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Day 270, 271, 272, 273, 274 - San Martin, Bariloche & Ski Sunday! - Thursday 12th, Friday 13th, Saturday 14th, Sunday 15th, Monday 16th July 2012
After breakfast we bid farewell to our lovely hostel and owners (by way of a big hug and a kiss) and got on our Argentina bound bus. The scenery was lovely, snow covered mountains and Christmas trees everywhere - it wasn't long before we were both humming Christmas songs, very funny given that it's July! After an hour or so we reached the border and said adios to Chile and hola to Argentina - it wasn't the warmest welcome to Argentina though and I mean that in every sense of the world; it was in the minus degrees with snow everywhere and the border guard, when he discovered we were English, didn't seem best pleased that we were entering his terrain! It's quite funny as when I was reading the guide book on Argentina right at the front of the book in bold writing is a section on do's and don'ts and at the top of this list was this sentence "Don't refer to the Islas Malvinas as the Falkland Islands (if you're British, don't refer to them at all)" - it made us chuckle but we also made a mental note of it!! We arrived into San Martin in the afternoon and we're not so thrilled to discover it was even colder than Pucon!! After finding out hostel, we headed back out again for a walk around the town - it's similar to Pucon but with even more wooden buildings and chocolate shops! After eventually finding an ATM we headed to a little place for some dinner and then to one of the many chocolate shops. Armed with a bottle of red and four different flavours of what looks like the most amazing chocolate in the world, we headed back to our place for the night.
After a standard Argentina breakfast of sugar coated pastries and coffee we headed to the bus stop for our 10.30am bus to Bariloche. Our bus route was to take us via the seven lakes route which winds through forests, crosses rivers and streams, and follows along the edge of several lakes (such as Nahuel Huapi, Correntoso, Espejo, Escondido, Villarino, Falkner and Machónico). The scenery was spectacular and there was lots of snow! We arrived in Bariloche and headed straight to our hostel, Perikos - it was lovely with lots of wood panelling and the warmest hostel ever (it had central heating - what a luxury!) which is brilliant given it was minus two outside! Once we'd settled in our gorgeous room, complete with dressing table, we left with one thing in mind - ice cream! Now you might think that all the cold has got to our brains as who on earth would want to eat ice cream in minus temperatures! But alas, freezing or not, Bariloche has a little ice cream parlour called Helados Jauja which is famed for maybe the best ice cream in all of Argentina (obviously we're thinking we will have to try a few around the country to see if this is correct!). So with that in mind we ordered a quarter of a kilo of three different flavours each, yes EACH, meaning that we ate half a kilo of ice cream between us!! It was well worth it though - so yummy! Feeling a bit piggy for having ice cream for lunch, we thought we'd try and work it off with a walk around town. We looked around the main square and it's pretty chalet style buildings and checked out the St Bernard Dog's posing for pictures and then looked around a few shops and went down to the lake. Come late afternoon we headed to the supermarket to buy some dinner, in an effort to try not to spend our entire travelling fund (its expensive in Bariloche) and for a mere £11 managed to get a full dinner of fresh pasta with salad and a bottle of red wine. All the eating and cooking had knackered us out so we headed to bed early!
We woke up early, or so we thought - when we looked at the clock it was 9am but still dark outside! It seems the sun doesn't come up till 9.30am in Bariloche in the winter. After breakfast we milled around a bit and eventually made our way out by lunchtime to visit the Cerro Campanario. However before getting on the forty minute bus journey we thought we better get a quick snack; now the issue with not speaking the lingo is that when you come to order food you're never entirely sure what might turn up. Normally its fine as luckily we're not fussy eaters so will eat just about anything, however this time, thinking we were going to get a cheese and ham sandwich we were slightly disappointed and surprised when a hotdog covered in cheese with a large bit of bacon over the top turned up! We ate it anyway! So with our tummies full we headed to the bus stop and caught the bus to our destination; it was a bumpy ride but scenery, driving alongside the lake and mountains, more than made up for it. We arrived at the Cerro Campanario and got on the ski lift up to the top, it was freezing! We arrived to what might be the best views in the world; in fact it was apparently voted in the top ten views of the world by National Geographic. The lakes and mountains, some snow-capped some not, were amazing and went 360 degrees all around where we stood. After snapping a few pics we found shelter in the little café and indulged ourselves with two hot chocolates and a huge piece of chocolate and dulce cake (not a good food day!). That done, we walked around for a while, took lots more pictures and finally made our way back down on the ski lift - we were frozen by the time we got back on the bus! In the evening we went for dinner and for what might possibly be the best dinner we've had. It was a little place called La Salamandra Pulpier, a taxi ride out of town but well worth it. We started with a jug of the house wine, a gorgeous and smooth Argentinean malbac, accompanied by homemade bread and six very juicy and tasty meat empanadas, and followed it with an amazing cooked piece of steak and salad. It was a perfect dinner; the restaurant was really cosy, the owner and chef very friendly, the food out of this world and all for under £35! To add to the night, there just happened to be a ski instructor there who we chatted with and arranged to do lessons with the next day - plus he gave us a lift home so we saved on the cab fare! Brilliant night!
