 |
| Valle de la Luna |
For those of you who read my last blog, you can imagine that
we didn’t do a whole lot in San Pedro other than relax a deep-clean the
bikes. The nature of my trip has changed
quite a bit, and having only paid for indoor accommodation once in over a
month, it’s been difficult to blog and/or have access to the internet. So, thank you for your patience and I have a
ton to share with all of those who wish to listen!
 |
| Valle de la Luna |
As I had mentioned, we met an Australian, Nigel, who left a
few days after we arrived. On his way
back up toward the Argentine border, he met Lukas, a German cyclist heading
down to San Pedro from the Laguna’s Route.
He told Lukas about the hostel we were at, and we all met. As it turns out, I had actually already met
Lukas briefly in Cusco at the end of June.
He had been just on his way out of town.
A few Israeli folks arrived (by bus) and we all had a grand ol’ time
eating veggie empanadas and playing ping-pong, etc. I was out riding around (it’s difficult for
me to not bike for more than a few days) and happened upon an older Polish
cyclist heading north, who decided to check out and stay at our hostel. We all talked bikes for a long time while we
cleaned stoves, patched panniers and clothes, etc. The second-to-last day there we randomly met
an Australian couple and wound up at a local’s hangout watching the Chile vs.
Venezuela soccer game over some decent Chilean beer. Lukas and I walked around town around
midnight in search of some good vibes and found them at a place with live
music. During our last day there, two
Irish folks and a French guy staying at our hostel rented bikes and we all rode
out to the Valle de la Luna, a Utah-esque regional park, walking through caves
and caverns everywhere.
 |
| Dunes |
The whole idea of riding on dirt for another few hundred
kilometers didn’t appeal to Loic or I, so we decided to take the longer,
supposedly more scenic, yet paved way to Argentina and Lukas from Germany
joined us. The three of us rode out of
town, watching the enormous hill we had come down a few days ago grow before
us. With almost 300km until the next
town, we were carrying even more water than when in the Laguna’s Route,
something like 16 liters for me (32 pounds, heavier than my bike). As we began climbing, a lonely truck driver
stopped behind us and struck up conversation, offering us a ride to as far as
Uruguay! Hesitating a bit, we loaded up
the bikes and drove to the turnoff for Bolivia, getting off where we had come
out on the dirt road a few days back.
Normally I wouldn’t be okay with taking a ride, especially up a hill as
it defeats the purpose of having to take the bad things with the good, but we
had already seen all this, so it was okay.
Back at 15,500ft, the road undulated awhile through fields of snow and
looming volcanoes. We found a decent
place to camp and were back to freezing-cold nights…
 |
Hito Cajon - absolutely nothing there except for a junction
Paso Jama - Our next access to running water
Susques - Our next access to food/gas |
 |
| Cold up here at almost 16,000ft |
 |
| From inside the Lukas-View Suite |
The next few days were a blur as Lukas is fast and doesn’t
mind letting us draft off him. So we did
three back-to-back 100km+ days in mountainous terrain with long flat valleys
containing big salars and flamingo-filled lakes. We fought a headwind most of the days, but
couldn’t get out early enough in the morning to beat it because the cold. With the exception of our first campsite, every
campsite we had en route to Salta was spectacular. One was next to a Salar, where we watched the
sunset over Chile, one on the edge of a desert cliff, another in a deep, flat
valley, and one hidden in the trees above a lake. Crossing into Argentina was straight-forward,
though it’s unfortunate that Americans now have to pay $160 to enter, as of
June 2013. Landscapes look the same, but
the road no longer has shoulders. This paved
way crossing the Andes has surprisingly no traffic though, which is a nice
treat.
 |
| Cycling on the moon |
 |
| Crossing into country #28 by bike |
It is really cool to have Lukas around, yet he’s not the
typical structured German cyclist. He is
23, very free-spirited, wields a brightly painted guitar, and meditates for an
hour every morning. He is very in-touch
with himself; he’s always smiling or laughing, and is keen on learning new
things. It adds a nice dynamic having
him around Loic and I. He’s also
vegetarian which will make things easier for me in the cities. After 285km, we reach our first town in
Argentina, which is very Bolivian – dirt streets, mud-brick houses, a general
lack of fresh food, etc. Yet it is
obvious we are in Argentina based on the way the people act. They are very open to others, and understand
what we as traveling cyclists are doing.
