BARILOCHE, chocolate capital of Argentina and X treme sports wonderland !

27.12.12 Argentina

Headed North to Bariloche, chocolate capital of Argentina and access to some of the best X treme sports anywhere. On the outskirts of this amazing area it is reminiscent of a shanty town. We are briefed on security, a big increase in gangs targeting overland trucks, and warned not to leave anything other than clothing in the tents. The campsite, Selva Negro, is set up a 250 metre steep road deep in the red wood forest. Good facilities and most important wifi.
Eight of us sign up with Aquas Blancas for a full day of white water rafting including breakfast and all equipment.

28.12.12 Argentina / Chile

It is a beautiful day, clear blue sky and quite warm. Geoff, Francois, Sue, Vanessa, Karen, Steve, Lisa and I head off, having been collected, on a two hour drive to the launch site. We are driving through some of the most unspoilt countryside I have ever seen. We are going to be negotiating the Rio Manso. From glacier source, it is born at Tronador mountain and runs through the following lakes. Mascardi, Los Moscos, Hess and Steffen which divide the river into three different parts. Superior Manso, Middle Manso and Inferior Manso. The river born in Argentina continues towards Chile and flows into the Pacific Ocean. Hence we all have our passport details as we raft into Chile at the end of the journey. Rafting this stretch of the river is graded as levels 3 / 4 so fairly exciting stuff.

Stood around we are asked for two volunteers, nobody moves. Go on Tony a few friendly wags shout out. I step forward with Francois, two captains for the very front of the raft. Donned in wetsuits, over jackets, life jackets, safety helmet and your paddle we take instruction and our positions at the front of the raft. The rest of the team join us so we are four aside. My side consists of Vanessa, Karen and Sue.....the English side with Lisa ( Irish ), Geoff ( Aussie ), Steve ( English ), led obviously by Francois the International side. We head out into the very clear slow moving Rio Mansa for further instruction from Peter our navigator and instructor. The trick is to wedge your right foot under the strap at the front of the raft and your left foot behind you wedged into the inflatable rib side, hang out over the side of the raft and dig deep and fast all in time. We practice and it quickly goes to pot, but practice makes perfect and in a short space of time were looking good, but we need more power, more effort.

We set off mid river amongst amazing colours of blue and turquoise and initially the flow takes us whilst we gawk at the amazing surroundings. We spot our first rapid and wait for our command, " forward " we dig in and attack, negotiating the waves and rocks as the river narrows. We come through unscathed and are triumphant. The next three are all slightly different and we manage admirably. Laughing and whooping I ask Peter how many more rapids to go. Laughing back he states we haven't done one yet........What !!! Nervously we look at each other and giggle like kids, oh shit ! Anyway a few bends later we hit the first rapid, what a wake up call. As it looms and we're bobbing like a cork the adrenaline kicks in, paddling like mad, attack, attack, attack we enter the full force of the swirling, maelstrom. A huge wave looms about ten foot in front of me I duck and Vanessa gets the full force :) as it jets over me. How we came out the other side unscathed I don't know but we did, absolutely amazing. We celebrate hooting and jeering and calm down once Peter informs us the other nine only get worse.

We battle our way through the rest of the course and miraculously remain intact having rafted through some of the most spectacular, rugged and beautiful countryside I have ever seen. We spotted two Kingfishers along the way sat on branches watching our performances. A truly great day ended by a long walk up the hillside, a lovely trout and salad lunch followed by a well earn't iced cold beer.

1. Chocolate heaven
2. Ditto
3. The White Water crew
4. On calm waters
5. I am at the front on the left as u look at the raft.
6. You can just about see us.
7. Safety kayak disappearing
8. Nearly at the end
9. Beautiful surroundings

These pictures were photographed from a laptop screen, as I have the disk but can't get them transferred on to I pad.
Well till next time
Adios

Tony x

Cueva De Las Manos.

23.12.12

Cueva De Las Manos, Cave of the hands.

