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First of all, all the best for 2010 and more of those blabla. We will salut on it a time, that is way more important.

Yesterday I went to glaciar Perito Moreno. The glacier is one of the easiest to approach in the world and there are ice pieces fallen off regulary. Of course I also saw the glacier with a very close view and pieces were fallen off. The only thing is that there were to much tourists, but since I am one myself as well I should not complain to much about this.

Tomorrow I will leave El Calafate for El Chalten, if there are bus tickets, to see one of the highest mountains in this regions. The special thing about the Fitz Roy is that the slope is almost vertical!

Unfortunately I will be home soon, crawling up the north, to Buenos Aires, has really begun by now. Everything has an end…

It is a while since my last post, but this one is going to be a short one as well. From Bariloche I flew to Ushuaia. Ushuaia is the southest city on earth and they are proud of it, they sell it on everything, they give stamps in passports with ´Fin del Mundo´.

In Ushuaia I went up hiking on a glacier, the glacier was not that special but the view over the Beagle channel was magnificent. After the glacier I strolled a bit around town.

A day later I visited a musuem, located in a former prison. The museum was quite interesting about maritime exploring around the Cape Horn (named after the place of Hoorn) and the Island of Fire (Tiera del Fuego). In the afternoon I decided to do a boat tour on the channel. Seeing sea lions, plants on Brigde Island, different kind of birds and some light houses we arrived in the harbour again. The guide told us that the water is that cold you will die in twenty minutes and because the channel houses the king crab, your body is gone in an hour. They eat all of you, except for some bones.

After arriving in the harbour the guide called me and three other Dutch people back for just another beer. Another beer became another beer and after a while we decided to do another trip on the boat and there we went. Arriving at Bridge Island again the capitain said that we could swim in the water. We thought and said that he was crazy but he did. The next one jumping in the water was me, and after I went, two other Dutch people went as well. Swiming in the Beagle channel, awesome! We wore a suit, of course.

Now I am in Punta Arenas, Chile, where I will leave tomorrow for a hike on the third biggest ice field in the world (after Antartica and Greenland), sometimes people get lost, every year people die there. There are no weather forecasts, because the weather is every day the same: rain, wind, wind and more wind. Sometimes even snow (also during summer) or thunder. Must be fun to hike there for up to three or four days. If I dont come back, they do not have a search and rescue service, so making a call does not make sense.

Enjoy Christmas and new years eve, I am going to hike!

What a crappy post, crappy written, next time a sorted post, when I have more time!

Thanks to a guy living in Amsterdam (!!) I was able to upload some pictures. Well, not all of them of course, so I made a selection. The selection was made in five minutes, so no guarantees about the quality.

Enjoy: click!

Today (December 14th)  I arrived in San Carlos de Bariloche, better known as Bariloche. The busride was comfortable and Andesmar (the company) reached my high expectations. Unfortunately did not won the bottle of wine when playing Bingo in the bus, but enjoyed a few movies and especially the landscape. This is Patagonia, and just the North.

So far I have just seen Bariloches centre from the local bus, though it looks ok, a bit German, Swiss and Austrian with an Argentinian flavour. Hopefully the Argentinian flavour is not in the beer, that would make it perfect.

This post will be extended in a few days when I have seen more in this town and its surroundings, though, so far so good. Lets go to the Aerolineas office to confirm my way to expensive flight to fly all the way to Ushuaia! Once in Ushuaia I have just a month left to travel up north, up to Buenos Aires to catch my plane to The Netherlands.

Update: today (December 15th) I went for a hike near the city of Bariloche, in the national park where Bariloche itselfs also lays in. The views were amazing, I thought I was in Swiss, this because it looks Swiss, it smells Swiss, you pay Swiss, though from a Swiss clock they have never heard here. Well, at least the busses here have a timetable, that is really amazing in this area of the world, so far the first one.

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In the pictures above, the view from Bariloche busstation over the lake near Bariloche. A trolley that is damn old in Valparaiso and a newer Tur Bus-bus somewhere on the road in Chile. It takes a while to upload photo’s from my cell, but at least there are some now!

Since the day before yesterday (December 10th) I am in Argentina again, in Mendoza to be more precise. Mendoza has to be reached from the west through one of the longest and highest mountain corridors in the world, the Andes. The Andes is pretty high when compared with the Alps and the biggest peak of America (north, middle and south) can be found just around the corner. To get up in the Andes in Chile you have to use plenty of curvy roads. The main pass to enter Chile (or to exit if you wish) is this one, so loads of busses and trucks use this pass about ten months a year. Two months a year the pass is closed because of the weather. Some parts of the pass were scaring as hell, the driver went to pass another bus in the middle of a curve and that passing does not always has a happy end was made clear immediately afterwards, a tanker truck on its side, hanging from a cliff.

