JoyDrive » argentina

Off into the sunset…

tom — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 23:06:16 +0000

For the past couple of weeks we’ve been catching up with family and friends in New Zealand, preparing resumes and planning our next move—so sadly I think this will be our last post…

It’s taken us over a year and a half to drive 50,000 kilometers on the Pan American Highway. Marlin, the little red battler, our unbeatable 1991 VW Golf is safely parked and our Joydrive to South America has been completed.

It has been an awesome adventure, we’ve met some exceptional people and seen some equally remarkable things. We have at times been completely outside of our comfort zone and our understanding of this world has grown considerably.

We would like to thank everybody who helped us along the way, anyone who shared in our Joydrive online and the host of generous, helpful and friendly people that have coloured our roadtrip with their goodness. We couldn’t have imagined a more amazing adventure!

If you are driving to Latin America and have questions, feel free to contact us or check out our site Drive the Americas for great tips and advice for driving the Pan American Highway.

Joyful Find: Kristin and Chris of The Darien Plan

kels — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 10:23:12 +0000

Once in awhile, in a rare occasion some cosmic forces collide and by sheer coincidence you end up meeting some people who you know will be your friends for life. We were extremely fortunate to meet up with Kristin and Chris by chance in Puerto Escondido, Mexico and continued to meet up and hang out with them on our long driving adventure.

From Mexico to the end of the world we have managed to:

share ridiculously small spaces and not kill each other (5 weeks, 4 adults, 120 square feet and a cold shower
listen to the most amazing music mixes including Jolene and Dreadlock Holiday
ship cars from Central America to South America and have them arrive to the right port
deal with inane border bureaucracy smoothly
work the system to find the best accommodation deals
stumble through language issues with the locals (between 4 of us we managed)
survive unsafe handling of fireworks
sample as many wines as possible in South America
create the best website about driving the Americas
whine about what we miss from home
handle long blamming drives
laugh through every crazy and funny bit of it!

These two have made our trip all the more special and saying goodbye (only for now) was pretty sad but all of us know we will meet up again soon…Carnaval 2011 we hope!

Some delightful pics of our amigos we like to call “Los Rubios” (the blonde ones).

Who the hell is Vesper?

Buenos Aires – The Paris of South America

kels — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 01:14:15 +0000

After a relaxing week on the coast we headed into Argentina’s biggest city, Buenos Aires, home to 13 million porteños (“people of the port” – residents of BA). With an interesting political history (which is a dangerous topic to begin with) and a huge economic crisis in 2000 – BA has become one of the most touristed cities in South America even more so with the US dollar getting an exchange rate of 3.8 pesos making it a rather affordable cosmopolitan destination.

European architecture mixes with Latin vibrancy, descendants of Italians, Spaniards, Ukrainians and Jewish to name only a few intertwine to create a very diverse population in this massive city. Argentine Spanish is spoken with an Italian lilt to it and throughout the city you will hear snippets of expressive and passionate outbursts adding to the unique flavour that is Buenos Aires.

Checking out the crowds

I have been waiting to see this city from the moment I read about it and the “Paris of South America” did not let us down. To make our trip to the city even better my parents dropped in for a two-week vacation to help us celebrate the end of our drive to the bottom of the world.

The rents in Colonia, Uruguay

Buenos Aires is bursting at the seams with things to do and see so we compiled a few of our highlights:

SOCCER
Argentinians are mad about futbol (soccer)….perhaps obsessive is a better word. One of the first things you get asked by locals is “what team are you?” meaning which team are you a fan of. We bought tickets to take in a game at the River Plate stadium, one of BA’s largest stadiums. Arriving early to get seats we thought the stadium might remain pretty empty as the game being played wasn’t one of too much importance. Turns out it doesn’t matter whether it is a play-off game or not people come out to support their teams. The away team fans were sequestered in their own section complete with their own exit, barbwire fencing and security guards – they take this futbol thing very seriously. Loads of inappropriately worded songs were thrown back and forth between opposing fans – my folks asked if we could translate but sadly (or thankfully) we could only explain that they involved rather unsportsmanlike words.

BA chic!

