Patagonia Adventures

We're going rogue and leaving the Oasis truck for a few days; why? The truck leaves Monday morning at 8am and has 3 nights bush camps, 2 nights camp site, and then 1 more bush camp to reach Buenos Aires next Sunday. By going independently on overnight buses, we can visit Puerto Madryn (the only place worth a visit on the long stretch between Ushuaia and BA, due to whale watching and exploring the Valdes peninsula) and then get to BA a couple of days earlier to do some sightseeing. Most people are flying between the two - only 5 are left on the truck journey to BA (the young girls, the old girls, and Nick)!

After a nice meal at La Cantina Fueguina de Freddy last night, we set off a few hours later on our first bus at 3 am on Monday morning; the route we travel is from Ushuaia to Rio Gallegos, change bus for Caleta Olivia, then change again for Puerto Madryn due to srrive at 13:20 on Tuesday!

Ftom Ushuaia, it's the same journey down here in reverse as far as the Austral Broom ferry crossing point over the Magellan Strait into Santa Cruz province, then it's northeast to Rio Gallegos; it's steppe and pampas to, and after the border crossing back into Argentina. We arrive in Rio Gallegos before 3 pm and do some shopping at the Carrefour next door for food, and chill out at the bus station, waiting for the 6 pm departure to Caleta Olivia. Ant does an excellent job of organising tickets for the Puerto Madryn to BA bus and hostel accommodation in the former.

The flat steppe landscape continues as we head north through SantaCruz province; this is how it is for most of the journey. We're upstairs, and the screens show a bad movie and some episodes of "Heart of Stone" with poor sound (help!). There is a beautiful sunset as we drive west from Puerta Santa Cruz; then it's dark both outside and inside the bus, lights out. We arrive in Caleta Olivia at 4:30 am, and it is soon dawn - it's been a long day!

We drive along the coast, but it gets more hilly for a while as we enter Chubut province, but then it's flat scrubland again, pretty much all the way. There were a couple of stops close to Puerto Madryn, where we arrived at 1:30 pm. Then it's to the hostel and out to investigate whale watching tours for tomorrow. It's all sorted, so it's time to eat and drink at Nautico Bistro de Mer Fish Restaurant; I had Abadejo en papillote (a fish stew served in silver foil).

If you've got this far you'll realise we've spent almost 36 hours travelling! Shades of 1978 when Anthony and I travelled in North America together (45 years ago)!Leia mais