When you read this article as a European Mendoza might also ring another bell: wine! The Mendoza region is all about it, plenty of tourists visit this city because of the wine and a majority of the production is exported to Europe as well as North America.

Yesterday was the day of wine tasting, not by tour, just by picking a local public transport bus and hiring a bike at mister Hugo in Maipu. Maipu is 45 minutes by bus south of Mendoza and for not even half a buck (0,40 euro) you get there. Just wave with the advertisement of Mister Hugo and the bus driver signs you where to get off the vehicle. After meeting mister Hugo, misses Hugo, sun Hugo and daughter Hugo the bike was given without any deposit, this because you are Dutch and Dutchies are masters in riding their bikes.

Well, getting the bike was easy and driving around Maipy as well. The only used bike path in South America I have seen lays in Maipu. Dozens of tourists use the bike path day by day. Maipy excists of a main street with some side streets, almost every side street houses at least one winery or a wine museum. A wine museum was visited, a museum where the collector has an A-grade for following the course “how do get as many crap as possible in one room”, but wine after the visit was ok.

Preparations were done and so up to Tilariche, a famous winery by their saying. After a movie, some explanations (more expensive than the free museum, but better explanation!), some more explanation we tasted a white wine (Sauvignon blanc) and two red wines. Of course one of them was a Malbec.

In the meanwhile the weather turned from sunny and hot to rainy and cold, so on the bike to the next winery it started to rain heavily. The rain was that heavy that the road was not seen anymore and the local police forced us to stop because it was unsafe in their opinion. Ok, the rain was a bit heavier than we are used to in The Netherlands but we could survive it. Instead of the olive museum, another four kilometers down the road, we decided to go to shelter at the next winery, just a few hundred meters away. Tasted some wines (including a rose) there and two tasty red wines.

Finally the sun conquered the clouds and we went back to Mister Hugo to deliver the bikes back. In the mean while Miss Hugo had prepared some tasteful empanadas. It is good to have a snack after tasting the wine. Unfortunately Mister Hugo serves free wine after bringing the bikes back and so we drunk again, well, one glass of course. The bus stop was close by and so we went back to Mendoza. Wet but not wasted was the motto of the day.

Today I saw some sights in Mendoza it self, since it was Saturday everything unfortunately already closed by the time I went on the street. I thought Mendoza (about double the size of Rotterdam) is deadlier than the village I am used to on a Sunday! That is not a compliment! Mendoza though is a nice city, since it is an oasis in the middle of the dessert you would expect it very dry. Though due to an irrigation system, stolen from the Inca’s, the whole city is provided with water. This water is used to water the trees and the fountains. The trees are in use to create some shadow (and they look nice) and the fountains can be found on mainly one of the five main squares in the city: so a lot of water in a dry environment.

About transport in Mendoza

The busses in Mendoza are different organized as in the rest of Argentina. Here in Mendoza family of lines are set under a number and tendered (?) to a company, this instead of tender the bus transport line by line. I can imagine some efficiency benefits can be made out of system, though I wonder if they take the benefit out of it. Since schedules are not in their dictionary I wonder if efficiency benefits is a word they know up here. Almost perfect the main number does not correspond with the line number in any case.

For example, the Mendoza-Maipu connection is run by several lines that all have a kindly different route. The line numbers are 171, 172, etc, but the main number of the lines is 10. It would make more sence to give a main number of 17? 

Furthermore the Argentinian railway collapse has, of course, also reached Mendoza. In Mendoza they want to rebuild a local rail line, the sign says the railway line is ready to use in 360 days, but I wonder if they already thought of ordering some trains. Talking about the trains, you see abandoned tracks, stations, halls everywhere though where are the trains? Exported, melted down?

The wide lanes Mendoza exist of have a lot of space for pedestrians (compared with other cities in Argentina) and I even saw police on a bike! Besides the police nobody seems to bike here, though the city is ideal for it: wide pedestrian lanes, shadow because of the trees, flat area and the centre is relatively dense.

Just a note, or maybe two

I lost my cable to connect my camera with a computer somewhere, so no pictures until I have bought a new one. That might take a while.

Tomorrow down South to Bariloche where I will leave, hopefully, a few days later to Ushuaia. From there I have about a month to travel up north to Buenos Aires. Loads of time, so travel relaxed and maybe end with a week on the beach!

Valparaiso is a city just an hour away from the capital of Chile: Santiago. A compact city located between a few hills and the pacific. It is a hilly city which excists of mainly two parts, the flat area and the hills. The hills are connected with the flat part by numberous cablecars which are, almost without exception, built in the 19th century.

