Good bye Pampa and to Punta Arenas we go!

After three days of rest at El Calafate, I decided I had to keep on the move. Not much happened during our stay at the city but there was a possibility that Florencia would join Kanaan on a ride from El Chaten towards El Calafate. It took them longer than expected to leave El Chalten and I couldn't wait more, I had a weird urge to leave El Calafate and keep on the move. Connor decided he would wait another couple of days in the hope of meeting them again. Everyday we spent at El Calafate was colder than the day before, winter is coming fast now and I had to keep going.

Good bye Pampa Relaxo.

I said my farewells to Connor and departed from El Calafate with the goal of entering Chile near the Torres del Paine national park. For the fist day my goal was to make a 100k in order to take it easy the following days. I expected a flat road all the way so I should be done with it quite fast. I was wrong.

After around 50k a huge climb appeared in front of my eyes. An 8 kilometers climb called cuesta Miguez that took me exactly one hour to complete. I guess it's the only proper climb I could find at this side of the pampa. From then on everything went quite smooth for the rest of the day. Finally I got to experience the so feared winds of the pampa, lucky for me, after reaching the top of the climb I got it over my back which helped me to advance like mad. In no time I reached where I wanted to be for that day. Next day was pretty much the same.

View from half the climb of cuesta miguez.

I have no idea what's going on in this picture.

A dude next to the road.

On the third day things changed. After having a light storm during the night I woke up to face a strong headwind that would not let me pedal at all. It was a fantastic day though, sunny and blue skyes. As I slowly approached to where I would cross towards Chile clouds started to populate the skies. I would look towards the Chilean border and would see nothing but a huge mass of dark clouds covering the pass. Bad omens for someone on a bike. It was most likely it was snowing over there. On the Argentinian side, still a bright sun and blue skies. After some rethinking about crossing the border there I decided I would keep pushing on over the Argentinian side. At least I had nice weather.

I'm kind of getting used to people being wrong, and even me being wrong. In a matter of minutes the blue skies became grey skies and a light rain started to pour. Good thing, wind changed direction and now I had tailwind instead of headwind. Temperature started to low down suddenly and I started to freeze as rain started to become snow. I was going at the speed of light though, tailwind was doing its magic. From now on everything with the weather went from rain, to snow, to rain again, to snow again and so on till I finally reached Río Turbio, the coal mine town.

Initially I thought about calling it a day at Río Turbio, I was cold, I was wet, I was tired. As I entered the town I crossed through a huge coal refining factory right outside town, right next to the road. Heavy traffic was on the road too, something I hadn't seen in the whole pampa and not even in the carretera austral. I mean, I would have cars passing next to me every 5 seconds.

I crossed Río Turbio at the siesta time. It was 4 pm and nobody would be in the streets. Typical Argentina. As I crossed the town several dogs started to chase me in my slow pace through the hilly town, which by the way, was not nice to the view. Dirt all over the place, unmaintained buildings, and nobody in the streets didn't help to the sight either. I didn't glance any camping, hostel, shelter, albergue, or whatever where I could get a warm shower and some rest. What called my attention is that I started to see chilean plates on cards. I was really close to Chile.

Despite being tired, wet and freezing I decided I would continue the pushing towards the border. Ugly town didn't look friendly and something made just keep on. I reached the Argentinian border and they told me I was only 20 minutes away from Puerto Natales. It wasn't raining anymore and the sun showed up to greet me from above. I decided I would keep up despite having done over 100k already. I was 25k away from town and that shouldn't take me much and actually it didn't matter, I would get a bed for that night.

Done with the Argentinian border and done with the Chilean border. Time to do t he 25k. An awesome downhill showed up, straight and down which made me reach 70kms/h. The fastest so far of the whole trip. 70Kms/h is simply INSANE. Having side wind which kept me pushing me to the center of the road was more than dangerous, good thing is there weren't that many car on the road so I managed pretty well. Sad thing, the slope was over quite fast and once again and slow pace thanks to the strongest side wind ever. It took me around 2 hours to finally reach Puerto Natales where once again, the sun showed up to give me a warm welcome to the city. It was funny how the elements played tricks during that day for me.

Finally, Punta Arenas.

After a couple of days rest in Puerto Natales and not much going on in town as I had already been in that town some years ago I headed towards the last city I would visit in the south of Chile, Punta Arenas, the southernmost point I wanted to reach in this continent. When I decided I would keep on south to get some coldness I started picturing Punta Arenas and something told me I had to go that way, what for, no idea, just for the sake of it probably.

I left Natales with no bigger issues, I managed to do 100 on the first day of pedaling. In the morning of the second day of pedaling I woke up and noticed how the rear wheel had lost all the air. Finally a puncture I though. I proceeded to do the normal repair when I noticed the puncture was in the inner side of the inner tube. Shit. Bad sign. I checked the wheel but seemed to be ok. I fixed it and kept on. When I started the pedaling this second day there was no wind at all. After 1 hour all changed and again the strong patagonian wind hit my face. Head wind and after 30 kilometers I couldn't pedal anymore, it was simply impossible. I sat a while to get some rest when the rear wheel suddenly went flat again. Again!? Shit. I proceeded to fix again and once again in the inner side of the inner tube. Fuck. The wheel is fucked maybe? This time I changed inner tube for the last one I had, which to my bad luck, was fucked up too! Oh no, stranded in the kilometer 130 out of 240. Gladly I had some shelter.

Bus stop in the magallanes region.

What to do, wheel fucked up? Inner tube fucked up?... no possibility of repair... hitch hike then. I hitch hiked for around 2 hours but nobody stopped despite the fact I had the bike turned over and with no gear on. Finally a small truck stopped and asked what's wrong. I told my story and the driver agreed to take me to Punta Arenas. After arriving to the city I tried to fix the wheel again, but I kept getting punctures in different parts of the inner tube which lead me to think that the inner tube is death due to being so long time stored inside the pannier or at least I hope it is that and not the wheel the one fucked up.

Looking at the Magellan strait.

I called Alejandra, a friend of my cousin who told me could host me for some days in Punta Arenas. Again to my luck for this weekend, she lives far away from downtown up a hill. I had to push the bike all the way up to her place where finally I got some rest after a really really bad luck day. But so it goes, some days are good, some days are bad, some days are the worst days ever and then again the road provides with some solutions. I am now at a house where I got a nice welcome and going to spend some days here trying to fix the bike and check what the heck is wrong with the wheel. I also realized that the road south keeps going some more kilometers, around 60, so I may take the bike over there or maybe hike over there, with not that much weight though and maybe will camp a couple of days there to experience the coldness of the Magellan strait and its weather. Reaching the southernmost point of the road was my goal, and there I should go. I have to fix the bike first though.

Until then.

Cheers.