We stock up on bread and water and continue another 10km up a really
steep hill to camp.
 |
| First Argentinian sunset |
 |
| Fighting headwind for daaayyys. |
 |
| A surprising amount of "dead-horse art" out in these parts |
 |
| Supposedly the starriest sky in the world - I counted 4,868 |
 |
| That last photo caption was half fact, half fiction |
The next day, we meet up with Nigel, the Aussie who is
strong, but carries perhaps 150 or 160lbs of stuff, including his bike. We cycle together for some time, but the
three of us really want to sleep at a comfortable altitude, so we push on
without him up our final pass before the 10,000ft decent to Jujuy. The going is tough with headwinds and
water-weight, but I manage the pass and we plunge through dozens of switchbacks
down to 9,000ft before finding an incredible canyon to pass the night in. We make a big, bland celebratory dinner as we
wouldn’t be doing any more legitimate Andes mountain passes for at least a
month or two. I’m back again to not
using a fly on the tent, ahhhh! In the
morning, I try a bit of meditation with Lukas and after packing, we descend
down throughout the day to a hot 4,000ft.
We bypassed Jujuy hearing it was ugly and met up with route 9 going to
another big city, Salta. Normally the
roads between two nearby cities are gross no matter where you are in the world,
but this road was incredible. It
narrowed to a nicely paved one-lane way winding through landscapes that look
like New England, past little lakes and many farms. After a great camp near a lake, we finished
this beautiful road and rode into Salta.
Northern Argentina is truly siesta country. Aside from the supermarkets, literally
everything closes around one and reopens again a few hours later. And a word about the six supermarkets I found
in Argentina thus far: there is no peanut butter, no soy milk, there are no
veggie patties… there is no soy meat at
all. Even in the small towns of Peru and
Bolivia, soy products are easy to find and in the bigger cities, all supermarkets
carry peanut butter. Trying to phase out
fish, my search for protein was long and arduous, but I finally found a little
nutrition shop selling expensive whey powder.
Late on Thursday, Nigel pulled into our hostel by chance! On Friday night, Lukas and I were making
music for a few hours when we met some local university students. We smoked hookah and drank Fernet, a drink
they have everywhere here, until the early morning hours. Around 4am, we all went up in their car to
the big lookout above the city, then did some pre-dawn sightseeing before
heading to bed. The following day we
relaxed most of the day, and then tried to find some fun in the evening. We walked over 50 blocks in search of a place
many people recommended, but arrived to find that it didn’t fit our vagabond
vibe.
 |
| Bro Camp.... |
The next day, Nigel, Lukas, and I left together in the direction
in Cafayate, a small town in Northern Argentina’s wine region. We wound up sleeping in an awesome olive
orchard and got to see all the things Nigel is carrying including a frying pan,
a mallet for tent stakes, a 12x12ft tarp with poles, 3-person tent, etc. The following day, we rode up and into the
Quebrada de Cafayate, a big, beautifully red canyon. The winds changed every few minutes, so it
was hard to tell how much distance we’d be able to cover. We stopped several times to hike into deep
side canyons with shadowy names like Throat of the Devil and The Obelisk. When we exited the quebrada, we had already
done 90km and the wind was starting to pick up sand, making the riding tough
and the searching for camp tougher. I
walked around some rock formations and found something more-or-less
suitable. It was a sandy and cold evening,
but watching the latest few episodes of Breaking Bad was a welcomed treat.
 |
| Nigel from Australia and I going into into the Quebrada |
 |
| Life's peachy... in a gulch |
 |
| Olive oil mecca |
We rolled into Cafayate the following morning and while
hanging out in front of the market, a lady approached me offering her backyard
to camp for 20 pesos. The cheapest
hostel seemed to be 60 and being right in the center would be nice. Plus, I’ve decided to extend my time in
Argentina and need to make my pesos last longer. The three of us set our stuff up and explored
the town a bit. I planned on staying
here for a few days, but it wasn’t what I was looking for, so Lukas and I
decided to leave the following day and Nigel would be a day behind us.
 |
| mmm Bodegas |
 |
| Such a beautiful canyon |
The ride from Cafayate to Belen was pretty uneventful. Late the first day, we saw a few dreadlocked
travelers roadside and stopped to chat.
We made some music, had some mate, and one of the people lives in the
little village so we passed the night with them, making a big dinner and having
a great night. The moonrise above all
the art painted on the walls and below the vines of gourds in the courtyard was
spectacular. We had a sandstorm the next
night and headwinds all day, ugh. During
the sandstorm, we sought refuge with a family in the middle of the desert. They were very friendly, offering us drinking
water and showing us all their animals: chickens, turkeys, pigs, cows, goats,
and a one-week old llama... It was a
loud night. On our last day to Belen,
when we stopped for lunch, we met up with two cyclists, a couple from Mexico
and England. We had heard about them and
about two women from the U.S. cycling in front of us. We finished the last of 9 (yes count em, 9)
baguettes we purchased yesterday afternoon and continued on. The road was gravel and the headwinds were
insane, but least it was finally warm!