After a wonderful meal of half a lamb slow roasted over coals with cardboard over the top ( if the cardboard catches fire, coals too hot) we head off to this UNESCO world heritage site. The approach road from being flat steppe suddenly reveals canyons, rivers and lush growth. It really is stunning seeing a beautiful river meandering through lush vegetation, reddy brown canyon walls towering either side. We drive half way down the canyon and are escorted on a 2 km walk down a path hugging the canyon wall and see over 800 images of mainly adult hands, some children and the occasional animal sprayed onto the canyon sides. These hand paintings date back to about 7370 BC and include guanacos, scorpion and other prints. 90 % are left handed, indicating the owners were right handed.The colours are mainly red ochre, yellows, whites and more rarely green ( copper) coming from further afield. One image has six fingers (they think as a result of interbreeding). The colours were mixed with blood, urine, water etc a mouthful being taken and blown through an animal / bird bone over the hand leaving the image. The nearest other hand paintings of this sort are one hundred miles either north or south.

Really interesting day, some good photographs of the hands, general scenery and a young peregrine falcon.

Happy Christmas from Parque National Los Alerces.

25.12.12

A lie in until 0830, that's most unusual for Christmas in the Hays / Salsbury household. But am enjoying the moment of silence amongst the woods thinking of you all rising extremely early, probably hourly from midnight. Ha ha morning Tommy, keep them on their toes, I don't want them going soft while I'm away.

Well here I am in such beautiful surroundings on Christmas morning sat in my tent opening the seven letters and cards from the most important people in my life. What lovely words, well mostly, some hilarious some causing the odd tear but overall making me feel very proud.

Hot homemade pancakes with maple syrup to start the day, couple of cups of coffee and were ready to relax. Kens on the Jamesons already, will he see the day out ? I go for a walk down by the lake, sit on a tree stump with the intention of updating the diary / blog. All too quickly I realise I've been sat for an hour watching the gentle breeze blowing the clouds around the snow capped peaks and have got nothing done, oh well there's always another day. A call from Heather to say that it's secret Santa time and we all have to receive our presents. An hour of hilarity and its back to preparing dinner.

Dinner is prepared in a Potjie ( South African cast iron pot ) coals placed around the base and on top of the lid. The meats, pork and beef, sit on a bed of onions and it cooks for about four hours to produce an absolutely delicious meal accompanied by sweet potatoes, cabbage, polenta, chorizo, potatoes, salad, etc etc etc covered with an onion gravy from the pot. Washed down with a Chilean red it was amazing. It was an exceptional day, very strange in many ways, no television or radio and totally departed from the commercialism of Christmas. Midnight arrived and we wished each other a Happy Christmas once again and to bed.

Anyway on that note I would like to wish my wife Lu,her family and my family a very HAPPY CHRISTMAS. It's times like this I realise how very special you all are and indeed how very lucky I am. So enjoy while I am away it's all back to normal next year, I'll think of a competition in the meantime ha ha love you all x x x

And to my friends, who are all very special as well, I wish you and your families a very Happy Christmas and look forward to catching up on return for a bit of a bash.

Boxing Day. A beautiful warm sunny day spent leisurely reading Dan Brown, until Heather disturbs the peace with " are you and Francois coming swimming" ha ha not likely it's blooming freezing.The Lake is fed from the slow melting snow covered peaks, crystal clear varying shades of blue. Anyway after several dips in the icy cold I felt very exhilarated, though the photos do show some strange facial expressions. By the way other than us three the rest were far too sensible. :) will I ever learn.

Till the next time,
Adios
Tony x

1. Pete n Kirsten, owners starting the Christmas meal
2. Me tending the fire ready for lunch
3. Santa and his helpers
4. Me receiving my pressie from Santa
5. The Potjie being prepared
6. The contents revealed, it was delicious
7. Happy Christmas from Concho and his mates
8. Me with Christmas dinner, cheers
9. A bit chilly !!
10. Ditto
11. This was a beautiful setting.

