Moments of laughing, thought and mud

Not quite conquered the Salar yet, but the last couple of weeks have seen me chill out in Salta, explore isolated cloud forest national parks (ie wet and humid) in Northern Argentina, meet some very kind and interesting people in isolated indigenous communities, have my first taste of Bolivia, do some pretty cool riding and only just make it unfrozen for a final Andes crossing back to Chile from Argentina.

Instead of doing a play by play, thought I'd just jot down some of the moments that have made me cringe, smile and think over the last couple of weeks....

Of course there's copious amounts of photos to wade through - of both the PN Baritu, the Quebrada de Huamhuaca - but I'm going to keep things clean for this post...

• Enjoying my first taste of coca tea – the coca leaves that men chew in big wads in their cheeks (que feo...), but these are just the leaves in hot water (tastes like a green tea)
• In Salta, watching Diego and Mika do tug of war with my front forks to separate the parts (the oil seal was being changed)
  Enjoying a very dry, warm night inside a converted German police bus in a wet, raining campground courtesy of some very cool Germans AND Jan's kick ass river stone stove built on the asado
• Realising how shit it is riding in rain, but also how proud I was to make my own waterproof pants out of a garbage bag and duct tape
• Enjoying some termas after arriving wet and cold – and seeing grandmothers and granddaughters rubbing mud on eachother's backs in the baths
• Making it through a border crossing, another country, 30kms of dirt and 27kms of mud slide that took me 3.5hours to conquer to Parque Nacional Baritu in northern Argentina. There were 3 quite isolated communities ' one called Los Toldos, which is relatively a big city of a couple hundred people, then 2 smaller communities ' Lipeo and Baritu with 24 families and about 30 families respectively. Very very closed communities, girls having children at 15, 12 kids in a family, no electricity. But families that are very close, inquisitive and curious children, children who grow up and return to be medics and teachers in the communities and very relaxed and generous all round.
• Especially in Lipeo and Baritu, also being asked straight after disbelief that I was travelling alone on a motorbike, how many children do you have? Such a different place and environment to anything I am familiar with.
• Definitely feeling the loneliness of solo travel while camping in PN Baritu
• Discovering 50+ photos of Adelina – a girl from Lipeo – taken at the campsite, inside my tent, dressing up in my clothes on my camera
• Riding 2 up with Massimo who let me stay in his house from Toldos to Tarija
• Absolutely LOVING my first taste of Bolivia – the markets, the very unique looking people (women in colourful billowy gypsy skirts, long pigtails tied at the ends and top hats), fantastic food
• Realising that I was saying I love you I love you over and over to a hot shower in Tarija, Bolivia after a week in the forests and bathing in cold rivers.
• Enjoying immensely the windy dirt roads of the river canyons in Bolivia from Iscayachi to Villazon. Was really fun riding and I think my favourite road yet.
• Riding over Paso Jama to nearly 5000m, a day before it was closed due to snowcover, arms shaking from the cold, fingers barely moving to change gears, doing yoga breathing to try and warm up while I rode – but doing the most kms I'd ever done in 1 day (about 460kms) and making it to meet up with Kurt in San Pedro de Atacama.
• Eating gulyas/goulash made by Philipe in Calama... I had 4 servings for dinner, and 1 more for breakfast.
• Riding out of Calama on my 200cc bike, leading Philipe in his sidecar, Kurt in his 650cc BMW boxer and Fred in his Kawasaki 650 KLR. Felt like I was part of a bike gang, albeit a really nice one:)
• Riding with Philipe in downtown Calama as a passenger in a sidecar – and getting more turning heads and looks that I normally get riding loaded up into a town.
• Laughing to myself as my bike tried to keep up to the bigger ones at high altitude on gradual ascents. Alas, it tries so so hard and has the best of intentions, but is just not that big and beefy to really cruise up there with the big boys.
• Eating freshly baked baguette out of an outdoor adobe oven in the hostel in San Pedro de Atacama – made by Arthur the French chef at El Anexo. The BEST bread I've had since travelling here...
  