After pushing pretty hard, Lukas and I arrived in Belen where I had
arranged a Warmshowers homestay. We found
our host Antonio and his family of 7, met Jacque and Kayla heading to Ushuaia
by bike, and Luciano, an Argentinian traveling by thumb. We went out for a stupidly expensive dinner
of plain pasta with no sauce or spices, then delicious ice cream.
 |
| Ruta 40 |
 |
| The traveling artesania sanctuary with Mate gourds growing above |
 |
| Avar's Warmshowers |
On our rest day, I deep-cleaned my stove for hours, changed
my chain to a new one, cleaned some stuff, ate lots of food, and watched as a
sandstorm engulfed the city. It’s nice
to be indoors! Coco and Gregg (the
couple from Mexico and England) arrived later in the day, not having been able
to do it yesterday due to the wind and we all cooked up a veggie lunch!
 |
| Coco and Gregg |
 |
| The beginning of 'The Family' |
 |
| Sr. Antonio |
My plans changed a lot after spending time with Lukas. I agree with his philosophy which is that it
is good to have a plan, as long as it’s easy to change. I signed up for WWOOF Argentina, an
organization that puts prospective volunteers in contact with organic farms
worldwide. The few farms I have
contacted aren’t accepting volunteers at the time because it is still the tail
end of winter here, but it will all work out when it’s supposed to.
 |
| The Family from L to R: Kayla, Jackie, me, Gregg, Coco, and Lukas |
 |
| Lukas |
I spent two days with what would later be called “The
Family” in Belen. We painted the
panniers, stitched art, found a second guitar to jam with and had a grand
time. We watched 180 Degrees South and
later formed the ‘1kg Ice Cream Club’.
In the next week, the 6 of us cycled together and whenever we passed a
Grido’s (ice cream shop), we would get a kilo for the group. It became a ritual and we even made a
manifesto for the members of the club.
1kg Ice Cream Club Manifesto:
No picking up the tub
Don't scoop too deep
No second-hand support
No spoon blocking
If you break your spoon, you're out
No moving of the tub towards oneself
No tilting of the tub
Five second scoop limit
No multi-scoops
At the end of the session, all must clap
If you break a rule, you get a slap on the hand and a time penalty
depending on the crime. We even
considered making spoon-necklaces to be prepared when we found a Grido’s.
 |
| Mexican night in Salica |
 |
| Herbert and his kids, some of the strangest people I've met... |
I dug deep and happened to find the artistic side in me,
stitching an outline of South America in the back of my Goodwill sweatshirt,
and then when Lukas gave me his fleece he picked up second-hand in Trujillo, I
gave Gregg my map sweatshirt. I painted
some stuff, repaired a few things, etc.
Leaving Belen after three great nights, The Family split up a bit with
Gregg and Coco being new to cycling and others having cycled longer and/or with
different weight. Camping with The
Family was exciting as we’d make a big fire, sing, make crazy music including
The Family Song, make headlight art, practice meditation, tell jokes, go for
hikes, repair bikes, etc.
 |
| The Family |
 |
| Camp |
Lukas had always said that if you ask the universe for
something, it’ll come and it rings true with every turn I take. We arrived in Salica, a small town where
Lukas had heard there was a special place for cyclists to camp. The turnoff was marked with a toilet bolted
to a high sign and an upside-down mannequin head hanging from the toilet. The place has a big grassy area for tents, lots
of crazy art, a communal kitchen and ping pong table, ducks walking around, an
awesome dog, and a hill with a chair on it overlooking the farmlands owned by
Herbert, the crazy owner who inherited the place from his grandfather. It’s so nice we decided to take a rest day
already. In the town itself, all the
people are incredibly friendly and there’s an ice cream shop, panaderia, small
supermarket: everything a cyclist could
need! We did ice cream and started
earning our keep at Herbert’s place.
Jackie and I painted an outline of the world on the outside wall of the
communal area. The whole facility
doubles as an alternative school for indigenous youth. On our first night there, we made homemade
pizzas in the earthen-built fire oven and on the second, Mexican night, with
Coco taking control to make some of the best food I’ve eaten in a loooong time.
