El Calafate – Perito Moreno Glacier

We arrived without a hitch at the Bus Terminal in El Calafate around 5 PM and with a little pushiness got a taxi that took us to our Hostel Del Glaciar on Av Libertator (careful, there are 2 hostels with the same name). This fairly new Hostel is a great place.
Glenda in BA had booked it for us and yes, the Hostel Del Glaciar received a call from Dingbat who did not cancel our first day, but moved the whole 4 days we had booked one day forward.

So instead of cancelling the 18th of Feb as I told Dingbat to do, they moved all our days starting now on the 19th. Ok, we can live with that, we just have to cancel the last day now because we have airline tickets booked for a flight to Ushuaia on the 22nd.

Bruno at Hostel Del Glaciar was very helpful. But he could not refund me the money because I did not book the Hostel. It was booked by Supernova, the travel agency, and only Supernova can be refunded. So for that to happen, I contacted Glenda and she is working on it. Let us see when and if I get the $97. returned. Glenda understands, Bruno understands, I understand - but this is Argentina, do you understand?
Now that we have one day less than planned in El Calafate, we immediately booked the famous boat tour to see the glaciers. There are many glaciers in this area and the most famous of them all is the Perito Moreno Glaciar. Yes, as you can see the name Perito Moreno pops up all the time. There is a town called Perito Moreno, there is a river by that name, a mountain and a glacier, a National Park and who knows what else.
Perito Moreno was the discoverer of this area. He mapped this lonely terrain, he and his men made the area known and famous. Born in BA in 1852 to a wealthy family he started his expeditions at the age of 20. This was the golden age of Argentina when this county was wealthier than the U.S. As director of the Museum of National History he discovered many lakes, mountain ranges and even forgotten indigenous tribes; some of them not so friendly like the Tehuelche. More about them later but the name means ‘fierce’ in their language and they were very tall and war-like. Perito Moreno was captured by a clan of the Tehuelche and sentenced to death but escaped the day before his execution.
He spent his life as a discoverer until his death in 1919. His name can maybe be compared to Lewis and Clark in U.S. history. He loved to chart the unknown; he did this for years and years; loved to prove a point. Honor was given him by Universities but he was most happy on his trips. He realigned the continental divide in the southern part of Argentina.
Perito Moreno helped settle land disputes with Chile and explained why some rivers, previously going East are now going West. (Glacial Ice flows blocked and diverted the rivers which were the boundaries between Argentina and Chile). He was a busy man, a dynamo of Argentina who now has his name on many Argentinean National features.
Our boat trip was the best we could do given our age and physical stamina. There are walking and climbing tours on the glaciers but there is an age limit here, a cutoff date. Nobody over the age of 65 is allowed on those ‘walking’ tours. I could technically have qualified but I preferred the comfy seat on a big boat.
Our pick up by mini bus was at 7 AM and we arrived at the harbor gate on Lake Argentina about 8:10 am.

A mass of people stood already lined up for the cruises leaving from this location. The morning winds were blowing a stiff breeze and standing in line for 20 minutes really chilled me to the bones. Boy, am I glad I am not walking on the Glaciers. It is cold, it is f r e e z i n g cold.
The gates opened up on time and like a herd of cattle, we all rushed to get on board our respective boats.

In addition to the fee of 500 pesos ($120.-) for this tour, there is an additional entrance fee to the National Park of 100 Pesos, which we forgot to pay. But because the masses were so great, the ranger just pushed us past the border check line. We saved that expense.

Finding a good seat on the ship was not that easy, we were among a pushy bunch of people. Our boat, a large Catamaran, held about 250 passengers and the boat was loaded to capacity.
Our official trip began at 9 AM and we were met immediately by icebergs.

Some had a very intense blue color to them. The bergs looked like floating jewels, huge and in every conceivable shape.

As beautiful as those icebergs are, we all know they can be a menace too.

So the boat proceeded slowly at first until we reached more open waters. We were in a canal of some sorts and slipped through a very narrow opening in the rock walls called Boca Del Diablo (throat of the devil) only to be in another channel.
After about 2 hours of just more or less open waters we approached the first glacier named Upsala.