TANGO
Although cliché for Buenos Aires we were wowed at the quality of El Viejo Almacen’s tango show. Tango shows are advertised everywhere and I had figured that it might be overdone but watching six dancers and their complicated footwork perform on a stage not much bigger than a large dining room table was very impressive – we left suitably satiated by the tango.

LA BOMBA TIEMPO
Ok, my parents might not agree about this but the Cuidad Cultural Konex, BA’s cultural centre, hosts a fantastic drumming show every Monday night for 20 pesos/person. La Bomba Tiempo is a group of about 12 percussionists who show up and perform to a very cool crowd of under 30s – neo-hippies, highschool kids and foreigners fill in as the evening wears on and dance to the drums as long as the guys will play.

Buenos Aires from Kels M on Vimeo.

SHOPPING
Buenos Aires is abundant with small, locally designed clothing labels. Even better , the clothes are priced really well for those of us travelling on North American currencies. I had been starving for fashion and after months of wearing the same clothes Palermo was little piece of heaven. The neat thing about Buenos Aires is that one store will house around 20 or so individual designers who rent a small bit of space to showcase their labels – so each rack you look through belongs to someone different. There are a few questionable fashions happening in BA at the moment (like a horrible MC Hammer/harem poop pant combo and toe-less boots) but there are definitely some great longer t-shirts, funky belts and amazing leather goods to be had. In fact the ‘rents bought 3 custom tailored leather jackets for less than $600!

Taking a break from shopping...

CITY WALKING
Tom and I are big city walkers…probably because I love to people watch and wandering around BA gives you a great insight into how porteños live. In La Boca you see the futbol team’s colours worn proudly by all the residents, in Palermo ex-pats mix with upper middle class locals in trendy cafes and restaurants, in the city centre suits rush by on their way to the office. Down in Recoleta the rich retire to posh apartments and visitors take in the amazing cemetery searching for famous (or infamous) Evita’s grave and San Telmo’s Sunday antiques market brings out the hordes of those looking to find a hidden gem along the cobble-stone streets.

Cruise through Recoleta's history

MEAT and other tasty treats
Yup… bring on steaks that can feed a family of four. We ate our way through Buenos Aires from huge cuts of beef for about ($7 or $3.50 per person because they are big enough to share) to morning café con leche, croissants, picadas (snack plates), deli sandwiches, ridiculous amounts of ice cream and, of course, a LOT of wine.

This is one serving!

For a really good steak we recommend La Brigada in San Telmo – order your steak en punto (“on point” which is medium) and enjoy a great meal, great service and very nice wine, the Argentine Malbecs are great!

Everything I learned was from my folks!

Whale watching and Penguin walking

kels — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 16:00:33 +0000

After reaching our destination of Ushuaia we saddled up for the long drive back to Buenos Aires. The landscapes are pretty much the same up the Atlantic coast – mostly large estancias in the empty pampas. We motored along heading to Punta Tombo, home to the largest colony of Magellanic Penguins in South America and who doesn’t like penguins?

We cruised into the park around 5pm and after buying our tickets priced at three times what Argentine nationals paid we wandered into the reserve. Minutes into our walk we started to spy our cute tuxedoed amigos. One lone little guy even hopped up onto the bridge to say hello and we spent about 15 minutes up close and personal with a very forward and curious penguin.

Our drive up the coast then took us to Puerto Madryn where we were lucky to catch the Southern Right Whales that come to Argentina’s coast to have their babies and teach them how to swim in a safe environment. Driving down to the nearby beaches we were happy to find the whales hanging out and playing at both Playa El Doradillo and Punta Flecha.

Penguins and Whales from Kels M on Vimeo.

I was rather taken by the whales and wanted to have a closer look so we cruised about 35km up the coast to Peninsula Valdez – a marine animal sanctuary. Puerto Piramides offers boats tours to see the whales and we hopped on a sunset cruise, perhaps we were just lucky but we ended up with an awesome day, capped off with a blazing fiery sunset.

The end of the road…

kels — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 15:00:13 +0000

On October 20, 2009, 20 months, 18 border crossings and 45,946 km later we arrived in Ushuaia, Tierra del Fuego without a single flat tire.

