Part1-Ruta 40

Alumine River, hairpins in the distance

Beautiful scenery

The weather was great, the scenery sublime, the road not too difficult, but hard enough to be interesting, though there were some large trucks chucking up huge amounts of dust on one stretch. Further south a few homesteads and small farms started appearing. 

I rejoined Ruta 40 at Justin de los Andes. Initially my plan had been to stop here for lunch, but the sight of hordes of tourists put me off.  What I saw of the town looked very pretty, in a twee Swiss-chalet sort of way.  Since I’d started the trip, I had felt a complete antipathy to crowds, noise, traffic; civilisation in general.  In fact, this antipathy had started before I left home. The whole point of the trip was to get out in the wilds, see some scenery, push the envelope a bit; to see if I could actually do it, after years of thinking about it and imagining myself out there.  And I’d found out I could, and that civilisation held no interest any more, at least, not on this trip. I could go to a coffee shop or a nice restaurant any time I liked, but I only had two months for this.

After Justin de los Andes, I rode on the the best bit of Ruta 40 so far, excluding the 700km of dirt up north. Sweeping curves through a landscape that looks like all the best bits of Scotland with a bit of northern Italy thrown in, the smell of pine in the air on a sunny summer’s day (temperature was 23 degrees). The road passes many lakes. I videoed some of it, but didn’t stop to take many photos, partly because I knew I would be exploring this area with Jackie in 3 weeks, and also because I wanted to get the bike serviced in Villa la Angostura, and wanted to get there for the evening business hours. I knew Itchy Boots had got her bike serviced in Villa la Angostura, but she never answered my message asking exactly where. I had already discovered that there was a place you could rent Royal Enfields, so that seemed the obvious place to start. Just before Villa la Angostura, I pulled over at one of the scenic viewpoints by the lake. I chatted to a couple on a BMW, who offered me some mate tea. It looked like Scotland on steroids. The lake was huge, and the mountains round it fitted the scale.  Then I set off for Villa la Angostura. First stop was the campsite, Unquehué camping y Dormis, which was conveniently situated next to a supermarket. It was, however, quite full. My worries about noise were somewhat allayed when I was told that they had a strict noise curfew at midnight. The price, at ARS700, was the same as I’d spent on a hostel in La Quiaca, so I knew I was in a tourist hot-spot.

Lago Espejo Grande, RN40

Lago Nahuel Huapi, just north of Villa la Angostura

While putting up the tent, I snapped a pole. On the ground on the next pitch, I could see a couple of broken fibreglass tent poles, so I asked the occupants, two young guys from Buenos Aires, if I could have one of the broken poles. They said they were from a previous occupant. Luckily, the metal collar on one end of the poles, used to fit another section into, was exactly the right size, so the repair was quick and simple. While I was putting the tent up, the sun was getting in my eyes, so I put my Boca Juniors baseball cap on. “No, no….” the guys both moaned, and I realised they were River Plate supporters. They ribbed me about my hat for the rest of the evening, until they both collapsed from drinking too much wine.

After putting up the tent, I headed to town. With the help of a local biker, I found the shop that rented out Royal Enfields. Termi, who works there, told me that a guy called Marcello serviced all their bikes. He jumped on his little dirt bike and showed me the way. It is actually an approved RE service centre. Marcello asked a few questions: how many miles, how much had I been abusing the bike, how much oil was it using. He seemed impressed it had only used a litre of oil after being thrashed down desert highways in high heat for days on end. I arranged to drop the bike off the next morning at 10am. Marcello told me it would be ready by 1800, so I was committed to another night in this campsite that cost as much as some decent hostels in more remote parts of the country. I headed back to the campsite, picked up some shopping, and cooked spaghetti bolognaise. They sell bolognaise sauce in small Tetrapaks here in Argentina, and it was about to become my staple for the rest of the trip. I had a few drinks with my neighbours, who were getting thoroughly pissed, extolling the virtues of Argentinian red wine before eventually collapsing. The whole campsite seemed to partying hard, with music blaring from different directions. Drunks staggered around tripping over guy ropes, shouting at each other. I was wondering if I would get any sleep when, exactly at midnight, all the noise suddenly stopped. 