There was no way to get close to this glacier. So many icebergs blocked our way that we could only see the real ice fields, the wall of ice from a far distance. Chunks and chunks of huge bergs blocked us. The temperature was cold, the wind blew hard. Only the most adventuresome folks dared to stand on deck and expose themselves to the chilling winds as we proceeded towards our next stop, the glaciers Bolado and Onelli. Since those glaciers are small compared to the rest of the others we had more or less a drive by for photos only.
Our first look and what most people see on their trip out here is the glacier Spegazzini. Wide and majestic, this river of ice empties itself into an iceberg filled channel that is wide enough for the boat to navigate through. The boat could get fairly close and the sight we had was one of the natural wonders of Nature. I saw a frozen river, flowing down a snow-filled, ice-filled mountainside.

For millennia this process never changes. Nothing stops this river of ice until it can empty itself into a lake or the ocean. Mountains that are in the way will be pushed aside or will be worn and scrubbed away. The frozen water will win in the long run. Slowly, without remorse, the ice moves on until it can finally relieve itself and unload its burden.

While we were there, a loud crack preceded the fall of a small section of the giant ice wall into the channels, which are all part of this huge lake named Lago Argentina, the largest lake in this county with the same name. This glacier is very active; a constant melting in the summer and refreezing in the winter makes for a great visit and an almost guaranteed sighting of chunks of ice falling into the water.
After maybe 30 minutes for taking pictures, for finding the best angle for a once-in-a-lifetime photograph, we moved on to the jewel of the area, the renowned Glaciar Perito Moreno.
Finding our way back through the channels of icebergs, through the channels of rocks to where we were facing the glacier Perito Moreno took a good two hours. People became more daring and the warmth of the middle of the day helped many to be on deck instead of being in the cabin. At one point a rather large wave suddenly gushed over the starboard side of the catamaran and doused a lot of the people with ice water. Carol was one of those who got soaked.

She was lucky; her waterproof parka took the brunt of the wave. It took a long time to dry out the wet jeans however.
Arriving at the highlight of this tour did make some people stop talking. Argentineans are a chatty people and for a moment their natural exuberance was overshadowed by the sheer size of the ice wall facing us.

Our boat kept a respectable distance from the ice wall. We could, theoretically have floated really close to this wall of ice but it would not have been safe.

At any moment huge blocks of ice could have come loose and crushed our boat with no trouble. We looked small compared to this display of Nature. The

wind blowing off the glacier was cold.
At one point the crew of the boat obtained a large piece of ice, a tiny iceberg.

They heaved it aboard and chopped it up and used the ice as ice cubs in drinks one could buy. A larger ‘trophy’ piece was given around to hold and was used as a prop for a photo op. I passed on the drinks but had a picture taken on the bow of the ship amid the winds blowing off the glacier.

It was cold as you can see from the way Carol is bundled up.
It is hard to describe the feelings one gets when faced with huge natural phenomenon. I basically feel so tiny, so unimportant. It is silly actually to even have an opinion. Mother Nature does not really care one way or the other what we think, I believe.
I am always awestruck.
Our return took us back to our starting point and we got to the waiting bus at around 4 PM only to sit and wait for other people who were somehow delayed until 4:30PM.
We were back in the Hostel Los Glaciares at about 5:30 PM.
Just as we were getting warmed up and checking our emails in the lobby of the Hostel, in walked a group of BMW riders.

This group, lead by guides of the Australian Company “Compass Expeditions”, seemed like old friends to us by now. We met them first in Bariloche; one of them seemed to have remembered my lovely face from a GlobeRiders DVD. Then we met again in the town of Perito Moreno just as they were standing in front of their nice hotel. And now we meet them again right here at the Hostel Los Glaciares in El Calafate. We met them three times and I wonder if these meetings have any cosmic significance. So let me add some pictures here and let me say that all of the riders must be good riders.

