Bariloche
Trip Start
Nov 01, 2004
1
91
133
Trip End
Nov 01, 2005
Bariloche,
Argentina
Friday, June 24, 2005
At 8.00am the lights came on and the music started. They first showed 80s music videos and then "Oceans 12". The last 3 hours of the journey became very scenic as we first headed through the Lakes District which was full of rolling tree covered hills before getting into Bariloche area proper - beautiful blue lakes with snow covered mountains surrounding them. We arrived around 3.00 to find a nice 10 degrees temperature (better than the forecast of 1) and caught a taxi to our hostel (41 Below) which turned out to be the best hostel in South America that we have stayed in. It was new, friendly, warm and run by a Kiwi - so it was just that bit better than anything else we have stayed in. Bariloche is the ski & snow-board capital of Argentina and our walk through town showed that - lots of buildings were done in an Alpine style, lots of chocolate shops to keep Gillian happy and tonnes of people were going round in their fancy designer ski gear
01 View From Hostel Bedroom
. We have managed to arrive in town for a festival again! This time it is the Festival Of The Snow - our first introduction was a rather loud rock concert in the main square (where you can get your photo taken with St Bernards!). We opted out of ear punishment and headed into the main museum in the town. The museum was excellent and had some great pictures from the early 1900s when this place was just a collection of farms. They had the usual tribal history, a conquistadorīs helmet and some lovely tribal weaving. After buying some lovely chocolates and trying some lovely cheeses we headed to the Chinese for a meal that contained vegetables!!! Veg is still hard to come by and a Chinese restaurant is an easy place to get them. We then headed down to the Cathedral where there was a choral concert taking place as part of the festival. Entry was a donation of food for charity and over 2 hours we got to hear 5 different choirs sing - each singing 5 songs of their choice before joining together for a couple of songs together. They ranged from 17th century hymns to a renditions of Queens "Love Of My Life". The Swing Low was a bit hard to take because of its recent rugby usage but we got over that! After that we headed back to the hostel where we shared a lovely bottle of wine (2 euros!!) and chatted to the gang in the hostel. Gillian played some cards with them and we headed to bed far later than planned.Day 238 Saturday 25/06/05 Bariloche & El Bolson
We heard about a fabulous market in El Bolson consisting of some 320 stalls - itīs a town only 2 hrs south of Bariloche so we decided to head out there
02 Bariloche
. It was a wonderful bus journey there through snow covered forests and hills with the occasional beautiful lake thrown in too! The temperature has dropped a bit and itīs about 6 degrees......Stewart bought a scarf! Itīs also meant to be the Bonnybridge of Argentina - there are more UFO sightings here than anywhere else! It also attracts the New Age people and has developed a mystical reputation. The town itself is fairly small but is flanked by snow capped mountains on two sides. We walked through the market which was still setting up (2 hrs late) and seemed much smaller than advertised. We wandered up the church which was sadly closed before heading back to the market to see if anything had got more interesting. There were definitely some interesting and different stalls (as well as the normal touristy tat) - the deer head shaped bellows complete with antlers were lovely! Stewart had a couple of nice beers to taste and there was some excellent cheese for sale which we succumbed to! We returned to Bariloche early and then the rain started. Gillian had had an option to go horse riding but decided against it - and just as well. We caught up with some emails before having a lovely meal in Familia Weiss - Stewart tried the wild boar and liked it - though it was more the alcoholic raspberry sauce that did it for him! We headed back to the hostel and realxed on the comfy sofas with a bottle of wine - which cost us a euro! Day 239 Sunday 26/06/05 Bariloche to Puerto Madryn
Well...itīs a little warmer but it is chucking it down. For the first time since Vietnam it just sucks! We decided to stay in our warm cosy hostel and watched "Pirates Of The Carribean"! After that we headed to an internet cafe for a while before having a nice meal at Friends. We caught a taxi to the bus station and left at 6pm. Sadly they put the lights off straight away (itīs dark about 6) and it was 8pm before the first of two films started.