Mileage today 197 miles, about 60 on dirt

I left Chos Malal around 9am, an early start for me; I was finding it very difficult on this trip to get going early. Of course, in a campsite it’s a bit easier, as you get woken by the sun, noise etc fairly early. Fabian was up before me, and by 8am was heading off for some fishing, his little bike packed with his massive bag containing all his gear perched on the back. I packed up, and rode down Ruta 40 to La Lajas. The road was starting to look more interesting, with hills on both sides of the road. After about 40km, I came across another shrine beside the road. This looked far neater and better built than the shrines I had been seeing for Gauchito Gil, so I decided to investigate. It turned out to be a shrine to Difunta Correa (Deceased Correa) , another semi-pagan saint-like figure. According to legend, in 1840 a woman tried to reach her sick husband, who had been abandoned by the Montenaras (partisans) in the deserts of San Juan, north of Mendoza. She died when her supplies ran out. A few days later, some gauchos came across her dead body. Feeding from her still full breasts was a baby. The gauchos took the baby with them. Some time later, they erected a shrine to the deceased mother, Deolinda Correa. The shrine to her in Vallecito is still visited by pilgrims. Her devout followers believe her to perform miracles and intercede for the living. They leave offerings of water, which can be seen in the photo. The Catholic Church refused Deolinda Correa sainthood, as she only performed one miracle, and the Vatican requires two.

I left Ruta 40 at Las Lajas, heading on RN 242 towards Pino Hachacdo, on the border with Chile. Just before Pino Hachado, I turned off onto RP23, the road Matias from the Chill Inn in Mendoza had recommended to me. I could immediately tell why he liked it so much. The road follows the Rio Latran, heading south. It’s a dirt road, not in great condition, with ruts and rocks, but it’s one of those roads you don’t want to rush anyway. The scenery was fantastic, hills on my left, the river meandering along on my right. Araucaria trees commonly known as monkey puzzle trees, decorated both sides of the road, and there was absolutely no traffic. I liked it so much that I decided to stop early and enjoy the scenery. iOverlander mentioned a track leading down to the river to a nice place to camp, so I kept my eye out for it. I’m not sure if it was the track mentioned, but after about 20km, a small track led down to a ford in the river. In the distance on the far side I could see a small farm. I didn’t cross the river, instead turning right and following the river for about a km until I found a beautiful spot to camp, under some arauacaria trees.

Camp

After stripping off my bike gear, and setting up camp, I walked down to the river. It was by now about 2pm, and pretty hot, so I found a pool, stripped off, and went for a swim. Absolute bliss! The water, which I presume is glacial melt, was freezing, but very invigorating. I washed some dirty clothes and lazed around inthe sun by the river for a while. I spent the rest of the afternoon wandering around, taking pics, drinking tea, and did a bit of work on the bike.

There was no phone signal, so I sent a few messages to Jackie on the Garmin InReach. I then got out my Lixada wood stove, for he first time on the trip. I found that the cones from araucaria trees made the perfect fuel for the stove, so spent a while collecting them. Soon, the kettle was on the go, and I made some mate tea. The Lixada stove is a brilliant bit of kit. It cost me £12 from eBay, and will burn twigs, pine cones etc.

Cooking dinner

As it started getting dark, I cooked a meal on the fire of pilchards with pasta. It was actually pretty disgusting. I cleansed my palate with a small bottle of cheap whisky, and sat by the fire until my cones ran out. It was quiet save for the sound of the river, some strange bird calls, and the inevitable occasional  dog bark in the distance. I sat in the starlight thinking about what I wanted from the trip. The original plan of riding Ruta 40 end to end was now not really an option, unless I backtracked to Las Lajas. And, of course, I’d missed about 30km of Ruta 40 on the very first day, when I had taken an unnumbered road after leaving the start of RN40 at La Quica. And for a week, Ruta 40 had been a bit of a drag most of the time. Endless tarmac straights, intense heat, long boring plains, with the Andes just a movie in my peripheral vision, way off on the right. South of Gobernador Costa, I knew from cyclists I had met that it would once again be miles and miles of boring tarmac. I wanted more dirt. Of course, I was now getting into the cooler areas, but, as far as I knew, I had only another 80km or so of tarmac on the rest of Ruta 40. And what is Ruta 40 anyway, beyond the myth? It’s a road that was conceived by a bureuacrat in an office in 1936. It’s exact route is constantly in flux, as they tarmac it and deviate it to feed new mining towns. In the end, it’s just a number. And my lucky number has. always been 7

It didn’t take me long to convince myself. Fuck RN 40. I’m off to Chile to ride CH-7- Otherwise known as the Carreterra Austral.