They did ride on this awful Route 40, some did fall down, all did get dirty and felt cold and felt scared and all of them can now be very proud. John you made it,

Walter Maurer you even rode 2 up on some of these stretches. All of you accomplished an amazing feat. I take my hat off to you. This was not an easy trip but the comments you left about Compass Expeditions were all very positive. I am glad to have met you all. As you can see from the photo the company runs new 650 GS bikes for this tour. The bikes performed perfectly, too and the chase vehicle was a bonus.

After some leftover food from last night’s Parrilla in the kitchen of the Hostel, washed down with a bottle of wine we still had from our wine tour in Mendoza we called it a day.
We crashed into bed at about 11 PM right after we had booked a 4x4 tour for tomorrow morning.

Perito Moreno to El Chaltén

After our visit to the caves, the minibus took us on a bumpy ride back out Rte. 40 to meet the bus going to Chaltén. Our meeting spot was someplace along Route 40, at a predetermined spot. We did not meet the same bus we took to Perito Moreno; we met a different bus, different drivers, different in many ways. First of all no sign of Dingbat, like I stated before, we are on our own now, stranded and trying to get to the hostel in Chaltén and then to El Calafate, the town where we booked this section of the trip to end.

As our mini bus arrived at Route 40 we could see our new bus arriving, too. The timing of meeting each other in such a vast space as Argentina was nothing short of amazing. Our new bus did not have a bathroom on board and was filled almost to capacity. Our new bus was older too, but rattled less. Our new drivers, from now on, drove in drizzling rain and only on gravel roads all the way to Chaltén; 13 hours of bone shaking ruts, of up and down hills, deep gravel groves, washed out tracks and sliding in the slimy mud.

We drove and drove south along Route 40 but this time, the road had no relief in sight and it was all gravel, rocks holes and mud.

I looked at the road with motorcycle eyes and all I could say was “no thank you”. Yet we met some folks along the way who were riding this awful stretch,

even waving at us in the bus. One bike we saw along the way was making repairs but was OK and waved us on, thumbs up when I made the bus driver stop to ask if we could help.

The road was lonely, forbidding, desolate and dangerous. I am amazed that anyone rides his/her bike on roads like this all day long.

This was a 13 hour bus trip after our cave visit. No sleeper seats, no reclining seat feature to speak of, with seats made for small Asian bodies. I am too large for these seats. Did I say no bathroom?

How do you hide and pee behind a tree when you drive through a desert?

Especially if you are a woman! Every 3 or so hours the bus stopped and you could do your thing, but…. where do you hide?

This Route 40 is some tough road. I noticed that some stretches are being paved now; still, it is a lonely, desolate, difficult road to be on.
This road is dangerous in an area without much of anything. No house, shade, gas station, not even people or animals. Nada!

Rocks, scrub bushes, sand and either heat, wind or ice cold. God help you if you have trouble here. The few cars we met while travelling did not slow down; did not seem to care if you were stranded on the side of the road. To travel here means to survive or perish. You are on your own here, you are either going to make it to the next town and find help or else!

We bumped, rattled and rolled along on gravel roads between 10 to 50 km/hour speeds hour after hour and arrived at 10:30PM in Chaltén. The bus was a Mercedes stick-shift, the drivers really, really good.

We were dropped off at the bus terminal, two big suitcases at our sides feeling beaten up and lost. Where is our Hostel? Who do you ask that late at night in a small, God forsaken town in the middle of the mountains? But our luck was changing. We found a guy who told us our hostel for the night, Los Condor des Andes, was only 3 blocks away.

We walked, rolling our suitcases along the rough streets. We checked in, slept, had breakfast and the hostel the next morning got us new bus tickets to El Calafate for 90 Pesos each and for a 1 PM departure. We walked back to the bus station again and after another 4 hours on the bus, finally arrived at El Calafate.

As a side note to Chaltén: the town itself does not amount to much. Small as the town is, it used to be even smaller until it was discovered in the ‘80s as a great starting point for mountaineering or trekking.

Establishing the region around Mt. Fitz Roy, the highest mountain in Argentina as a National Park,

having glacier walks in the area and allowing true mountain climbing on the peaks of ‘Cerro Torre’ made this small place a Mecca for mountain climbers.

