Hola Beast Crew

The Beasts have been to the end of the earth and now we are heading north to the other end.  We are heading north from the freezing Antarctic boundaries into the sunshine and the tropics.  We have updated the webpage with photos of our trip so far and we hope some of you are still following our journey.

Puerto Ibanez (Chile) – Bajo Carajoles (Argentina) – El Calafate – Torres del Paine – Ushuaia (the end of the world) – Rio Gallegos – Santa Cruz – Fitzroy – Gaiman – Puerto Piramides/Peninsula Valdes – Puerto Madryn – San Antonio del Oeste – Carmen de Patagones – Balneiro El Condor

9th November 2006 – 8th December 2006

Patagonia, the land of big foot - a desolate sheep occupied territory that stretches from half way down Chile and Argentina to the Land of Fire, Tierra del Fuego.  Patagonia plays host to two of the most famous overlander roads in the world – the Careterra Austral and Ruta 40.  We headed 800km south on the dusty, ripia Careterra Austral (southern road)road passed through little villages and through the town of Coihaique intending to get onto a boat to cross the mighty Lago Buenos Aires to cross into Argentina at Los Antiguos. 

We sat for 2 hours in Puerto Ibanez whilst they squeezed the cars onto a car ferry that sank into the water with every car.  We had a reservation for the boat but when the last car had turned up we realised that we had to drive across the dusty gravel border to Argentina.  We got our passports stamped out of Chile and then we drove the 40km into no man’s land and into Argentina. We then hit Perito Moreno before heading south onto the overlander’s fabled road, Ruta 40. 

Ruta 40 (route 40) runs for approximately 4000 km from the north of Argentina to the south; petrol stations are strewn 150km apart and estancias (farms) sprawl over thousands of hectares. Some of the parts of the road are tarmaced but most of the road it is ripia (gravel).  Ripia is a nightmare to drive on.  Tracks form in between giant piles of gravel and as the wind whips up racing across the Patagonian plains, the dust on the tracks form corrugated ridges which rattled the poor Beast to pieces.  Screws and bolts undo themselves all over the car and dust poured in through every crack coating everything in a fine layer of grey.  The Patagonian sunbaked scenery stretches off into the distance with sheep tugging at the scarce green bushes and occasional guanacos, nandus and armadillos running across the road.     

After 700km of the bone rattling Ruta 40 we drove into El Calafate and we realised how quickly the town was expanding as we drove down the runway surrounding by enormous houses.  El Calafate is the nearest town to the Moreno Glacier and is like a ski town with chocolate shops, winter gear and fantastic eateries.  The Moreno Glacier is located in the Los Glacieres national park 70km to the west and it has been one of the highlights of our trip.  The glacier stretches for 15km, is 4km wide and has an ice face of 55m above water and a further 180m below the surface of the lake.  It is one of only a few in the world that is still increasing in size and it is magnificent.

After being stung financially by several weeks in Chile (Chile is as expensive, at present as the UK), we decided to drive in and out of Chile quickly.  We were heading to Torres del Paine and turned off Ruta 40 to cross the border.  We got out at the dusty outpost to get another stamp in our passports and another temporary import license.  As Alexis sat waiting for Greg to get back in the car from his discussion with the customs officers about overlanding, she watched a tiny lamb waltz into the customs office.  She was expecting him to be chased out of the office but he waltzed back out with a burly army officer following him and brandishing a milk bottle.  The lamb, Pepo and his milk maid stood by whilst we changed our first puncture of the South American leg.

We arrived in Torres del Paine after passing more Nandus, Guanacos and seeing our first Zorro (a grey fox).  Torres del Paine is a stunning spikey mountain range with glaciers grinding their way down the mountains leaving turquoise lakes at the bottom.  There are several long hikes that you can take around the spikey mountains that take several days… Greg and Alexis headed straight for the nearest bar to look over the lake and the mountains!