  

  

  Muddy road to PN Baritu

  

  Across the Andes again - Paso Jama

  
  

  

  Windy road down from Paso Jama

  

  Gorgeous riding in Bolivia

  
  

  

  Markets in Tarija, Bolivia

  
  

Back across the Andes – this time at 4700m and going solo...

Entonces... adventuras con mi moto (… and so – adventures with my motorbike). After leaving Diego and his very small backpack in La Serena after a very successful transfer of ownership of the bike, I headed north for the first time absolutely solo - my destination was Copiapo (yes the town of last year's big Chilean mine collapse)  

Part of the attraction of having a bike, is that I can take any turn off that looks appealing – and so I did that about 200kms north of where I started and ended up in a smaller fishing village called Huasco. There I met a Chilean – Fernando, a sailor who ended up living in Norway for 30 years but returned to his village about 10 years ago. He had some wonderful stories and I ended up spending 2 nights there enjoying the village, eating seafood and visiting Fernando's olive farm.

From there I headed along a desolate but beautiful coastline of sand dunes, where I had the first of my mechanical adventures – in addition to the self inflicted running out of fuel I also had a dead battery. With the help of some locals in Caldera (nice laid back coastal town) and Copiapo (um, sorry to say not terribly exciting) I got back on the road and got ready to cross the border back into Argentina – across a 4700m called Paso San Francisco.

starting out in the foggy morning

Steadily climbing up the tarmac

The road to the pass on the Chilean side is about 200km of tarmac and gravel roads, and after steadily rising in altitude and opening up my air box because of the thinning air, I reached the Chilean border around 2pm. The original plan had been to continue up, but after some warming tea and biscuits, I was very fortunate to be invited to stay in the casa de Carabinero (the Police in Chile), which along with my first hot hot shower in 5 days and the freezing nightime temps was totally appreciated!

At the border with Mario - the carabinero

The next day I had about 30kms of sandy fine gravel to negotiate, but I got through it successfully, and made it to Laguna Verde (Green lake) – a stunning salt talk at 4500m, set in yellow/brown high altitude desert planes – an absolute marvel when you chance upon it in the barren high altitude landscape! The next day after sneakily camping inside the carabinero summer post house I had fun taking copious amounts of pictures at the border – after all how many times do you get to cross the Andes solo with a 200cc bike?? I also passed the highest volcano in South America – Ojos de Salado (source/eyes of the salt planes) and other beautiful mountains.

Cerros Tres Cruces

Cerro Ojos del Salado - highest volcano in world AND 2nd highest mountain in south america

FIrst sight of Laguna Verde - it blew my mind. I was just yelling out loud to well no-one.

After suitably jumping around under the international border crossing and flying my kite in celebration, I made my way back into Argentina proper – and after all that gravel, to see pavement was absolute heaven!

At the border - 4726m high!

Cerro San Francisco

Why did the guanaco cross the road?

So it's been a week now since the crossing – I've met some very generous locals – both in Chile and Argentina (I'm soon going to do a blog on the characters I met), visited 2 Inca ruins at El Shincal and Quilmes, have passed through Cafayate (a fantastic wine region and also laid back town which is one of the places I'd like to return to), achieved my first helmet face tan (very attractive) as I passed through ancient rock pinnacles north of Cafayate, zipped through the cute touristic town of Cachi and rode pedestrian bridges to small campsites, and now I'm in my last big city in Argentina – Salta. From here the plan is to hopefully meet up with another female motorbike rider – and do the Salar de Uyuni – high altitude salt planes between Chile and Bolivia.

Back on Ruta 40

Garganta del diablo - near Cafayate

Quebrada de las Conchas - near Cafayate

A little bit dead and sore after 50kms cycling

Adobe houses on the way to Cachi

Way to Cachi

Amazing rock formations

Near Cachi

I am enjoying riding the bike so so so so so so much – the freedom, the 'bad ass'-ness of it all, and the reactions of locals (you are travelling – alone – on a motorbike – alone – a woman? – really?!), picking routes on the map, stopping waay to much for pics – all of this is definitely making it THE way to travel South America. Also getting to do things like ride over footbridges first thing in the morning....