Sunday ski day!! By 8.10am we were washed, fed and ready waiting for the bus to take us to Cerro Catherdral ski resort. The bus was packed full of people including two Argentinean lads who were staying at our hostel - one of them was so chatty and informed us that he loved the Beetles and that they were very popular with the youth of Argentina! After forty minutes we arrived at the top, it was freezing and very busy. After a bit of hunting we eventually tracked down Fasttracks, our ski instructors and hirers of equipment - they were a lovely bunch, very chatty and friendly and our teacher for the day was the lovely Lucas. We kitted up with all the gear and then made our way (in ski boots - not an easy task) to the clothing shop to hire some pants and gloves, by the time we were set to go we had added about ten kilos to our weight! First stop was the baby slopes; we put our ski's on and practised stopping and starting - so far so good. Then we side shuffled up the hill and went down and practiced turning - Ad was brilliant and I wasn't too bad either. Lucas said he was so impressed that we should go to the next slope, a slightly bigger one just over the other side. So we went to the bigger slope and spent the rest of our lesson skiing down - Ad only fell over once and me twice so in all we did well. Ad was a bit of a natural and after a couple of hours was eyeing up the large mountains, I was a little less confident especially after my second fall / crash into the nearby hill! The only problem with our day was that due to the ridiculous cost of hiring everything and the lesson and the fact that we were beginners we decided it wasn't worth it to buy the £150 ski lift pass as well - the issues with this were firstly, we had to walk up the slope every time we wanted to ski down (very hard work) and secondly, after a few hours on the baby slopes we wanted a slope a bit bigger and less busy! We rested after our lesson and sat down for a quick hot chocolate (the best we've ever had, it was literally just pure hot chocolate) before hitting the baby slopes for a couple of more hours. Come 3pm we were knackered all of the skiing and walking up the slopes (and me crashing or trying to avoid crashing) so we headed back to Fasttracks to give back the equipment. We were greeted by Lucas and the others and given a little bottle of chocolate orange liquor! Feeling famished Lucas showed us to a spot for good goulash so we sat and scoffed a whole bowl full whilst taking in the views of the surrounding snow-capped mountains. After a walk around the little resort and checking out the prices of the ski equipment (a few hours on the slopes and we were already talking about buying all the gear and going skiing every year!) we headed back on the 5pm bus back to town - oh we took some churros covered in chocolate and nuts and filled with dulce for the ride! Back at our place we crashed and burned!
Today, on our nine month anniversary of travelling we spent the day travelling - how apt! After breakfast, packing, a takeaway veggie lunch (too much meat recently) and checking out of our hostel, we boarded our twenty hour bus to Mendoza at 1.30pm with loads of downloaded films on the laptop ready for our epic journey! Oh and today we have decided to try (try emphasised hugely) to eat a bit more healthily - by that I mean we're going to try and avoid eating half a kilo of ice cream for lunch with a hotdog and chocolate cake on the side! Well the healthy start didn't last long - a twenty one hour bus ride with no stops for food meant we ended up with a dinner of crisps and chocolate! The bus ride was the worst yet, the bus was dirty and cold and it didn't stop apart from when it broke down and we ended up in some workshop for a couple of hours! And it was expensive at £70 each!! Oh well, Mendoza and loads of vinto tinto here we come!
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