To the initiated, this is a world class location, featuring difficult climbs; great skills being needed to conquer those massive rock walls. No wonder only 20 year+ olds were on the bus to this location, carrying only backpacks with crampons, clamps, ropes and spikes. No wonder they looked at Carol and me in a strange way. Like one of the other passengers said: “What are YOU doing in Chaltén?” I told him, we are on the way to El Calafate!

And now we have finally arrived, El Calafate!

Cueva de las Manos (Cave of the Hands)

This is a cave or a series of caves located in the province of Santa Cruz, Argentina, 163 km (101 mi) south of the town of Perito Moreno. It has been listed by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site since 1999.

Our jitney bus picked us up at 7 AM from the Hostel.

Right on time, this mini bus drove us for 160 km to the cave system. Ms. Dingbat was not with us, we had no guide while on this small bus. Our driver spoke some English but was not an official tour guide.
Once we arrived at our destination, at this National Monument, after we paid our admission of 100 pesos, we were given the worst ever English speaking guide. OK, I understand that this is Argentina, but remember we paid for an English guide to get the maximum out of our visit. We travelled half the world to see this site and drove via bus over bumpy roads, with stinky, leaking bathrooms, felt like we got tortured and were beaten up, slept in a dump of a hostel and now this? This is not funny. Maybe I am off but I expected the National Park System of Argentina to have competent, English speaking guides. I did not expect Spanglish speaking people. The whole visit was spoiled when I stood there listening to all this Spanish I could not understand. Complicated Spanish with dates and Paleolithic expressions is not in my vocabulary, I hardly get by in common use Spanish. It is a shame, I could not ask anybody, could not get more details from anybody. Nobody at the Ranger Station in the middle of nowhere spoke passable English. Yet, they did collect my fees and I did pay for an English tour.

Besides all of this, Ms. Dingbat was no longer with us, she just disappeared. She abandoned us as her way of managing our tour. Never mind what we agreed on; never mind what our itinerary was or what was spelled out to us at the beginning of the trip. Never mind what our planning was, never mind what we expected, paid for and were promised. We were left stranded at the Cave of the Hands with a jitney driver who spoke English haltingly and had no clue as to our plans. All he knew was to meet a bus after the tour of the Cave system and drop us off at a different bus that would take us to Chaltén. In my mind the question popped up, how do we get to Calafate, even to Chaltén after this tour? So concentrating on the cave tour was a bit difficult.

Here is what I do know about the cave of the hands.

The site we visited gets its name for the hand paintings, made by the indigenous inhabitants (possibly forefathers of the Tehuelches) some 9,000 years ago. The composition of the several inks is mineral, and thus cannot be carbon dated, so the age of the paintings has been calculated from the remains of the bone pipes used for spraying the paint on the wall blocked by the hand.

The caves lie along the Valley of the Pinturas River, in an isolated spot in the Patagonian landscape.

The main cave measures 24 m (79 ft) in depth, with an entrance 15 m (49 ft) wide, and it is initially 10 m (33 ft) high. The ground inside the cave has an upward slope;

inside the cave the height is reduced to no more than 2 m (7 ft).
The images of hands are often negative (stencilled). (See the red hand)

Besides these, there are also depictions of human beings, guanacos, rheas, felines and other animals,

as well as geometric shapes, zigzag patterns, representations of the sun, and hunting scenes.

Similar paintings, though in smaller numbers, can be found in nearby caves. There are also red dots on the ceilings, probably made by submerging their hunting bolas in ink, and then throwing them up. The colours of the paintings vary from red (made from hematite) to white, black or yellow. The negative hand impressions are calculated to be dated around 550 BC, the positive impressions from 180 BC, and the hunting drawings to be older than 10,000 years.
Most of the hands are left hands, which suggests that painters held the spraying pipe with their dexterous hand.
I saw a few hands with 6 digits,

a fluke of nature? A mistake? I could not ask! (See the center red hand) (Carol discovered later that this was a genetic abnormality.) Why were those hands not discovered earlier? Are there more caves nearby? Did they find graves, did someone find living quarters near by since this is obviously a ceremonial spot?
I had tons of questions! Yet, I might as well have spoken Chinese to our guide. There was nobody who spoke my language. The guide we had might even have known more but was not really interested in speaking English. She rattled on in Spanish in a rehearsed way. Too bad, I liked this old spot on Earth!