Bolivia is next after a bit of bike maintenance in Salta – it's going to be a completely different country to travel in, and I am looking forward to it!”

So – until I've conquered the salt flats...adios amigos :)

susanxo

The taste of my travels

I've written a lot on the amazing scenery and experiences I've been having so far on my travels, but not much on the food; and considering I spend approximately 16 hours a day either thinking about what to eat, looking for things to eat, eating, planning the next meal or musing on what I've just eaten, it's high time I write about it as well. However due to the way I'm travelling, instead of being a critique on restaurants and the usual tourist fare, it will be more of a reflection of those moments my nose and taste buds have made my face break into a big grin, and my tummy smile on the inside (and at times develop a little bit of a pot belly).

So to do my tummy justice, I've compiled a 'food' album for those interested in the good things in life:)

Most of you know me pretty well, and so you know that food just makes me happy. What you might not know is how happy – one of the best things for me about going to bed is that I get to wake up and start eating again! A bad meal is just so disappointing – like I've wasted a chance to eat on something crap.

One of the great things about hiking a lot and staying in campsites is that you can easily cook something up – and get inventive in the process! Some of the best meals (there's a list below) were fired up over coals.

I'm going to do a bit of reflection on the best food and wine moments so far, then hopefully as the trip continues I'll post up the individual moments as they occur...

As well as the pics I've posted up below, there's more on a dedicated food album. Oh yes, there is a food album. Some are repeated from previous posts/albums, but there's some new ones as well.

The good stuff...

First off – Argentina. On the whole Argentina has sadly not been a particular food destination in my experience, but there have been a couple of stand out ingredients and dishes that I'll try to relay the experience off:

• Simply – carne (meat): what all the tourist guides say is true – the meat here is really, really amazing. Even in a top end meal, whatever fancy things they try to do around it or in lead up dishes, the flavour and melting texture of beef just stands out and makes everything else cry. You can buy good quality meat in even the smallest town, and what may look like a rolled up slab of marbled back loin, just needs to be thrown on a grill over coals and cooked as you like it. You can definitely season it, but even on its own it just is bursting with flavour and tenderness. There are many cuts available; and having a parilla (grill) or asado (bbq) is an integral part of family gatherings and other meals.

• Potatoes (papas): they are tasty tasty as here – and there's a lot of it so that's good. Don't quite beat the potatoes that I had in Nepal (the high altitude appartently is perfect for growing) but pretty close.
• Empanadas – pastry/turnovers/pasties – for me the best are when the pastry is flaky (like puff pastry). The most fancy one I've had was chicken, orange and cashew, and the best on the street one was chicken, olive, egg and vegetable.Also like the simplicity of caprese (in Argentina – basil, cheese, tomato) as well Humita (corn). In Santiago I also got happily engrossed in making these at the hostel – there's more on that below. They are either baked in an oven, or fried. Generally in Argentina I had baked, but on the coast in Chile, particularly in the small fishing ports they are generally fried, and let me tell you, on a cold misty morning nothing beats a fried jaiba (crab) or mariscos (seafood) parcel of steaming tasty fried goodness.

Jaiba (crab) empanada in Horcon, Chile

• Choclo (corn) – in the husk, on the coals... exploding golden nuggets. Priceless.
• Batata (like quince paste) – sold in big blocks in Argentina, nice (obviously) with cheese:).
• Helado in Argentina (ice-cream) – I've devoted many words to this already. Suffice to say that especially at Jauja in Patagonia it is simply heaven in a cup.
• Chorizo especial from Villa Trafful, Patagonia in Argentina. Chorizo everywhere was pretty good, but this one was muy espeical y rico (tasty)!
• Dulce de leche – caramel. In both Chile and Argentina, eaten by the potful, and used a lot in pastries and other sweeties.