Herbert and his family would come in
occasionally and talk about crazy things, and then Herbert would go pound on a
drum hanging from the ceiling as hard as he can, then leave. Gregg and I played at least a dozen games of
ping pong, settling the even score on our last morning before leaving. I even helped restore a classical guitar he
had lying around; with all six of us each doing something, the place really
came together by the time we pedaled out.
The two days ahead are remembered for their intense headwind
and midday siestas to help us forget the wind.
Our camp was beautiful again, just off the traffic-free road, protected
from the wind behind a hill, cactus and spiny trees everywhere. Lots of warmth, music, and shooting stars
ensued.
 |
| Chilecito |
When we got to Chilecito, we hadn’t a place for everyone
though I had arranged a Warmshowers for Lukas and I. He wasn’t home, but the lady on the
motorcycle we followed to his place lived right down the street and invited us
to pass the night there! Vicky took 6
dirty cyclists in, fed us tons of food, let us sleep inside, use the shower,
leave and come when we pleased… She is
an incredible woman. To have leftovers
after 6 hungry cyclists have eaten dinner… well, I don’t think I’ve ever seen
it done. Kayla and I repaired, tuned,
and greased Vicky’s bike and Coco made her a dream catcher. Vicky is in her 40’s, lives with her Nephew,
works at a juice factory and always has a lot of family coming and going. She lost her husband and now battles cancer,
but is always smiling and with a big heart, helps out where she can. She made us dinner and brought bread the next
morning for breakfast. The girls are on
a timeline so left in the morning, and Lukas, Coco, Gregg, and I took it easy,
exploring Chilecito. The markets are
really cheap and the town nice with great people. Luckily for me, Coco and Gregg are really
into the show Breaking Bad, so we got up to date with the latest few
episodes. Vicky rescued a puppy a few
days before we arrived and we gave it tons of love while there. We could see his condition improve during the
time we were there, with water, good food, and so much love from everyone.
 |
| Vicky and her family |
Lukas left early the next morning as he is trying to get to
Cordoba and I have decided to go at a slower pace with Gregg and Coco. We cycled 5 beautiful days with some serious
headwind to San Augustine de Valle Fertil.
In the last few evenings, we picked up a box of wine or two on our way
out of town. On the 4
th
night, we had consumed 2 liters of wine on empty stomachs and went to bed a bit
toasted. It started to thunder and
lightning with big drops of rain beginning to fall in the middle of the night. Being situated in a dry riverbed, it was a
mad dash, still drunk, to get everything to high ground. Crazy night, warm though and lots of flat
tires the following morning. Coco’s
front shifter broke on a dirt shortcut road, but we repaired it using a rock
wedged between the seat tube and front derailleur. Gregg changed it to a smaller rock every time
we had a hill to climb.
 |
| Dry riverbed we had to flee from in the middle of the night when it began pouring rain |
 |
| Canyon country |
We finally made it to San Augustine de Valle Fertil on the
fifth day from Chilecito, a great little town still in a dry climate, but with
tons of birds and wildlife. We saw
eagles, foxes, condors, rabbits, snakes, etc.
San Augustine is small enough to get around by bike, but big enough to
have everything we need, so we took two rest days at an awesome little
campground near the central plaza.
Everyone gets around by bike and no one locks their bikes; I even felt
comfortable after dark using the free wifi in the plaza with my computer.
I planned on cycling to Cordoba alone for WWOOFing and to
attend the meditation course, but the WWOOF farm I signed up for happened to be
on the other side of Cordoba, 250km from the course, so I emailed a few other
places nearer but they hadn’t space for me.
The Vipassana meditation folks never replied to my request of coming to
an earlier course and it being October 5th and the course beginning
October 23rd, I’d have at least 10 days to kill doing
something. With a great relationship
building between Coco/Gregg and I, I decided to head to Santiago with
them. They know a lot of people there
because they had lived there a few months to make some extra money earlier in
the year.
Coco is a 27 year old, tall, Mexican-born traveler with a
chill demeanor and artistic style. She
used to do photography but has been working on new things since they started
traveling 7 months ago (3 weeks ago with bike).
Gregg, 25, is an English musician who kind of looks like my friend
James, and is straight-up good people.
They’ve been married 5 years, having left their lives immediately upon
meeting one another and lived back and forth between England and Mexico for
years. They went to Cusco to make money
in the music scene at the beginning of this year, but left of boredom and have
been on the road since. They began
hitchhiking when they got to expensive Argentina/Chile, but found a guy with
two bikes to give and started a new adventure.