On the Road to Calafate

We booked a special trip to visit the ‘Cueva des las Manos’ Caves. Those caves are on the way to Calafate. We committed ourselves to two days on a bus again, with a stop overnight along the way and a visit the second morning to see the Cave of the Hands (Cueva des las Manos).

then arriving in Calafate the second night. The girl at the Hostel Los Tronchos did all the paper work for us. I was a bit concerned since she used a bus line that does not start from the Bus Terminal but from someplace on a side street in town. We scouted out the bus stop yesterday and yes, it seemed to be legit and known to the locals.

The first day on the bus was purely bus riding. As I said before, up at 5:30AM, a taxi at 6:00AM and then waiting in the rain for the bus to show up at 6:30 AM. I am still concerned since this was a stop not at the Bus Terminal but in front of a store in the middle of downtown Bariloche. So we stood around, wondering if the bus would show up. There was no sign or any other indication that this was a bus stop. We found an overhang to shelter us from the downpour. Another couple stood nearby and we were the only people around this early in the day. He came over to verify that he was in the right place; he seemed to be concerned, too. I told this fellow that I was told this was the spot. I guess we are correct! How do I know for sure? We were standing in the middle of a block, someplace in Bariloche, waiting for a bus, along with this South African couple. All of us were just hoping this is the place!

Sure enough, after some 20 minutes and a bit late, an older bus, worn down from traveling on the unforgiving Route 40 showed up. It had the right name on it, so it must be the right bus. We asked if this bus goes to Calafate and yes, we were told to get on the bus. We stowed our bags in the hold and off we went on a new adventure. Still not too sure about our destination, we asked the guide on the bus who barely spoke English, if this bus goes to Calafate. She affirmed that this was our bus; we were on our way to Calafate. Phew, what a relief! The bus was not crowded; there were plenty of seats available.

The occupants were mostly young people in their 20s, traveling with backpacks, not suitcases. Our guide, a young woman, conversed in Spanish, speaking on a loud microphone, giving all of us instructions about the trip. At one point she was leaning against the bus door when suddenly she fell out of the bus. Luckily we were stopped at a traffic light or for some other reason and she just fell out not hurting herself much. Her English was beyond my comprehension, I understood nothing she had to say. I am not sure why we had her along, but she was there, none-the-less. She was not the guide for the Caves.

Our trip that day ended at 7.30 PM in the town of Perito Moreno. The last few hours were no longer on tarmac but on gravel.

We had some short stops along the way for smoke breaks for people who smoked or bathroom breaks and a lunch stop.

There was a small toilet at the end of the bus but the constant shaking of the bus made this bus bathroom an iffy affair. After some hours it even started to stink from the constant shaking of its contents.

We stopped for the first night at the smallish town of Perito Moreno. A desolate place, brought back to life with the discovery of the nearby Cave of Hands in 1999. The town is still very much asleep.

The hotel picked for us on this excursion in Perito Moreno was 3rd class. It had a restaurant attached but we opted to find a local place a bit more elegant for our dinner that night. There were better hotels in town, but our tour just preferred the local flavor, incl. cigarette stink, over a better place.

The steel bathroom door in our room did not close, the shower was so dirty Carol did not even take a shower; she said she would be dirtier getting out then walking in. This hotel was an old place from the past, before the tourists made Perito Moreno a bus stop on the way to Calafate.

Calafate??? No, we are not going to Calafate, our 'tour guide' said!

What do you mean; we are not going to Calafate?

Well, we are going to El Chaltén, close to Calafate, but we are not really going to Calafate!

How close to Calafate do you go?

Well, 3 or 4 hours away by bus from Chaltén!

I am puzzled! All along the way I thought we are going to Calafate, I even told our guide, I will call her ‘Dingbat’ from now on, about our Hostel reservations in Calafate and now this Dingbat tells me the bus is not going to our chosen destination! What is going on?

