Perhaps we are getting used to these ultra-long bus rides. The 19 hours we spent on the bus traveling from Mendoza to Bariloche didn’t seem so bad. That isn’t to say that we actually enjoy them, there are countless other ways we should rather spend our time but they don’t seem quite as horrible as they did a few months ago.
One of the many stunning views we were treated to on our bus ride as we approached the lake district
We hadn’t anticipated visiting Bariloche this early in our travels but cutting out our return trip through Santiago due to road closures meant that we needed to travel south through Argentina instead of Chile. Bariloche is a lakefront town of 113,000 people, with German influences around every turn. The whole town is filled with housing and buildings that look like they came straight out of a European chalet. It was very beautiful and we could only imagine what it must look like during the winter with a dusting of snow.
As San Franciscaners (Yes Kevin still claims to be from SF) we had to take a photo of Bariloche’s equivalent of Lombard Street
We decided to only spend a few days in Bariloche knowing we would circle back around to it again in a couple of weeks before heading down to Patagonia. We spent some of our time walking around the lake as well as exploring the town. We also took a bus to a nearby ski resort town to hike up into the mountains. The hike took us from the Catedral ski resort up to Refugio Frey, a lake and camping area popular with climbers for the towering rock faces that surrounded the lake.
It was a beautiful hike full of fields of bright yellow flowers and sweeping views. We ate a picnic lunch once we reached the lake. We ended up getting caught up in a conversation with other tourists when we were about to head down the mountain, so when we began our descent based on our initial estimates we unfortunately came up a bit short on time. We had checked the bus schedule before we started the hike so we knew when we needed to be back at the resort. About a mile and half before the base we realized we wouldn’t make it in time to make our bus, so we set off running. We rounded the last bend in the trail a full 10 minutes before the bus was scheduled to leave. Unfortunately, this was just in time to see the bus pulling away from the stop and heading down the road. In all of our months in South America, this was an anomaly. Bus don’t leave early. Sometimes they leave very very late but they never leave early. So sweaty and out of breath we wandered over to the ski lodge and sat down at one of the cafeteria tables to wait for the next bus. There was supposed to be a bus in another hour, but as providence would have it, this bus wasn’t early. It wasn’t even on time. It fianally pulled up to the bus stop 40 minutes late, which combined with the other bus leaving early provided us with a nice long wait to get back to town. Oh well, it was still a stunning hike and we made it back to Bariloche safely at the end of the day.
From Bariloche we caught a bus that took us along a road known as the 7 lakes drive. As the name would suggest, it was a beautiful winding route that took us from Bariloche north to San Martin de Los Andes, circling around seven lakes as we passed.
We could have filled an entire blog post with just pictures of the beautiful scenery from our bus ride along the seven lakes drive
Before we left Bariloche we had tried to find a hostel in San Martin de Los Andes. We knew we were traveling near the end of summer and high tourist season but it still seemed a little odd that the tiny mountain town was so packed. As we lugged our backpacks around San Martin searching for a place to stay we kept noticing a lot of fit-looking people in running shoes and sporty clothing. This area was known for hiking and adventure sports so we didn’t think to much of it at first. We finally found a hostel with a few vacant bunks and were ecstatic to change into shorts and flip flops. We dropped our bags and took off to explore the town.
When we made it to the lake we saw a large stage being set up and what looked like the finish line to a race. As we walked towards the stage we saw a large sign saying El Crucero, but we had no idea what this was. When we got to the stage construction we saw a guy setting up a sound system and asked him about the event. He told us it was a race around the area, but didn’t have a lot of specifics for us. When we got back to the hostel that evening Lisa met a couple who were in town to run the race and discovered it was a 3 day, 100 km race though the Andes and around the lake. The race started and finished in San Martin de Los Andes but drew runners from all over the world. It was broken into three waves with around 1,000 people starting each morning for three consecutive days. The fact that it was a race week explained a lot about why there were so many people in town this late in summer and why it was so challenging for us to find a place to stay.
Our time in San Martin was much like our time in Bariloche, we spent most days walking either around town or in nearby nature reserves. One day we hiked to one of the two miradors (view points) and were rewarded with aerial views of the town as well as as a great view of the lake for miles.
The beach at San Martin de los Andes
We both love making friends on our hikes
The coffee shop near the vista point was closed, but it was still a beautiful spot to have our picnic lunch
Another day we went to Lanín park where we hiked to a waterfall and a beach along one of the lakes. We were told at the information center in town that there were two buses in the evening to take us from the park back to San Martin, but when we arrived in the morning to the park the rangers said that there was only one bus and it left at 8 pm.
We arrived back from our hike around 4:30 pm and didn’t want to wait for 3+ hours for the 8pm bus, so we started walking back towards town, hoping to get a ride hitch hiking (hitch hiking is very normal and not dangerous in much of South America). We walked for about a kilometer before we arrived at the ferry dock and we decided to double check the price of the ferry before continuing our hitch hiking adventure. As we had suspected the ferry was way out of our price range, but we decided to stop for a cup of coffee at the restaurant next to the dock. We ordered 2 cups of coffee and didn’t double check the price before… I mean it’s instant coffee, how much could it realistically cost? It turns out it can cost quite a bit as we received our $6 bill for two small instant coffees (I know if you are reading this in the states that might sound reasonable, but a package of instant coffee here costs about a dime and we are on a tight budget). After paying our tab we resumed walking (44km to go to reach San Martin) with the hopes of getting picked up soon and not having to wait for the bus to pass to get back to town. We ended up walking for about an hour before a nice local man stopped and picked us up, and then stopped again about 100 yards down the road to pick up another couple that was hitch hiking. We spent the 45 minutes driving back to town talking with our driver and the other hitch hikers that we had picked up.
From San Martin de Los Andes we will continue exploring the Lake District but on the Chilean side of the border, starting in the town of Pucon. The bus should take us about 3.5 hours to get there from San Martin, not including the time to cross the border.
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