BBQ campstyle.
Day 3 were back in the car for 800km across the Patagonian desert.
Biggest skies we've ever seen!
We spent the night at the municipal campsite, arriving in the National Park Peninsula Valdez just after dark (10pm here), and wow, not what we were expecting. This blog entry we decided Shawn would write about- stay tuned! I guess you can't really complain about free camping, can you?
Breakfast at our free campsite. Yup, that's our table...
Touring Valdez on the dirt roads for over 200km was an amazing experience. Here's some of what we saw.
Lion Seals & Penguins on the Peninsula
After a long day of driving, and our car and hair full of dust, we headed into the nearest pueblo 150km south called Puerto Madryn. After an amazing hot shower, camp set up, and the vino poured into our camping mugs, I convinced Shawn to walk across the road to the bay for Whale watching. He was probably thinking, yah right what are the chances, when not even 2 minutes later a Whale, not 1 but 3 or 4, magically appeared out of the water. Full bodies, tails, fins and all- it was truly amazing!
The next day we woke to a wicked wind storm that nearly toke our tent like a sail, with me in it, into the bay! So much our non sandy tent!
We set off for the long ride back across the Patagonian desert, this time a very different experience and a lot more gas usage.
Sand storm in the desert on the drive back. 500km+
After 700km, we returned to El Bolson for 2 nights of camping and of course, more delicious treats at the market! This is also the first night of 3 that we froze in our tent! Temperatures dipped down to 3&4 at night while the daytime highs reached 23-26. How deceiving!!
We tried our luck for a warmer night one last time closer to Bariloche in the beautiful Parque Nacional Nahuel Huapi, claimed one of the best National Parks in all of Argentina. It was truly stunning!
Views from our hike to the mirador (lookout)
Our last night of camping in Patagonia was was cold, but nothing all clothing layers on and a few bottles of vino couldn't fix;)