Even though Valparaiso lays near the pacific beaches can be found in the city next door, Viña del Mar, but more about Viña next time…

The flat area of Valparaiso houses the main centre, full with offices, shops and markets and besides that also infrastructure, not only for cars and millions of busses, but also for a railconnection (worth mentioning it in South America) and numbered bees. Several cabs here are numbered with a line and called collectivo. They are a cocktail between normal cabs and busses. You pay a set price, but they drop you of in a range of their line where you want. The good thing about the concept is that you can get everywhere on the line from door to door for a set price that is cheaper than a regular cab. Besides this, the use of a system like this shows that the quality of regular urban public transport is way under the demanding level.

And even then I dare to mention that the public transport in Valparaiso is better than average. Besides the busses you can find trolleys here, but also a railconnection. The called metro, more an S-bahn connection than subway, runs frequent and with modern equipment. So what about the quality of public transport in other sides than Valparaiso. It must be interesting to see results of research between the actually traffic demand and the offered services.

Besides the millions of things with wheels the most important for the city is the fact that it is the host of the Chiliean navy. The vessels are easily seen from the harbour side and even from the hills, though even looking at them with a binoculars is already strictly forbidden and thinking (not making) of making a picture is getting yourself to hell as straight as possible. Ok, maybethis is a bit too much, but they are stricty guarded.

Besides the boring flat area of the city, the hills give space to thousands of colourfull houses. They can be found in red, yellow, blue and green, but also purple and pink houses are spotted. The hills are like a maze and on a sunny day (20 degrees, no clouds) like this (December 7th) an ideal spot to wander around and to make some lovely pictures.

Hidden between those colourfull houses the former house of Pablo Neruda (a famous poet) can be found. Even though this house is one of the three that can be found in this region the house is nowadays a popular museum which attracts many tourists.

The colours can not only be found in the houses, but also on the markets, with an harbour next door fresh food (allthough no fish) is supplied easily. The quality of the food is good, although simple (tomatoes, peppers, onions, cheese) lovely meals can be prepared.

If you do not get it, you will hate the city and want to leave as soon as possible. To Santiago for example, but for me Santiago is a stopover for the day after tomorrow.

Valparaiso is a city you must get and then you understand why people call it Valparadise.

Ps, I need a spell checker, time to upload some photo´s and to add other articles. When I finish a proper article I will send an email.

Another small update, not because I am using my cell this time, but because the internet in this hostel is freaking slow.

After San Pedro de Atacama I went by nightbus to La Serena. La Serena seems to be famous for its golden beaches near the Pacific, due to the Lonely Planet. After hiking in Northwest Argentina, an exhausting time in Bolivia and some tours in San Pedro de Atacama I could use a beach!

The weater decided different and because of a lack of son I was hiking the three next days in the Andes.

After taking a two hour bus ride into the Elqui valley and a few succesfull hitchkikes we had ended up in the park where we hiked.

Since there was no civilisation anymore and no tent sleeping was only possible near a self made fire in a sleeping bag. Since the Andes cools down rapidly after sun fall the fire was really neccesary.

On the day after (Saturday December 6) the real job has to be done and we hiked for a few hours up in to the valley.

After six hours climing we ended up with Jose. Jose lives six months a year without mobile phone (the closest signal is about two hours away), shop (few hours walking and being lucky with hitchhiking) or any other meaning of modern world.

He lives from the milk the goats give him, he stores the cheese he makes and sells them in autumn. It was really interesting to see how a guy can live there without any reasonable supplies ´we´ are used to. How he knows a lot of plants, herbs, animals in the region. How he makes cheese, catch fish and climb like a goat himself.

After hiking in the mountains I went to Valparaiso where I am now. Lets drop off my clothes at a laundry service (three days without any decent water and soap supply gives a smell only proffesionals can get out), have a rest and explore this UNESCO herritage tomorrow.

Afterwards, Mendoza! Back to Argentina. Back to, hopefully, over twenty degrees!

Note to self, dont mess up with different times in one post.

Just a small update, becase I use my cell. Bolivia is a crazy country, though with incredible nature. Fortunately I left chzos for order and am now in Chile. Chile is expensive and San Pedro de Atacama is besides hot and dry touristy. Tomorrow I will take a bus for 18h and the day after I might take a dive in the pacific. Lets get out of the driest desert in the word. In something more than an hour I will do a tour to the moonvalley, a valley that looks like, eh, make a guess yourself.

Have a nice Sinterklaas for whom celebrate it!

Pictures,

- Chair in the bus from San Miguel de Tucuman to Salta, the best so far!

- Border between Argentina and Bolivia and Chile and Bolivia.

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