Bariloche, bookended by Puerto Montt

Last Thursday I made my way from Chiloé to Puerto Montt where I had my stopover on my journey to Bariloche. I'd treated myself to a night in a Hotel Ibis and it was bliss! It was also incredibly handy for the bus station, which was literally right under the hotel, and with an 8.30am bus I was somewhat thankful for! My journey to Bariloche, which is back in Argentina was long, but fairly uneventful with routine border crossings. I was looking forward to a simple bus system again as Bariloche uses the same Sube cards that I had in Buenos Aires! Or so I thought. My card needed recharging, but when I arrived at the bus station the queue for the Sube desk was a good 30m long and moving at a snail's pace. Fortunately I had a whole pile of Argentinian pesos with me and this enabled me to sack the bus and get a cab instead! I think I'd still be queuing now if not!

In Bariloche I'd taken a risk by booking a new hostel with limited ratings, Berkana, which was just on the edge of the town but situated right on the edge of the lake. I was so right to do this; the views were stunning. This was what I could see from my bedroom window, which was above the dining area, so we got to look at this every meal that was eaten there!

The weather forecast for my time in Bariloche said it wasn't due to be great other than my first day there so I took the opportunity to visit Cerro Campanario 

and Parque Municipal Llao Llao. At Cerro Campanario you had the choice of either walking up the hill or taking the chairlift. I of course went for the latter!

When we got to the top, the views were out of this world, truly breathtaking. The pictures are pretty but don't do justice to the real thing as the colours were way more vibrant than this. 

After freezing myself to death looking at the views for around 20 minutes (top of a hill and very windy) I warmed myself up with the best coffee I've had in a long time (as II was back in Argentina) looking at the view from behind glass! Chile does not have great coffee. In Santiago, knowing this, they have 'coffee with legs' which is basically coffee bars where the female staff wear hot pants, to help you forget that the coffee is so bad. They tried to assure us this wasn't sexist in any way and the women have great working conditions, but I'm sure you don't need me to tell you my views on them... The male versions apparently closed fairly quickly as they weren't successful. Can't imagine why.

Anyway, after Cerro Campanario I made my way to the park 

and spent a very happy four hours walking round, taking in the views 

and occasionally being a little concerned by the creaking of the trees in the wind. When I saw this one

I decided it was perfectly legitimate for me to feel that way!!

That evening, we were treated to the most spectacular sunset, for which our hostel had a great vantage point.

On Sunday, it was the Bariloche IronMan competition. A 70.3 race, it was a half IronMan. When I was in Bratislava, it was the weekend of the Barcelona full IronMan competition which my cousin did. She is one of the incredibly inspirational women in my family and as one of her many achievements she completed the course in just under 13 hours, how amazing is that! Anyway as a result, I was really excited to watch the race in Bariloche. My hostel was less than 100m from the cycle-run transition station 

and so it was great as we got to watch two aspects of the race! This is the first guy coming in on his bike 

and then starting his run. 

I'm not sure if he won it, the guy who did completed the course in about a minute shy of 4 hours and the lead woman

Who if this was her completed in 4hr 42mins. 

I watched for about 4 hours and clapped for around 3hr30mins of that (the rest I spent trying to chat to my parents who were in Egypt at the time!)

That evening Carolyn arrived at the hostel and the next day, we spent most of the day together in Bariloche itself and went our separate ways when I went to buy my bus ticket back to Puerto Montt later that afternoon. I'd been thinking I could get this on the day, but I had to be back in Puerto Montt for tomorrow (I'll explain why later) and didn't want to risk not getting a seat. Thank goodness I did! They day before when I'd looked there were only three seats taken. When I got the bus station, there were only about 3 seats left!! Unfortunately I picked the worst of the three and ended up being seated next to a very large man who oozed into my seat. Not fun on a 7.5hr journey...

For the next leg of my trip, I need a hat, and so on my last day in Bariloche I made it my mission to find one. I hate buying hats. They really don't suit me. It's bad enough that I look dire wearing travelling clothes day in day out, but it really does add insult to injury when my head is covered by a hat too. But this time it's necessary. I found one that was about a 7 on the awfulness scale (about the best I can hope for) but thankfully I remembered at the last minute that 1200 Argentinian pesos is a lot more than the Chilean pesos I've been used to (around £42 vs £1.50!)  so I decided not to buy that one. An hour of shopping for awful expensive hats later left me thoroughly miserable and so I decided the only way the situation could be improved was with cake.

And boy did this work. Not only did I find an amazingly cozy, furry lined hat that was a much more reasonable 400 pesos

It's not truly terrible either. The requested selfies for you Shalini! Front and side so you can also appreciate the splendour of the bobble!!

The next day I made my way back to Puerto Montt on a bus trip during which not only was I squished by the guy next to me, I also had my rucksack selected to be checked by customs, as the sniffer dog decided I had fruit in it. I didn't, as having crossed the border into Chile previously I knew better than to do that. But it wasn't until I'd removed many items and opened every pocket that they finally believed me. Not fun to repack a rucksack at speed at a border crossing let me tell you!

Anyway, we made it back to Puerto Montt and I climbed the unbelievably steep hill to my hostel. A hike which was made worth it by the views...

Last night, having been mostly vegetarian for some time (I say mostly as ham seems to be considered a vegetarian option out here!) my body was obviously missing some nutrients you get easily from carnivorous eating as I was (very rarely for me these days) craving meat. And so I figured if I was going to eat it, I was going to make it worth it and went to a steak restaurant where I had a 350g ribeye steak with papas fritas (which was very tasty) and the obligatory pisco sour! 

I was sat near the grill which with all the raw meat wasn't for the faint hearted but was fascinating to watch the chef cooking.

Today, I decided to check out Puerto Montt. It really doesn't get good press in the guidebook but as you know, I've come to realise that these should be taken with a pinch of salt. I actually found the place to be OK. There was a strange cathedral (I think this was the cathedral) 

but some pretty mosaics as part of a fountain that wasn't working 

the oddest incredibly large figures looking out to sea 

And a tree with a knitted/crocheted jacket on...

but otherwise was a reasonable place to spend a few hours. Which I did, before coming back to my hostel to prepare for tomorrow.

So tomorrow I'm taking the ferry from Puerto Montt to Puerto Natales. This is a journey I'd originally planned to do by plane (which gives you some idea of the distance if it's worthy of a flight). However, when I was in Pucón, Amelia and Haden mentioned that they were doing this journey by ferry, so I decided to check it out and it looked incredible, so I booked it too (although not the same trip that they were on). It takes 4 days/3 night and goes through the Chilean fjords. Hence the need for the hat, and gloves that I'd bought in Chiloé, and me wanting to be certain that I made it back to Puerto Montt in time. The brochure warns you that this is not a luxury journey, it's a floating hostel, but everyone I've spoken to who's done it says it's amazing. And so I'm super excited! The weather had been so bad in Bariloche at the end of my stay I was concerned I wouldn't make it back and to be honest, it's blowing a hooley tonight in Puerto Montt. But I've received an email reminding me of the check in time tomorrow and so it looks like we're still on! I look forward to sharing those pictures with you in a few days!