Category Archives: Argentina

Abandoned house, which I used as shelter.

Cachi – San Pedro de Atacama

It was a strange feeling for me to leave Cachi. I spend hours the last weeks, reading my roadbook again and again. I found a really promizing route through the south of Argentina and the final border crossing to Chile. It included the highest pass of Argentina and some really remote passes for the boarder crossing. I was so exited that I just read the roadbook over and over again, after lunch hanging around in the tent. But with leaving Cachi it was actually at the point where I decided not to go to easy road torwards Salta, but take the hard way to San Pedro de los Cobres. Because I wanted to cycle the Pass in one day, and not to camp somewhere in last third of it, I had a easy day to La Poma.

Windy.

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Mendoza – Cachi

After some nice resting days in Mendoza it was time to hit the road again. I wanted to go back on some ripio road to maximize the adventure, but it didn’t worked out that well. I saw a road on a random map which didn’t showed up in all those maps I had. A quick check in Google Earth confirmed me in my decision to try this “road”. But after tough 20k, I had to run around. It was just impossible to ride this road. Maybe with less things on the bike, and more patience in pushing the bike…

Well, this road was unrideable for me.
Well, this road was unrideable for me.

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Race to Mendoza

Race to Mendoza
05.04 – 16.04
San Martin de los Andes – Mendoza

Due to the fact that I wanted to meet up with Lisa in Mendoza, I had 12 days for 1200k. Big parts from San Martin de los Andes to Mendoza are quiet boring, especially the last part, so only 12 days was fine for me. One day after we cycled on from San Martin de los Andes,  (Gary and me) where riding on our own speed and separated again. I had some pretty long and tought cycling days, with nothing to distract me from pushing the bike. Of course I had in mind that at some point I might get a hitch, if I don’t want to go crazy with kilometers per day. And yeah I got a hitch on day before Chos Malal and in Malarque. That saved me from beeing riding ridiculous straigt roads and “boring” parts. There are not boring its more a meditiation, but if you wanna reach Mendoza and try to push the bike hard, they are not the best roads! As soon as I was in Tununyan I figured out that I had plenty of days left, so I took a detour to Manazano Historico and rode to Ps. Argentino (4300m). One of the pest part of my riding so far. This pass is just fantastic! Pictures of my “Race to Mendoza” can be seen in the following posts.

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Gerade frisch aus dem Polizeiauto gereicht bekommen. Merci.

Race to Mendoza Part 1

Mein definitiv härtester Tag in der Pampa!

Rio Grande – Puntas Arenas

05.02.2015

No sooner said than done, my first task after my failed calculation about needed food/day, I had to do a 30k detour to Rio Grande. Before I arrived in the center of Rio Grande I saw a guy playing a trumpet in a field outside the town in an industrial area. So I stopped and listened. He immediately started a conversation and after the “traditional” questions Wherefrom, whereto and which country, he insisted in showing me the way to the next supermarket by driving his car in front of me.
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I am still alive – Just the internet not

Hola. I am still alive and I am fine :). Since a few weeks the internet connection here is really bad. If there is any, it is over satelite, which means interruptions and a really slow connection. Right now I am riding the Carretera Austral direction to Cochrane. In the next bigger city, which I should reach in about a week, I’ll have some restdays. The internet should be much better there and I’ll update the Blog. There is a lot to tell :)
Ride on!
Valentin

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What a Start

What a start. The first week is already over, and it has been a very thought week! The start was not perfect at all! I need to apologize for all my mistakes and false structures of the sentences, but I am on vacation and not in university ;-).Mum and Dad sorry to put the English version firstm but I just was in a mood to do so… I hope its fine for you all… All started really great. I didn’t need to pay for the bike or the luggage which was more than allowed on my flight from Buenos Aires to Ushuaia. Arriving in Ushuaia, first thing to be done was to get my bike ready and pack all my stuff.

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Chau Buenos Aires

Two and a half weeks in Buenos Aires…Great Time! It is a city where it’s definitely worth to stay for a longer time. Everyday I discovered new things on my way to the Spanish class. After I am reasonably able to get off at the right bus stop, I am already leaving Buenos Aires. Taking a bus is not that easy here, because there are no specifically signed bus stops or announcements. If you enter the bus, you need to say the bus stop where you want to get off. The bus doesn’t stop as long as you don’t push the stop button.
if you don’t know exactly where your bus stop is, you just need to be lucky ;-)
Meanwhile I know a few scraps of Spanish and I am able to have a simple conversation about daily life. The nice conversation with the taxi driver on the way to the airport got me confident. After I had changed the couchsurfing host last week, we were three persons this week. My host Enrique, Ashley (also a couchsurfer) and me. The pool on the rooftop got intensively used by us. On Friday, so to say as goodbye, we had Asado (Argentina meet) with Enrique and a few friends of him. Now I am suprised, if my bike is still in a good condition in Ushuaia. I planned to stay a few days around Ushuaia to explore the National Park.

Hasta pronto!