Big Sur

Leaving the northern Chilean coast behind, we are off to a bad start, arriving at Villarrica, portal to the Chilean lake district in the middle of torrential downpour. Unlike our beloved English Lakes, there isn’t even a fascinating pencil museum to shelter in and so we pitch a soggy tent in a soggy field…

…and wake up to breakfast on a building site. Villarrica sees the potential in tourism and is in the midst of building an artificial beach for its visitors.

Things improve when we reach Coñaripe and camp next to the mystical lake…

…before a beautiful ride, climbing up towards the volcano of the same name.

We are racing against time but the change in the seasons means we can enjoy the blackberries…

…picking juicy ripe berries as we go is one of the highlights of travelling by bike in the autumn.

Another highlight of bike travel in Chile is stopping for warm bread straight from someone’s oven. Pan amasado can be found in nearly every village in Chilean Patagonia and this particularly warm, fluffy and comforting batch couldn’t have come at a more welcome time. Straight from the oven with fresh local honey and a cuppa from the flask. Perfect.

Rain again stops play. We are forced to postpone our ferry crossing at Puerto Fuy because the weather is so bad but it leads us to ask for shelter at the cosy new fire station in the village.

Beautifully constructed from local pine, it’s not quite finished yet, but the attention to detail and craftsmanship are evident.

We stretch out in a warm dry room, listening to the rain hammer outside.

By the morning, nothing has changed and it’s a damp journey to the port…

…reminiscent of soggy days in Alaska at the very beginning of our trip.

The ferry takes us from Puerto Fuy across Lago Pirihueico and back into Argentina. When we arrive at idyllic Lago Nonthué just across the border, the sun finally shows itself…

…and we hang around the campsite to watch the rainbows.

No visit to the Argentine lake district is complete without a stop at San Martín de los Andes…

…where it is time to say goodbye to my faithful but battered old hat, with me all the way from Cuenca in Ecuador (May 2013).

The Argentine lake district seems distinctly more attractive to us than its Chilean counterpart…

…but perhaps that is because the sun shines on this side a great deal more.

Pretty churches with a Russian feel hide behind trees…

…we ride quietly past…

…until crystal clear Lago Espejo (Mirror Lake) convinces us to stop riding early and jump into the water.

It’s hard not to fall in love with Patagonia…

…really hard.

But there is an uglier side to this area – chocolate shop Swiss-style towns like Bariloche sometimes make the lake district feel like it’s a bit of a circus…

…especially when the circus does in fact roll into town and add to the mayhem.

Back on the road, we are heading for the less-visited towns of Esquel and El Bolson, stopping along the way to “create” a birthday card for James’ brother Ed. A handily placed road sign with the year of his birth, a hastily prepared poster, a tripod and hey presto we’ve got ourselves a card!

Map check in a lovely log bus stop. I could happily live in something like this one day I think.

Unbelievably, we are still on Route 40! It brings us to Esquel where…

…true to form, we seek out the bakery. Facturas are mini pastries to be found in every Argentine bakery in Patagonia. The quality varies but in Esquel we hit the jackpot.

Time for another detour and we choose a route to avoid roadworks at Futaleufu, the traditional border crossing for the Carretera Austral which takes you back into Chile. Keen to avoid the gravel, dumper truck mayhem we have been hearing about we used Skyler’s Off Route blog to plan a more picturesque and fun-filled route.

It’s a route that takes us along dirt roads, past forgotten lakes and through plenty of gates to our destination of the Chilean border crossing at Lago Verde, just a day’s ride from the fabled Carretera Austral at La Junta.

Idyllic camp spots…

…with crystal waters…

…and pretty little daisies which, I learned after all this time in Latin America are called margaritas. I will never look at a tequila cocktail in the same way again.

We reach Lago Vintter on a stormy day. The wind blows caps onto the lake and all of sudden we feel we are by the sea.

Ploughing through that wind, we head for the hills…

…I love the zig-zag at the end of this dead straight stretch of road.

At the end of that zig-zag lies a village that used to be known as Las Pampas and is now called Doctor Atilio Oscar Viglione. Thankfully our generous host that evening has a much more manageable name: Aldo. Head of the local police Aldo wastes no time in taking us in, giving us a bed, plying us with tea and then providing the tastiest indoor bbq I think we will ever eat.

Saying goodbye to Aldo, we start on one of the most enjoyable days we’ve had in a long time. We only clock up 30km, slipping and sliding across rivers and through gates but it’s challenging, remote and beautiful…in all the right doses.

We start the morning with a push across the icy river outside Las Pampas…

…and encounter our first gate…

…and then another.

I lose count of them eventually, all linked together with pretty, pebbly tracks…

…all beautifully engineered…

…leading us to…

…perhaps the most pristinely cared for border post in the world. Even the dog is immaculate.

I rashly opt to push through the next river fully loaded…

…while James sensibly lifts his across.

We fire up the stove for a delicious lunch made with Aldo’s sunshine yellow free range eggs.

Post lunch sees us weaving through a fantasmical ghost-wood.

One final gate marks another humble international border…

…and we are in Chile.

The stunning Lago Verde awaits with a prime camp spot but before we get there, refuelling is needed…

…Aldo has slipped a homemade cake into our panniers and this local hound knows just as well as we do that it’s a tasty snack. What he realises much later to his dismay is that cyclists don’t share!

We soak up the sights on the Chilean side…

…and our final camp spot before we hit the Carretera Austral? Why at a lake of course: this time, the serene Lago Roosevelt.