Oh the wind and the rain

Torres y Pampas

Yes folks, that is a photo album above, click and enjoy!

The weather is one of those topics a person might bring up when there aren´t other stories to tell. But if you are in Patagonia spending most of your waking hours pedalling a bycicle the topic becomes more interesting. Our first day riding in the Pampa out of El Chalten brouught strong tail winds that gave us the enjoyable, though probably false, impression that we were becoming supercyclists; we covered 115 kilometers in a few hours, which for us, was unprecedented (I should mention here, that ¨we¨ and "us" now include our new friend Eva, a thouroughly inspiring and good humored Danish woman of 22 who is biking solo from Ecuador to Ushuia). Of course the winds haven´t always been in our favor, and we have on occasion found ourselves working up a sweat, pedalling down hill. A clever Argentinian man we met our first day riding in the pampa gave us this tip--when the wind gets too strong to pedal, ride at night. During the day when the winds are strongest, just wrap yourself in a tarp, a sheet of plastic would do, and make yourself into "a cyclist empanada." Although, he also warned us that many fisherman and bird watchers get attacked by all the pumas lurking in the pampa and we should be very loud everywhere we go and avoid putting fish in our pockets. As Americans, being loud is no problem, but frankly I thought the cyclist empanada idea damaged his crediblity a bit - but Ty is known to store fish in his pockets... Luckily the winds have been pretty mellow and we haven´t had to try any of this empanada business yet.

After leaving El Chalten and El Calafate, where Ty spent a few long days waiting for promised bike parts to arrive and building himself a 3rd (and hopefully final) wheel, we headed to Parque Nacional Torres del Paine. There we celebrated Ty´s birthday by drinking copious amounts of Ty´s new favorite beverage, Nescafe (friends at Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, we are really desperate, any chance you can get some French Roast down here?). We hiked up to a mirador del Torres trying to wrap our eyes around the outragous beauty of these 3,000 ft granite towers, and that of the surrounding mountains. We spent the remainder of our time in the park trying not to belittle those other (lame) tourists who had not arrived in the park by bicycle and enjoying some of the first wildlife we´ve seen in Patagonia, including Darwin´s rheas (think ostrich), guanacos and foxes.

We´re now in Peurto Natales where we arrived last night after one of the rainier, colder days on the bikes. It started at 6 AM on the edge Parque Torres del Paine 90 kilometers of gravel before Peurto Natales, where we camped the night before . We awoke to rain and 35 degree temps; Fresh snow had fallen on the peaks above us. Our food was running low as we had been unsuccesful in procuring food from any of the stores in the Park, either becuase they didn´t have anything on the shelves or they wouldn´t sell us what they did have: (Rose: Could we buy that box of oatmeal? Storekeeper: No. Ty: Why not? Storekeeper: It is not for sale. It is for the restaurant. Eva: Could I buy some pasta? Storekeeper: No. Ty: Is anything for sale here? Storekeeper: Yes, the cookies, the potato chips, and the pisco (a strong grape brandy). The rain persisted pretty much all day, as did the cold temps. And I can´t say I didn´t miss our usual 5-meal-a-day habit. But, writing from a warm, dry internet cafe while looking out at the falling snow, yesterday´s pedal seems strangely fun. Ty and I agreed that if someone would have stopped and offered a ride, we wouldn´t have taken it. And the cold and rain made a warm meal and a dry bed seem the height of luxury when we did make it to Puerto Natales.

PS--With all the rain and cold, we´d like to thank our rain gear sponsers, Gwynne Axelrod, Dan and Dianne Hendricks, our fleece sponsor, Judd Rogers. We´d also like to thank the kind gauchos from Estancia Cancha Carrera who gave us a few kilos of fresh sheep steaks and fresh baked bread when we asked if they sold any meat, and a palace when we asked for a spot to pitch our tent. They´re just the most recent of the many fine hosts we´ve had during the long road south.

Much love to our wonderful readers,

Rose