Chile

if the saving grace for Argentina is carne, then for Chile it's mariscos – seafood. On the whole though, I enjoyed the food more in Chile – maybe that was who I ate with or that I LOVE seafood and had loads of it but on the whole I found it a little more enjoyable on the whole. If you're keen to see typical types of Chilean food, check out this handy list of pics and descriptions. For me, the highlights were:

• Ceviche/mariscos (raw fish, seafood) – only had in Chile – can cheaply pick these up in street markets, or at the small fishing ports.

Paila Marina (seafood chowder) in Caldera, Chile

In the market - Copiapo. Pots of Ceviche for $2

• Macha con parmesana (shellfish) – this was cooked for me by a couch surfing host – Victor in Valparaiso. Fantastic.

• Cazuela (like a stew) – very simple, good hearty food.

Best meals so far:

• Steak on numerous campfires – no fancy stuff. Just ask for a cut for asado or parilla, and throw it on a grill over hot coals. Juicy, succulent, full of flavour, delish.
• Hamburgesa completa (a BIG hamburger, well with everything) – The best I had was in Puerto Natales, it still ranks as one of my top meals. Maybe that was to do with eating it after 5 days in the rain in Torres del Paine? It was beautiful and with palta – avocado.
• Meals cooked with Yas and Matt in our hostel kitchen in Santiago – from home made empanadas, thai coconut soup, fig and cheese tart.

• Bread baked on a campfire – yes it's easy and very very tasty!
• Spinach & egg pasta – this has become a favourite, spinach, onion with pasta in raw egg.
• Meals at the eco yoga park – early on in my journey I stayed at a hare krishna park – the food was mostly grown on the farm, entirely vegetarian, and very tasty.

Where I've been shopping:

• Markets – esp for fruit & veg, and my staple, nuts and grains. Anyone who's travelled with me knows I have an seemingly endless supply of nuts, sultanas, grains etc. The street markets are miles cheaper than supermarkets as well.
• Bread baked on a campfire – yes it's easy and very very tasty!
• Todo suelto (everything loose) shops – the secret source of my stashes of nuts, dried fruits, legumes, grains and spices.

Haul post visit to everything loose shop

The alcohol

First off – wine, it's fantastic – big bold Syrah/Shiraz and Cabernet Sauvingon in Argentina and Chile, smooth Carmenere and crisp whites in Chile also. Dare I say it, although I drank more in Argentina, I think I like it better in Chile. It might just be the Carmenere; a variety smooth like a merlot, but much more full bodied. This was a variety of grape that for decades had been lost but was found growing in multitudes in Chile and marketed as Merlot.

In the UK or Australia, you spend about £15 or $20 for a decent bottle, here you spend the equivalent of £2-4, $2-5 for something decent. It's heaven.

Beer for me as well has been great – not so much that it's great, but on a hot day travelling through desert landscapes, it's worth it's weight in gold.

Pisco sour – Pisco is distilled from grapes, and Chilean/Peruvian. I first overindulged with these on the boat in Antarctica with Dana, and tucked into them again in Santiago. A Pisco Sour is pisco, lemon juice, sugar and egg white. Awesome.

Other drinks

Unfortunately for me, the coffee has been disappointing, so I'm going to save writing about this until I get further north. But, I can tell you about:

• Mote con huesillo – this is wheat grains with peaches and syrup. Found in Chile, it's an odd combo but not bad!
  
  
  
  
  

• Mate – found mostly in Argentina and southern Chile, the best thing about mate is the way you drink it. It is shared with others, and sipped slowly, so becomes much of a contemplative or social experience. In Argentina I had some, but wasn't at the point of making it myself, but since I've been in Chile, I've started making it for myself and really enjoying it. It's drunk out of a metal straw, out of a wooden cup (gourd).

VInes, wines and crossing the Andes on a motorbike

Happy Easter everyone!