Now that Crimbo is out of the way we will hopefully be getting back to the photography x

Caught short heading back to Chile.

20.12.12
Heading North after pack up to the San Sebastián border control. Argentinean side no problem, straight through across no mans land and to the Chilean side for more paperwork, sniffer search dogs on board searching for fruit and foodstuffs. All done we continue chasing the weather which appears to be outrunning us. Rain turns to hailstones and we encounter a terrific storm. Extremely cold, dark and miserable we find a bush camp, the remains of a quarry. Tents up it is freezing cold, hands numb we persevere, these expedition tents do go up pretty quick and we are getting faster each day. The dinner crew excels and in no time we have a hot meal of pasta and spicy sauce.

This does however have its consequences too much spicy sauce, no toilets on board, the shout usually goes up " toilet stop" boys to the left, girls to the right, the truck empties in seconds, some occasionally going the wrong way but hey we're all in this together what's the odd fart amongst friends. The usual practice first thing in the morning for your morning constitutional is to grab one of the many garden hand trowels, disappear into the undergrowth, dig a hole to minimum of 40 cm, lay your jobbie and cover leaving no trace.....!! Are they having a laugh where's the garden spade ? Ha ha

Anyway I digress, the howling wind, rain and sleet make for very cold nights but hey good old Mum saw that I was properly prepared and supplied me with some shiny silver socks and gloves for bedtime apparently the astronauts use them, yeah right. Sharing a tent with a tough old Aussie this explanation didn't go down too well, what's wrong with you soft pommies ? An explanation on technical equipment put him straight for the time being, thanks mum x

Everyone on the expedition is put into teams of three and four, each having their particular tasks for the day i.e. cook group, tent locker, bag store, site security, on board bar ( most important ) and various other tasks. Within a couple of weeks it becomes a well oiled machine and everything flows well. Strangely enough the tougher it is, the colder it gets the more enjoyable it is. Not much chance to wash when on the road, apart from the odd wet wipe, it could be three days before a hot shower and kit wash is forthcoming but boy is it good.

Well enough said about the day to day workings of the truck, sand / mud mats deployed, clagged up to the eyeballs we hit the road again on this amazing adventure heading back across the border to Argentina, Santa Cruz district.

1. Tents just visible in the storm
2. Morning just before departure.
3. Space age socks n gloves, my other hand is keeping the family jewels warm.
4. A shot inside our truck, complete with library, bar and everything else we require.

Till the next time with hopefully some better photographs.

Adios

Tony x

Ushuaia 2, Beaver

19.12.12

This is a special day as its my nieces birthday, so Happy Birthday to Meggy Peggy.....get that room cleaned up, you've now been named and shamed ya minger !!

Headed off into the Tierra Del Fuego National Park today looking for beaver ! Never seen one before.....now before you all start making comments this is not an easy subject to discuss :) these national parks are vast and absolutely stunning. We decided on a six mile hike, no problem, after our recent conquests. The woods were beautiful and we walked along a river until we came across the peat bogs and Castorera which is an active beaver colony. Straight away you could see evidence of the dams built by this exotic species.

Unbelievably as I walk to the edge I see a a tell tale v shaped wake going towards the dam. Took a couple of shots with the 300 mm lens but just that bit too far away.( I suppose if I had a 400 mm lens, the professional range, hint ! Lu that would be nice for my birthday, I would have got a cracking shot.) but we made the best of a bad job and I got we think a stoat with a fish in its mouth. We saw a couple of beavers, too far off to photograph, building their dams and lodges.

It was a beautiful place, as most places are that we get to, and we had an another enjoyable day amongst wildlife.

Adios

Tony x

1. Bird nesting in the middle of the river
2. Otter, fish in mouth
3. Beavers dam
4. Parakeet
5. Parakeet enjoying the dandelions.
6. Some sort of wren.

Ushuaia

18.12.12.