We headed back into Argentina the following day to head south to Ushuaia, the southernmost city in the world.  Ushuaia is located on the island of Tierra del Fuego, which after several years of war and then discussion was divided between Chile and Argentina.  The northern section of Tierra del Fuego is owner by Chile and they make sure that any visitors to the most southern part of Argentina won’t enjoy the journey there with a horrendous dusty road leading to Ushuaia.  We experienced another puncture and with the prospect of another ripia road we tried to find a gomeria (tyre repair place).  After spending an hour looking for somewhere to repair our tyres we asked a passerby who jumped in the car, took us to a gomeria, said we were visiting him from England to the owner of the garage and then disappeared.  We got both tyres repaired (unfortunately one looks terminal) and we crossed the most dangerous stretch of water in the world, the Magellan Straits and headed south back into Argentina.

As we were at the end of the world we looked into the possibility of travelling even further south.  A ten day cruise the great white continent of Antarctica will set you back a mere US$4000 or if you ask for a last minute deal, a bargain at $US3000. Due to our limited budget, a 4 hour cruise out into the Beagle Channel would have to suffice! The English lessons of the Alexis’s teenage years brought back to mind the poem, the rhyme of the ancient mariner as Alexis watched the black browed albatrosses wheel across the darkening snow skies. 

We were camping on the port front to save money and to see the Antarctic ships set sail.  The weather in Ushuaia is very sporadic and as Alexis was visiting the museums the skies became more overcast and it started to snow. Very quickly the Beast was coated in a thick layer of snow… this is supposed to be summer!  We met some other overlanders who said the temperature was going to drop overnight to -5 degrees.  Panic started to set in when we realised that we had the radiator water changed and filled with coolant rather than antifreeze.  Being the expert mechanics that we are we panicked thinking that the temperature below zero would freeze the radiator (of course it won’t if you have coolant in!).  We woke up every 3 hours to turn the engine on to keep the radiator warm and pushed a sleeping bag in front of the radiator to stop it freezing.

To escape the freezing snow and cold, we headed north through the barren windy southern Patagonian Tierra del Fuego passing through 2 borders and completing 2 temporary imports and up to Rio Gallegos where we stopped for the night and we were treated to some beautiful Argentinean guitar music.  We headed further north along the long, boring road of Ruta 3 which treated us to 3 bends over 2000km and stopped at the Petrified Forest where the stone trees laying on the ground predate the Andes mountains which rose from the earth 130 million years ago.  Our next stop was in Gaiman famous for the welsh tea rooms that crowd the streets and the population that still speaks old welsh.

We then headed to one of the best natural reserves that we have been to in the world, Peninsula Valdes.  Whilst we were there we managed to see Sea Lions, Elephant seals, Armadillos, Guanacos, Nandus and Southern Right Whales which swam beneath our boat as we watched, spurted water at us and slapped the water with the tails in the fading sunset as well as a pod of killer whales which were preparing their babies for the February feast in which they snatch baby seals from the beach; the mother was teaching her young baby to beach itself and then how to reverse back into the water.  A most amazing place.

We then headed to the Horizons Unlimited meeting in Viedma with many other motorcyclist overlanders travelling in South America.  We met some fantastic people who are all in the process of long term overlanding around South America and the world.  A great thanks to Oscar Knecht who organised a dusty ride to the asado and visiting the Argentinean national rally where there were 700 other bikers.

Greg gave Alexis a little surprise on a moonlit, sandy, Patagonian beach with the ocean roaring in the background as Greg asked her to marry him!  She accepted!!  The wedding invites may take a while but we promise not to get married in Vegas!  We are now off to Buenos Aires again to see if we can get some new tyres or get the old ones vulcanized before heading south to Mar del Plata (Argentina) for Christmas.

A very Happy Christmas to you all and we hope the New Year brings lots more hangovers!

Notes from Argentina:

Apologies for any misinterpretations in the Notes section.  All information provided is given by locals or people who know the area.  I try to check it before I send the info out but there maybe some discrepancies.