Birthday Boy

6th April, Gareth's Birthday, Wild camp near Hua Hum to San Martin de los Andes (33M)

Gareth at 35 years old 

So, much to Gareth's disgust we were in a wet tent and about to cycle down a wet road on his birthday. Definitely not on his wish list. There was some good news however as despite a very wet tent, it wasn't actually raining this morning and there were a few patches of blue sky around. We packed everything away, breakfasted and set out on our way. It was slow hard going. The rain had made the ripio road quite soft and it just seemed to grip hold of our tyres and hang on. We seemed to be constantly ascending and then descending again but we never seemed to get up any speed on the descents. It was really taxing and then any height we did gain was soon lost again on the next bit of the road. We passed the spot where we had turned around yesterday, typically there was a campsite only about 1km further on. Very annoying.

A birthday hug

After a while we found a parks visitor and picnic area where we stopped on the lake edge for a birthday picnic. It was a nice setting for a birthday meal and I can't remember what was on the menu, but I don't actually recall it being that inspiring, mainly because it had been 4 days on the road since the last time we'd entered a shop. Anyway the sun was out, at least for a while and the views were nice. When it did rain it was just after we arrived on the beach and was only a shower, but it did mean that all the other people left so that we had the place to ourselves.
Back on the road we continued onwards and mainly upwards although still with the occasional annoying descents, it was demoralising loosing height after all that hard work on the previous ascent. There was definitely more climbing and eventually we reached the highest point of the road at 1200m. What a relief when all we could see ahead was a long almost continuous descent down the valley towards San Martin.
Finally we had a rest on the bikes as we free wheeled our way down the valley. There were beautiful autumn colours just beginning to come out on the trees around us and just before reaching San Martin there was a mirador where we finally got to see our goal and the largest area of civilisation since leaving Pucon.

Civilisation and a clear (ish) view

Arriving in San Martin, we found our way to La Puma Hostel,which had been recommended by Alex and Julie. There were no double rooms free but we booked into a dorm room and with the others not having arrived yet we had time to spread out all our kit to dry and have a long long shower. Despite being Good Friday, I even managed to find a laundrette open and put our clothes in before it shut at 10pm. Definitely not a service that you'd find open on a Good Friday in the UK.
Clean and dry we then went to explore the town, had a beer at 'The Dublin' pub (definitely in tourist land now) before finding a lovely tapas type restaurant where we drunk far too much and ate a lovely meal of 'picadas' (finger type foods), including cured and smoked meats, pates, olives, bread and pickles. Very very yummy and one of the typical styles of eating in this area of Argentina.