The past month or two has has been a mixture of indulging in food and wine in San Juan and Mendoza, seeing some beautiful 5000m peaks up close at Cordon del Plata, whiling away days in campgrounds, crossing the Andes into Chile riding pillion on a motorboke and making some great new friends in Santiago discovering the surrounding area. There's been a lot of thoughts pondered, new things learnt and yet not much movement really, but I'll try and capture some of the things that have stayed with me. Looking over my pics, I've started to see (surprise surprise) a bit of a food theme happening, so I'm going to post soon a special 'food edition' of what I've filled my eyes and belly with so far. But back to the Andes...

Before I get into the motorbike bit, Mendoza with Dana was an absolute treat – visiting some wineries outside the tourist loop, eating mouth watering food at some classy restaurants and homes, laughing and talking a lot and for the first time in 4 months, sleeping in a double bed! Oh and literally spooning my way through a tub of peanut butter. Mmm. 

Dana and I getting serious with our wine tasting

Vineyards at Melipal

Tasting from the barrel at Rio Azul

Too much food, wine and laughter:)

At the thermal baths

I followed it up with some hiking up in the Cordon del Plata mountain range – peaks between 3000-6000m that many use as acclimatisation for Aconcagua. I managed to ascend pretty quickly – without any real acclimatisation, and spent a couple of nights (one at Campamento Salta, 4250m – the coldest I think I've ever been. Think ice forming on the outside of my sleeping bag and not able to sleep from the cold) I then attempted to get up to Cerro Vallecitos (around 5500m) but unfortunately I got thwarted by the wind and lack of proper gloves at about 5300m and headed back down. I've got a rather corny video doing a 360 from the col I got to – the wind is pretty ferocious, but you can see Aconcagua which is pretty special.

At Campamento Salta...brrr....

Side view of Cerro Vallecitos y Rincon

The col with Cerro Vallecitos on the right - where I got to before the wind got me

Cerro Vallecitos - what I wasn't able to get up to...:(

Brrr cold up here

Aconcagua

So now for the motorbike bit...after the hiking I headed back to Mendoza to meet up with Diego – a Colombian motorbike rider I had met in San Juan and who I'd been talking about riding with across the Andes with to Santiago. We decided to give it a go, and after very unsuccessfully trying to get both our luggage plus ourselves onto a 200cc bike, I very fortuitously bumped into an old travelling buddy at Mendoza bus station, who had a friend who was going to Santiago that night and was happy to take my bag and cross the border with it. An amazing piece of luck.

Bike packed at Mendoza bus station -what has Diego got himself in for?

Cycling up to the border

Just cross the border and made it down the zig zag road...

Diego and I set off, winding our way through the valley to Uspallata, where at the campground I had my first riding lesson. Well I didn't ride, I just pushed the bike around, tried not to fall over and sat on it. We also met two French cyclists, who we then played tag with up towards the border crossing. Suffice to say they left at 9am, us at 1pm, and we pretty much made it at the same time. The drive and pure awesomeness of these cyclists still astound me.

The route between Mendoza and Santiago is well travelled (It's quite a beautiful pass, at 3500m with a very windy road on the Chilean side which we managed to get down in one piece while being overtaken by semi trailers) – and is usually done in about 6 hours. We took 5 days to do the same distance; getting a bit lost looking for places to camp one crossing the border, meeting a very kind local in Lampa who let us camp in his garage, riding some awful gravel road and stumbling across an outdoor type market, and for me having my first 'real' riding lesson and only dropping the bike twice in 2 hours:)

After first 'real' riding lesson

Our destination was Santiago – where Diego was heading to pick up some paperwork, and I had wanted to head to the Pacific Ocean to Valparaiso which many had said was a great city to visit. The plan was not even to really stay in Santiago, but here I am, nearly a month later still here. It's a pretty nice city – on first arriving here, and heading up to Cerro San Cristobal and seeing the layer of smog cover the city I rather rashly started saying how much I didn't like it or want to stay here.

But it started growing on me – the numerous parks, bookshops/cafes, relaxed people, proximity to mountains and the beach, big food markets and restaurants all started whispering in my ear that it might not be such a bad place after all. We also met a French couple – Yasmine and Mattiew who after travelling for 6 months have decided to settle here for a couple of years. It's been lovely to spend time with them, cooking up feasts of all kinds, going to classical concerts in the lead up to Easter, having picnics, climbing spiders in playgrounds (my family know how much I love these!) and heading out of town for hiking. Definitely a place I could imagine living in – although not for me now.