Marlin, our little red battler, survived temperatures ranging from -40 to +40ºC, painfully huge speedbumps, numerous river crossings and some of the craziest roads to bring us to Ushuaia, the southernmost city in the world.

The end of the road actually lies within Tierra del Fuego’s Parque Nacional – a packed, dirt road winds through thick forest taking you to the end of Ruta Tres. And from, there, well you are going to have to walk if you want to get any further.

We enjoyed a picnic at the end of the road with good friends and fellow roadtrippers, Kristin and Chris. Wine (from the end of the world of course), some nibblies and lots of laughter capped off our trip.

It is hard to believe that after all our saving, talking, planning and, of course, driving we are suddenly here. It is quite surreal and at this moment I think we are still a bit stunned that we made it. A few nights before we arrived I lay awake pondering our travels over the past 20 months. With the Pan American Highway now behind us, I tossed and turned disbelieving that our driving adventure was coming to a close (at least for now). So we find ourselves at the end (literally and figuratively) with our trusty little Volkswagen Golf thinking of the generosity of those we met along the way, the countries we have seen, the moments of frustration, the laughter, the learning and the knowledge that a small car and a couple of regular people can sometimes do something just a little bit out of the ordinary.

The land at the end of the road

Ruta 40

tom — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 15:19:01 +0000

Driving through most of Central and South America has given us some insight into Latin American border politics, so after narrowly escaping a hefty fine for trying to smuggle popcorn into Chile we were surprised to find a lack of reciprocity and much more amiable officials on the Argentine side of the border.

We crossed over from Chile to drive through the Argentine Lake District in Patagonia and to meet up with the famous “Ruta 40″ which stretches over 5000 kms – pretty much the entire length of the country… one of the largest routes in the world (apart from the unofficial Pan American Highway) along with US Route 66 and the Stuart Highway in Australia).

The land here undulates around ragged mountains and breaks quietly apart falling into deep lakes and glacial valleys. We spent a few days in Bariloche and climbed Cerro Campanario to get a stunning view of the hidden lakes. Driving further south we stopped to have a traditional tea service in Trevelin, which was founded by the Welsh in 1865 and still maintains it’s strong Welsh heritage.

We made a quick detour off Ruta 40 to check out Perito Moreno a huge Glacier fed by the Southern Patagonian Ice Field before heading out to the coastal and windy Ruta 3 which finishes in Tierra del Fuego… the end of the road.

Biking with wine

tomandkels — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 15:40:27 +0000

We left Uruguay promising to return to it’s chilled out old-school vibe and headed into Argentina with plans to meet up with our friends (and partners on drivetheamericas.com) to get a little conversation and drink a little red wine. We hightailed it over the bleak pampas, passing flashes of pink flamingos, to the wonderfully sunny and charming Mendoza.

Since we were in wine country we felt that to really experience it we should take advantage of the nearby wineries. Boarding a bus for about an hour and half took us to Maipu and right to Mr. Hugo’s bike rentals. We pedaled through the spring day, stopping in at a few wineries to sample the wares. But I think the highlight of our little afternoon jaunt was the last stop – a small shop, A la Antigua, which had every sort of homemade delicacy imaginable: olives, dulce de leche, chocolates, preserves and liqueurs from Scotch to Absinthe. Osvaldo, our giggly and rather round host, invited us to try a little of everything all of which were ridiculously good, so good that we all left with backpacks a little heavier than when we came.

After enjoying a week of Mendoza’s sunny days and great wine we decided it was time to head to Chile in search of waves. But, before we could hit up the surf we felt it was only proper to pay our respects to Concha y Toro, Chile’s largest wine exporter and creator of one of our most favourite joyful finds. After a night of free camping (people are really too generous) we arrived at the crack of 10am to take a tour and a tasting at the humongous bodega.

Our tour guide, who had a very odd accent (think William Shatner’s Captain Kirk with a British accent), told us a little about the winery as we wandered around the estate, the Concha y Toro cellar and the infamous El Casillero de Diablo (The Devil’s Cellar). Señor Concha y Toro found that wines were going missing so he created a bit of a legend that the wines were protected by the devil himself thereby keeping frightened thieves out of his private collection. The tour includes two tastings of the medium brand wines and your own Concha y Toro wineglass…all in all a pretty good time.