Slightly worse weather in Bariloche. A lot more Switzerland.
Somehow I expected Barlioche to be like an alpine lake village such as Riva del Garda. It was similar in the way that there was a huge lake with some mountains around it. The shape and elevation of the mountains was different and the vegetation, too. In fact, it resembled more to some place in Thailand with small little islands in the sea if you would pinch the type of vegetation slightly.
We had reached half-time of our travels. The clouds introduced a certain darkness into our souls, annealing it as the temperature dropped, too. Confusingly, as up in the north it should have been hotter. All in all, we were up for some really lazy days. The dark tea of the soul.
One of the main things to do in Bariloche was eating the delicious chocolate (except for the high percentage of Swiss tourists, who of course will refrain from eating chocolate anywhere else than from Switzerland). So we did. Almost every day. We ate a good steak at Familia Weiss (dog following us). We drank wine. We had a cheese, chocolate, grapes and wine evening once. We did a quick hike to the Cerro Campanario where you are supposed to have the 7th best panoramic view of the world according to National Geographic (as far as I remember). I guess they had a much better weather but it was still rather nice.
The shore line of Bariloche is ruined by a heavy traffic road, so there’s no real esplanade. The architecture is a mixture of German or Swiss wooden buildings and the usual designs of tin and brick. Not very appealing. The main avenue is rather nice and lively. Lots of outdoor shops. We tried to get a T-shirt but somehow they only have ugly designs that are much centereda around Bariloche. There is a McDonalds. We went in and out again without buying anything. Instead we had a hamburger at a Swiss restaurant where you could also get something pretending to be Swiss Cheese Fondue.
Because of the weather forecast always being overly pessimistic, we didn’t go biking, or do much except for catching up with blog writing and sorting photos. Slow days but it really felt appropriate. I even got to play the new Ron Gilbert adventure “The Cave” for a few hours.
It was great to phone home to my girl and hear her voice. It’s been two weeks that I hadn’t seen her. I felt really bad not being in Munich for Valentine’s Day. All those advantages in electronic communication cannot compensate for physical presence. Life’s a bitch sometimes.
Speaking of, I drew the lucky pick of a bed bug infested bed and got bites all over my body again, including my face, legs and shoulders. Itching like hell. Not good, really. Axel had more luck. Otherwise, the hostel was okay. Our dorm room was populated with some white trash girls for a couple of days and both we and Oliver, one of cool guys, were happy to see them gone.
Daily wisdom: Using a lens with broken filter ring will cause subsequent costs that might justify buying a new lens instead. Like dropping a completly new polarization filter (~70 EUR) and thus breaking it.
With El Calafate, El Chalten and San Carlos de Bariloche, these were our only stops in Argentina. We left Bariloche in heavy rain though we had great seats in the front of the bus for the scenic ride over the Andes. Back to Chile, Puerto Varas. Time to shake the melancholy. Still a lot to see on our trip.