They’re heading to Ushuaia and then would like to return to Mexico
eventually. I’m really learning a ton
from them, and I’d like to think they’re learning about tips of cycle-touring
and bike maintenance from me. Sorta-vegans,
we’re all bent on finding some good food in San Augustine, so we picked up some
garbanzo’s and Coco made hummus using a rock and oil. They’ve inspired me to travel to Santiago
with them and perhaps find something worth staying for like a job in a hostel
as they had. There’s a meditation course
nearby in December and lots of mountains/climbing/rafting to explore just out
of town. The thing I’m most excited for
though is the lady in front of the subway tunnel who sells vegan burgers for
less than a buck.
We left San Augustine with a killer tailwind, stronger than
the headwind we had had in the weeks prior and were flying. We stopped in a small village for lunch and
met a family there and after talking awhile with them, were invited to their
house near San Juan when we arrive a few days later! We passed a half hour with these awesome
people and left, now with an even more massive tailwind. By the time I hit 100km, I was averaging
27kph, which blows my previous record out of the water. We camped near some abandoned railway tracks,
but it wasn’t enough to block the wind.
The sand blew in from all directions through the night and the wind
never ceased. Gregg, Coco, and I made a
few promises to one another, one of which was to make a band and play at least
one show in Santiago. We call ourselves
The Dirt Bags, and still don’t have instruments, but just as I had written
earlier, a guitar will come when we’re ready for it.
 |
| Hummingbird |
 |
| Parakeets overhead - so free! |
I awoke in the morning to find that my huge bag of breakfast
food: avena, cereal, sugar, seeds, and super-expensive
whey protein had mysteriously disappeared.
I was pretty down about it, but knew it’d come back to me in another
form. Not 30km down the road, we came
upon an overturned semi-truck. The
accident had been the previous day and there was a crew cleaning up all the
written-off cargo which happened to be fine wine. We pedaled away from the accident with 11
bottles of wine, which is all we could fit in our already heavily-laden
bags! That night, we celebrated our find
a bit too hard out in the desert and I really paid for it the next day. Gregg woke up, not having even zipped their
tent door shut and all I remember is that our last words before bed were
screaming “Everything is broken, man, nothing matters!!!”
 |
| Truck-crash-wine we found en route |
Another one of our promises to one another is that we free
every caged bird we see on the road and yesterday, Coco freed a bird on the way
into town where we filled up on water and veggies. As it so happens, the bird was in the hands
of the police at the quarantine checkpoint on the highway and the act didn’t go
unnoticed. The following day we walked
back to the road from our little stealth camping spot just as always and as we
were putting everything together and doing some exercises (another pact), the
police showed up with the empty cage, walked right up to Coco and began
accusing her of freeing it. After a few
minutes of denial, we were free to go and are now bird police fugitives.
 |
| Miguel, Gregg, Coco, Cecelia, and I at Miguel's house |
Luckily, the hangover was forgotten riding on the brand-new
cycle path all the way into the San Juan suburbs. We got to a gas station to use the internet,
and ended up passing 9 hours there, waiting for Miguel to get off work (the guy
we had met a few days earlier with his family) and pick us up to take us to his
house across town. Shell Station blues. We got to his really nice, quaint place last
night and are having a blast. We think
we’ll spend the rest of the week here as we meet his friends, rebuild Coco’s
bike, sell some art we’ve made in the plaza, and hopefully get a hold of a
guitar.
 |
Selling our art!
|
 |
| Miguel's place |
SO, to conclude this bastante largo blog, I guess I’ll just
say that I am incredibly happy, and everything is really happening as it
should. The trip keeps progressing to
new levels of learning, joy, good people, etc.
As I had said in an earlier blog, I don’t want to leave South America
without learning a few important things and this learning curve has really
taken a turn for the better in this past month.
Argentina is the friendliest country I have ever visited, which says
quite a lot having seen most of Latin America, Europe, etc. I’ve also become accustomed to drinking Mate,
a kind of energizing tea native to Argentina, at least twice a day. I now feel like I am living here and not just
traveling. Cycling is becoming a
secondary activity and meeting new people, learning new things, and improving
my Spanish is now the primary. I’ve
adopted a lot of new ideas about traveling, art, society, and true freedom I
didn’t have in April when I left. I’ve
told some of my family and friends that I hadn’t found what I was looking for
in this trip yet, and having cycled with Dad, Loic, Lukas, Nigel, the US girls,
and now Coco/Gregg, I finally feel like I am now beginning the third part of my
adventure. See you guys in Santiago,
thanks for following along! Remember
that I have a lot more pictures posted (a little behind at the moment) on my
facebook page, which can be accessed via a link at the top of this page. Chow!
