Argentina/Chile - Buenos Aires to Patagonia

The last 10 days have been full of exhilarating exploration of the great outdoors culminating in an 'epic' climb of the beast that was - Volcan Villarrica! It is here where our outdoor adventures got serious!!!

We left Argentina’s capital city, and headed 1,600km West to the Northern part of Patagonia. Our time was primarily spent in three villages - Bariloche and San Martin de los Andes in Argentina and Pucon in Chile. 

Bariloche was our first stop, a small Patagonian town located at the bottom of the Andes and spread along Lake Nahuel Huapi. The area offered vivid scenery reminiscent of the Alps region, snow-capped mountains overlooking turquoise lakes and surrounded by emerald forests. One of the nearby villages was even established by Swiss travellers who seemed to have introduced the locals to the ‘fondue‘, a typical Swiss (and French) dish.

Overlooking Lake Moreno just outside Bariloche

Upon our arrival in Bariloche, we embarked on a 5 hour trek (which we completed in 2 1/2 hrs) to the summit of ‘Cerro Lopez' - just over 1,800m in altitude. After grabbing a coffee and taking in the incredible view at the local refuge based at the top, we descended then followed this up with another 20km / 5 hr trek to Lago Negro...solid day at the office!

Half way up Cerro Lopez - another challenging mountain trek

We awoke feeling the effects of the previous day's trekking so we decided to take a slightly faster approach for the next day's explorations. We hired mountain bikes to enable us to explore the sites and attractions around Lake Moreno. The wind decided to join us for the undulating 30km circuit which made things  a little more challenging. Aurelie was painfully trying to stay on Shane’s wheels to get some assistance. As a true gentleman, Shane kept pushing the pace!

Bariloche also turned out to be a chocolate heaven.with ‘chocolaterias’ at every corner. Hand-made chocolates and other ‘dulces’ proved irresistible with Aurelie finally persuading Shane to a visit.

Pre-Christmas chocolate indulgence is under way

After a couple of days in Bariloche, and the freezing cold wind off the mountains getting stronger by the day making things quite uncomfortable, we were pretty keen to keep moving up North for hopefully some sort of improvement in the weather.

We made it to San Martin, another small town 3 hours north of Bariloche that was very similar both aesthetically and temperature wise to Bariloche, however a lot quieter. There was hardly a tourist to be seen, in fact, even the local buses were’t running so our explorations were all on foot. We did however manage to catch the local ferry across the lake to assist in exploring the surroundings and the national parks. We also noticed that the local speciality was the trout caught from the lake that the town based itself on and we were not going to miss this!

With only 10 days or so left of our South American tour, we crossed border into Chile and settled in Pucon, a small but buzzing little village that is the home of outdoor adventure. It was also here where the bar was raised and our outdoor activities reached a whole new level! We were here with one objective in mind, to summit Volcan Villarrica, one of Chile's and the world's most active volcanos. It literally backs onto the town of Pucon and stands tall and proud at over 2800m.

First glimpse of the intimidating Volcano - Volcan Villarica

The weather for the first couple of days in Pucon was quite cloudy, so summiting the Volcano was not possible. So we spent our time trekking and cycling our way around the lakes, mountains, waterfalls and impressive local attractions. Day 3 arrived and we finally got the green light that the weather was on the improve and that we would get the chance to attempt to summit this beast!

The first hour or so of our climb was on volcanic gravel, making it a bit technical. At some point, we passed the remains of an old cable car structure which was destroyed in the eruption of 1971. As we were getting closer to the top, we reached the snow, which was rather unusual given it is the middle of summer. By that stage, we were above the clouds and could enjoy the breathtaking aerial view of Pucon and the surrounding lakes.
 

Shane feeling on top of the world as we rose above the clouds

As we ascended beyond the 2000m mark, the wind increased within a matter of moments and we were literally being slapped and pushed by the biting and feisty, 60 km/h gusts of wind. The guide announced, welcome to Volcan Villarrica...these were some real mountain conditions!

We had a group of 6 in our touring party, but it was reduced to 4 when a couple of Brazilians from our group who we titled 'soft & softer', decided it was getting a little too cold and a bit too dangerous for them, so they pulled the pin and decided that continuing toward the summit was not for them!

As conditions got even worse, the guide continue to encourage us optimistically that reaching the summit was possible but emphasized the importance of our ice-picks as the surface turned from thick snow to what would better be described as ice. The track in this section also began to get even steeper. At this stage, Aurelie wished she had joined 'soft & softer' and gone back down to!

 Disregarding the testing conditions and pushing hard toward the summit

Unfortunately (or fortunately), at approx 400m from the summit, we hit a patch where the winds increased even more, the cloud set in and we were getting pelted by hail coming down sideways, forcing the guide to come to the conclusion that it was too dangerous to go any further as the conditions and icy surface made it simply too dangerous to continue our quest.

Just when we thought our adventure was over, it was there when it actually reached its climax! In our packs were some tiny plastic luge type objects to assist us in sliding our way down. After a brief demonstration on how to control these things using the ice pick as a hand-brake, Shane decided to lead the way. Because the snow was too powdery for the ice pick to get any traction and slow him down and the downhill section too steep, he increased speed to a point until losing control and tumbling down the snow for some 8 - 10m in an impressive ‘Tom Cruise’ like manner. Fortunately he finally managed to get a grip of the snow with his ice pick as the rocky part of the mountains got uncomfortably close!

Next in line was a young Canadian guy. Unfortunately he had learnt little from Shane's escapades and also lost control. He however panicked, dropped his ice pick, gathered more speend and slid at least a couple of hundred metres across a combination of rocks and snow, only to be stopped by some well placed rocks that he managed to get a hold of. Another 20 metres and he would have free fallen off the rocky face and been in a whole lot of trouble! Luckily he was wearing his helmet and escaped with a blood nose, a sore head and some bumps and bruises. There was no way Aurelie was taking the same path and a sympathetic guide came to her rescue and led her and the other remaining trekker down to the base to safety.
With the eventful Volcano trek behind us, a couple more days were spent in Pucon, relaxing, recovering and exploring the surrounds.

Los Ojos del Caburgua - the eyes of the river

Next and final stop in South America is Santiago where a visit to the Chilean vinyards awaits. The Chilean wine is 'supposedly' the best and well renowned wine in South America.

Exciting times!!

Christmas and the end of our South American adventure is now only days away!