Oh, I am fuming! In addition Dingbat tells us that part of the tour package is a night in a Hostel in the next town of Chaltén. She tells us a hostel just for the night, with breakfast is included in our package. And after that, our tour ends. Showing her the brochure we had did not help.
I believe someone changed our schedule to fit their needs. Someone took it upon themselves to omit the drive of the bus from Chaltén to Calafate since none of the other passengers were going to Calafate. All of the other passengers were mountain climbing in Chaltén, we were the only people going on to Calafate; the tour management ended our tour in Perito Moreno and dumped us, passed us on to the jitney driver and washed their hands of us. Yes, we will see the cave of the hands tomorrow morning after we wake up in Perito Moreno. A small bus will take us to the Cave. Our whole itinerary is being changed right then and there. Confusing? You bet!
What to do?

We have reservation in Calafate for late arrival tomorrow. We booked and prepaid the Hostel reservations in Calafate by credit card through Supernova, our travel agent in BA. This is a Holiday weekend, we cannot contact our Travel Agent in BA and nobody is working on this long Bank Holiday. And now you, Ms Dingbat, are telling us we are not arriving in Calafate tomorrow? Are you kidding us? I am livid. Planning is everything. We trusted the travel agent at the Hostel, we trusted the Bus line when we stepped on the bus and we even trusted Ms, Dingbat, even though she fell out the bus door. I should have known better right there and then.
So a lot of confusion, a lot of how could this have happened. But we need to keep our cool, those things happen on a trip, confusion can be really bad, we can work this out.

First things first! We are going to the Cave of Hands tomorrow morning starting at 7AM. We have a pick up at the hotel. We need to buy breakfast because it is not included in the package tour and then......we are off to Chaltén. Yes, we are still on the way to Calafate but with a huge detour and an unexpected stay over in Chaltén. But let's talk about the Cueva de los Manos next. I explain to you after that how Ms. Dingbat found a way out of this mess and how it happened.

The Town of Bariloche

The hostel we were booked in, Hostel Los Troncos, was fairly new and a good place to stay, even though the shower sprayed water over the toilet. There was no way to avoid it, I tried every way possible but the bathroom was just too small. It was a feat just to use the towel to dry off or even to get into the bathroom to use the facilities. This new place; built in 2007, had a bad layout for the rooms we were in. The Wi-Fi was good however and we did the needed updates on our emails. Breakfast was included in the price of the room and the breakfast room downstairs was set up well for this purpose. The surprise at breakfast was fresh baked medialunas (croissants) every day. Two of those delicious croissants for each person, yummy!

The rooms were very small, just large enough for a bed with no room to even put a suitcase and we are travelling with two big suitcases. The first two nights we received a room without any outside light, the window in this room opened up to an air shaft. After two nights we switched and had a view of the mpountains yet this room was closer to the street noise and also overlooking a parking lot. The location of the hostel, on the main street and about 5 blocks off the main square, made up for those short-comings. Yet it was a noisy Hostel, new, nice looking, but poorly laid out. This place could serve as a metaphor of Bariloche.

Bariloche is nice looking but…

We walked the town, looking for our pick-up spot for our early bus departure the next morning to Calafate. We had booked a bus trip to Calafate with the hostess of the Hostel Los Troncos, she spoke halting English but I thought we did OK and she did the best she could. We had tested her skills the previous day with a booking she made for us, a tour of the Black Glacier. Everything on the Glacier tour ran as she had promised. Let's see how the trip to El Calafate will work.

The town of Bariloche itself is a fast growing, busy, not so small town. The tourist explosion for the National Parks in Argentina has affected Bariloche, too. I had the feeling, though, that the town grew too quickly, without much thought about the details and without a good Master Plan. The newly built houses seem like copies of Swiss chalets.

This idea of a Swiss looking town just does not fit in Argentina. While the area might be greener than the surrounding desert-looking areas, it is not Switzerland. None-the-less, the idea seems to be stuck in the heads of the folks around here that Bariloche is somehow Swiss. Names like Edelweiss, Chamonix, Zitterthal, etc. are visible on buildings. Even Fondue is touted in a restaurant, a knock off of food from Europe that does not really fit here. Argentina is Argentina. It seems preposterous to copy something when Argentineans have so much of their own culture. These 'imitation' chalets just do not fit in. I am jaded, I know it. I would love to have seen more Gaucho places, more indigenous history, more of the real Argentina with Tango and culture of Argentina, and less of a bad copy of Switzerland.

