Tuesday 29 October 2013

26/10/2013 Stage 49 El Sosneado - Bardas Blancas

2013-10-26 click date for more photo's
26/10/2013 Stage 49 El Sosneado - Bardas Blancas
Untitled by malcandmarjetpatterson at Garmin Connect - Details

Well! After hesitating for a while WIND is definitely back in the number one spot of hates. Soft deep sand threatened to overtake head winds for a while but no longer! I hate head winds always have and always will. There just is no reward. One minute all is hunky-dory and the next you pretty much come to a standstill even though you are meant to be zooming down hill. At least if you are struggling up a big hill there is a reward in coming down hill. There is no compensation for head wind. The thing that upsets me most is the noise of the wind . It just spoils it for me, the noise of wind in my ears. But hey ho I think I had better get used to it because we are just about to enter Patagonia. The windiest place on earth. Having got my moans about wind out of the way, even though many more will follow I'm sure, it has been another wonderful day cycling. We both decided that a 600 meter climb is just perfect to distract from the boredom of flat terrain and the descent is well worth the effort getting up. The landscape has become even more enchanting again now that we are right in the Andes again. We passed Malargue a ski resort town earlier and you do empathise with the Argentinians who see themselves closer to Europeans then to other South American nations . It sure feels closer to any European country then to their neighbouring countries. The upside of it is that people can imagine your situation so we get lots of encouragements along the way. ( cheers, toots,bottles of cold water etc) I think in Peru and Bolivia we were considered from a different planet and little communication was possible but here there is more of a mutual understanding.

As always it seems that the last few miles into town seem the hardest. They seem to go on forever over very though terrain, into wind, uphill whatever! But we eventually found Bardas Blancas with one Hosteria which also had the only shop and restaurant found a place to stay and a cold beer was on offer. Few provisions and no bread but enough for the next 36 hrs as there's nothing until Barancas the day after tomorrow Looking at the bathroom facilities made me decide I would rather stay smelly than risk it. Who died of a smelly body anyway?? [ Your companion smelt of roses after his shower as I remember ]
typical hotel room chaos

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