Cerro San Cristobal in Santiago - mmmm smog.

Yay! a Spider just around the corner from the hostel.

Acting up at the museum

Drinking Mote con huesillo - trigo wheat with sweet peaches 

I did manage to get to the Pacific Ocean – before heading to Valparaiso I went to Isla Negra where I camped on the beach (well to be technically correct it was an abandoned property on the beach, and um where people may have used as a toilet), but I really enjoyed watching the sunset while sitting on the rocks, watching waves crash and foam and wash up these rather octopus like seaweed thingies. (people were collecting these and dragging them into cars, to dry/cook and sell) Isla Negra is also one of the homes of the Chilean poet and politician, Pablo Neruda whose house I visited. An interesting sort of man – from the copious amounts of 'things' in his house, a man obsessed by collecting collections. Collections of figureheads from ships (about 7 keeping each other company in his living room), pipes, masks, trains, butterflies, insects, bottles and more. Oh and he had a stable built for a papier mache horse he bought. What intrigued me was that he purchased the complete collections rather than collecting the individual items himself, so a sort of collector of collections. What does that say about a person?

 Beach at Isla Negra - first taste of Pacific Ocean

Doors in Valpo

Valparaiso next – and it definitely lived up to my expectations. Great seafood, a bustling city, steep hills with colourful houses and graffiti, little galleries, a busy functioning port and just a really great vibe. I couchedsurfed there – staying with Victor, an engineer and teacher and closet amazing cook who helped me with my miserable spanish and taught me a lot about Chilean food.

I also headed out with Diego to Cajon del Maipo – intending to meet up with Yasmine and Mattiew but not making it in time to hike up together to some glaciers, but in the end I made a 'breakthrough' with my riding and got really good practice on gravel and started to feel really comfortable on it.

Cooking up a storm with Yas and Matt in the hostel

Yasmine with our empanadas!

Back on the bike at Cajon del Maipo

Exploring glacier caves near Banos Morales in Cajon del Maipo

With Yas and Matt at the top of La Camapana - where you can see the ocean to the Andes

The thing was that I was considering buying the bike and continuing on my travels on it. The taste I'd had the last couple of months first travelling in the car with Max, then with Diego on the bike had opened up a big burning hole of wanting to explore on my own, take any road and get off the bus route. But having never ridden a bike before (well actually I did ride my brothers dirt bike one time very unsuccessfully) I was unsure whether I could, wanted to, felt confident enough (both driving and with mechanics and travelling by myself) or whether it was really a good idea or no.

But I think the riding I did up in Cajon del Maipo sealed it for me. I loved it and wanted MORE. So after we came back, over a very nice bottle of Carmenere (the grape that for many years people thought was lost, but was being grown in Chile mistaken for Merlot) with Diego, Yas and Matt and everyone else who happened to be in the hostel kitchen, I 'formally' asked to buy the bike from Diego. Very very exciting.

So thus the past week I've been dragging a very patient Diego around to get a RUT – Chilean tax file number, buying parts/gear, transferring ownership – and of all excitements, getting panniers built on the bike (that yay I get to pick up this afternoon!). It's a big step, and yes I'm not sure how it will pan out, yes I am on a crash course of motorcycle mechanics courtesy again of a very patient and great teacher Diego, yes I have A LOT to learn about riding but I'm giving it a go. First step is to head out of town to a campground to do some more maintenance on the bike with Diego, then I want to head Northwards to then cross back into Argentina at Paso San Fransisco. It's very high – at 4700m and with about 200kms of gravel/dirt road leading up to it but you all know me – I'm diving right in.

So here I am, still no further northwards than when I started in BA in November, and about to continue the travels on a bike. I have no idea how it will pan out but I am so excited about hitting the road – for real this time.

Till next time...

susanxo