When a town grows as quickly as Bariloche did, what do you do? How do you get a city plan together, how do you handle the infra structure, the water, electric, sanitation issues? What are you proud off? What is your handle? Where are your roots? All those questions are just floating in space and were not addressed when Bariloche exploded from a small town to the city it is now. Some people had this 'Swiss' idea and went with it but it seems wrong.

Around the town square Bariloche built new, solid stone buildings which house the Municipal offices. These building are just a few years old. Everything seems new but it does not seem organized, logical, or natural. The planning of the town seems rushed. The execution of the buildings, albeit very solidly built, shows short comings that add up. Bariloche is a city now, still growing due to the nearby National Park and the influx of tourists which create a gold rush of some sorts.

The town plaza, just built too, sports an already defaced, monument of someone sitting on a horse. Did anybody not see who spray- painted the monument, carved the few wooden benches and caused the other vandalisms? Did anybody care? Did the police not see who did this damage? Did they not care? I watched idle police officers standing around looking bored.

An empty, green plastic hut was set up for something right next to the defaced rider’s statue. It looked shabby and ripped. The sidewalks on this new plaza were popping up already after being poorly installed. Nobody seemed to mind the lose paving stones and the curbs worn down already and the general damages or the unfinished sections of concrete work.

Local teens were roller boarding, or riding their bikes in dangerous ways amid strolling tourists. I counted 4 separate photographers talking pictures of tourists using a live St. Bernard dog with a small St. Bernard puppy as a cute thing next to it on this plaza.

The groomed dogs carried small barrels on their necks, just like in the pictures of the Swiss dogs on the St. Bernard Mountains in Switzerland. It seemed so wrong.

Workers were setting up an elaborate stage for the weekend performance of? We never found out. There was no sign to let the tourists read what was going to come, what was going to happen.

This plaza was built not that long ago, yet it seems they forgot the daily maintenance schedule of the place. Trash was piled up.The center of town clearly shows the ‘tourist fever’ rush. The growth rate was just too fast and not well thought through.

Still, the National Park that started it all, the Glaciers, Mt Tronadór and the hiking in the woods are worth a visit. I wish Bariloche well. I hope this town, Bariloche, can handle its growth and can find its own identity.

I hope Bariloche can get rid of the rough edges it seems to have, find the tranquility and the elegance tourists crave. I hope Bariloche can find her own identity based on what the area is. Bariloche, bring back some of the indigenous ways, live simply off the land. Teach us space-age people the simpler life. Bariloche go back to nature; do not copy what others did in Geneva or in the Emmenthal. Show us visitors that this is truly a unique place to visit. Because the area is a one of a kind place and deserves better.

A good place to eat in Bariloche is the Spanish Restaurant “Breogn Taberna Gallega” on Av. San Martin 405. I had a delicious paella and the local trout was wonderful too.

Bariloche has fantastic trout fishing and could be a Mecca for people that love to fish for this delicacy.

We tried the much advertised 'Tony' Parrilla across the street from the Hostel but were disappointed and I will never go back to this place. We asked Tony if we could bring our own wine and we were told, yes! Then we were charged 60 Pesos, (US$ 15.00) for the use of his wine glasses. He never even blinked when he presented us his invoice. In fact the use of his wine glasses on the invoice was added in red ink to rub our noses in it. Tony, shame on you! Your place is a rip off! Your steak was way too salty and the meat tough besides. There is nothing great about Tony’s Parrilla.

Good bye Bariloche! We are off to Calafate, again along famous Route 40, driving ever deeper South.

Our bus leaves tomorrow morning at 6.45 AM, we need to get a taxi at 6 AM. Getting a taxi this early is not easy since it is really the middle of the night for Argentineans who party until 5 AM without a problem. We know about that because our room faced the street and the noise came right into the room even with the windows locked. Make sure you get a room facing toward the back if you visit this Hostel.