Ushuaia,Southern most city in the world, a strange place concocted of all manner of different houses obviously with no thought for building regs, health and safety or anything else for that matter. If you can live in it, it will do. Old containers, sheds, big sheds and then poorly constructed brick and concrete etc finally arriving at those who have done well for themselves and reside in chalet style houses. There doesn't seem to be any set areas with this miss mash all together in the same pot. It is a very industrial area with mountains of sea containers stacked all around. It is the main port you catch the large ships and ice breakers for trips to Antartica, at around 5000 dollars for a ten day trip. One of our team, Mikail, took the plunge and got a last minute deal at a reduced rate. He'll catch us up later on.

As for us we chartered a sailing boat ( ten of us) from Tres Maria's, operated by Hector Monsalve, a famous local diver, underwater photographer etc etc and visited some of the protected Islands in the bay to view Yamana Indian Middens, local wildlife including King Cormorants, Sea Lions,and flora.

The Indians that originally inhabited these islands were a hardy lot. They wore no clothes, were small in stature, had large chests and had a different body temperature to us which allowed them to withstand the desperately low temperatures in winter, it's blooming cold enough in summer. The women did the hunting, diving for molluscs and other sea food, whilst the men canoed and carried the burning coals for the fires. The middens are the remains of these fires, normally in sheltered areas, depending on wind direction, which contained shells, animal bones and coals.

It was a relaxing day enabling me to take a few more photographs of wildlife which was amazing. I decided not to take the trip to Antartica as its somewhere I'd love to take Lu in the future. ( a few brownie points earn't there ha ha :)

Now I've been learning on the job so to speak re the blog. Up until now I've only been able to update when I have wifi, and even then you may lose half if you suddenly lose the signal. One of the girls on the expedition is clued up and suggested blogger which allows you to write your blog offline adding photos etc and then publishing as and when you get a signal. The only downside is that you can only add photographs at the end and you can't add comments to the photos and there's a possibility the quality of pictures aren't the same. But it enables you to keep up to date which is a benefit. What I will do is write comments on the pictures in sequence and if the picture quality is not good I will re add the best ones signal providing. Lets give it a go.

1. Me and some of the guys having a cuppa before we set sail.
2. On board the yacht.
3. The mountains surrounding Ushuaia.
4. King Cormorants. This reminded me of Lu giving it bell oil and me doing the usual ha ha.
5. King Cormorants.
6. The colony, some of these nests are a thousand years old.
7. Don't disturb !
8. A youngster.
9. Life is such a bore!

Oh well time to depart, wishing you all well at this busy time of year......it's manic here...Adios
Tony x

Still further South to Ushuaia.

17.12.12
Truck packed we head off further South, everyone fired up with enthusiasm recounting their individual stories of the W trek. We are heading to USHUAIA, the southern most city in the world. We cross the border again back into Argentina passing along the Magellan Straits. We come across a couple of disintegrating ships on the cobbled beach, they made fascinating pictures.

Each drive is approximately six to seven hours covering great distances of ever changing countryside, mostly Argentian Steppe at the moment. As we approach Ushuaia we suddenly come to a halt on the outskirts, there's a road block. Trees across the road set alight, vehicles behind this, a crowd chanting and banging a drum. It's the local truck / lorry drivers protesting about pay and conditions. After hanging around for about fifteen minutes were let through the road block, flaming trees pulled aside, thumbs up and victory signs from the crowd, it all seems pretty good natured.

We arrive at our camp site set just out of town in the thick woods, at the base of a ski lift. It's their summer here so it's not in operation, summer !! God it must be bad in winter.

Well that's us tucked away for a couple of days, lets see what this area has to offer.

Despedida !

Tony x

1. One of the skeleton hulls lying on the cobbled beach outside a deserted town.
2. Same
3. An old army bridge crossing one of the many rivers.
4. The long road ahead through millions of acres of Steppe.
5. Catching the ferry.
6. Roadblock outside Ushuaia