My blog updates are far overdue, so I’ll do my best to fill in the gaps now. I spent the last 10 days traveling in Southern Patagonia with three friends.
Day I: Traveling
Friday we took a bus from the Retiro station in Buenos Aires. We were told to arrive 30 minutes early, and ended up waiting an extra 20 for the bus to arrive. This is the Argentine version of fashionably late, but my American self was panicked, especially because the bus station didn’t know beforehand what platform the bus would arrive at.
The ride itself was 20 hours. Argentina has put a lot of thought into their buses and seems to have developed a system as categorized as US planes. There are many levels of seats ranging in sizes and how far they lean back. Each bus has only one type of seat, and some serve meals even. We got a dinner of milanesa (breaded meat, a classic dish), bread rolls, a jelly roll with cold cut and hardboiled egg wrapped up in place of jam, and a mini pie, and stopped for breakfast of coffee and medialunas.
Patagonia is a lot of empty space, occasionally punctuated by a sheep or small shrine by the side of the road, the size of a dog house. The view outside the window was endless miles of blue shrubs and blond tufts of grass, under an endless sky, and dark blue mountains in the distance. In general the whole area looks a lot like a wetter New Mexico.
I had never been to a hostel before, and was prepared for roughing it. Instead of mattresses on the floor and a crowded room, we were greeted with neat bunk beds, 2 bathrooms to ourselves, free use of the kitchen, and all the coffee and tea we wanted. Our hostel, Casa de Tounens, was run by a Frenchman named Vincent, who moved to Argentina 2 years ago and started up the hostel 4 months ago. The hostel felt more like living in a language-interest house than a hotel; we chatted with a Dutchman, some Belgians, a few Israelis, an Englishman and a fellow American in a mix of Spanish and English (Vincent himself is trilingual).
The further you are from home, the easier it is to make friends from home. Americans in other countries are really friendly, because the mere fact that you both speak English and used to live in America already gives you much more in common than you have with anyone else, and gives you tons to talk about.
The hostel is named after Orélie-Antoine de Tounens a crazy Frenchman who came to Patagonia (south Argentina/Chile) and declared himself emperor. He went as far as to mint his own money and publish a constitution. Pretty much no one cared, until the Mapuche Indians jumped on the idea. Happy to find someone who also didn’t think Chile ought to own Patagonia, the Mapuche joined up with Tounens. Chile was afraid he might be a French spy, or that he might be representing the French government’s plans, and captured Tounens. France assured Chile that Tounens was just insane and ought to be sent home. Upon returning to France Tounens promptly spent his money on returning. He was immediately re-deported, and tried to come back again.
Traveler’s Tips/ More Details than Everyone Else Cares About
We took Condor-Estrella from Retiro to Puerto Madryn, and chose cama ejecutive. The seats are wide and leather, like first class seats on American planes. They don’t recline to be flat, but go pretty far.
They played American movies dubbed into Spanish like Talledega Nights, Hocus Pocus, and a pretty entertaining Android Apocalypse. The sound does blast a bit loud, but I found it easy enough to sleep.
For most buses, I would recommend bringing a pillow, if you’re the sort who wants somewhere to put your head. This one gave us a pillow and a blanket for the night. I didn’t see the bathrooms, but in general, toilet paper and hand sanitizer are a good idea.
As for a place to stay, I highly recommend Casa de Tounens, which you can purchase through hostels.com. The owner, Vincent, is really nice, and will help find you trips. The house has several bathrooms and two TVs, along with many English and Spanish movies to watch, and two computers (admittedly, the internet is slow). Each morning he gave us fresh bread from his bread machine, some sweet breads, and jams and dulce de leche.
Vincent was also kind enough to book (and pay in advance for) several trips for us. In fact, the whole money culture at this hostel and the second one was so relaxed it was shocking. Vincent let us in without ever asking for money, and when we questioned him, he assured us that we just had to pay before we left. Our hostel in El Calafate (America del Sur) also set up and paid for trips for us, and only had us pay on our last night.
Day 2: Kayak
We took a bus down to an area called Punto Píramides to go sea kayaking and see the animals. No one else was on the ocean, just my friends and myself in our two 2-person kayaks and our guide, a marine biologist. It was amazingly peaceful, and wonderful to be surrounded by nature again after so long in the city.
I just wore a few long sleeve shirts and a pair of long underwear pants. With the spray skirt creating a pocket of air, I was surprisingly warm. (The guide advised me to leave my jeans behind so I’d have something dry to change into; a very good idea).
Right whales use the waters in the area as a mating ground at this time of year, and it was full of the gray animals. We saw one mother with her calf, a surprising white color. The whales came astoundingly close, I’d say they were only 2 or 3 kayak lengths away from us. I once went on a whale tour in Boston, and kayaking here, the whales were far closer. During lunch on the beach side, the whales must have come within 15 feet of the shore to splash around. Our was more concerned with keeping us far enough away from the whales than with trying to get to see them. If we let ourselves drift much closer, we could be hit as the whales swam and jump around.
History Tidbit: According to our guide, right whales have a unusually high amount of blubber, making them particularly desirable to hunters. Many sailors would go out and kill a bunch of whales. Given their particular density, right whales’ corpses float, making them stand out from the others. The name “right whale” comes from the fact that sailors knew that the floating whales were the “right” ones to hunt. In Spanish, the name is “ballena franco” or “honest whale”.
We also saw a collection of black and white birds that at first looked like penguins. On closer examination we saw they had long curved necks and could fly.
As for the land, the beach itself was mostly small rocks and fancy shells, and the sea was bordered by natural rock walls and caves.
After seeing the whales, we paddled over to two sea lion colonies. Their eyes are huge, like chestnuts, and the females have smooth heads. It makes them look like gophers or Whack A Mole heads when they rise from the water. When the sea lions popped up, there was always a hiss, like a puff of steam, they may have been snorting, I’m not sure. Each colony consisted of one male and many females basking on a rock. The women were far more friendly and would dive into the water and swim straight for us once we approached. At first I was afraid, thinking we’d angered them, but they just wanted to play. Our guide assured us that as long as the sea lions were in the water, we shouldn’t worry: water is the animals’ element, and if they’re in it, they’re not going to feel threatened. Swarms of sea lions chased our boat and one frolicked too close and hit the front of the kayak. Only when almost all his wives had entered the water would the male think of moving off his rock.
In Spanish sea lions are “sea wolves”. It’s interesting how imprecise our naming is; for most sea animals our names are metaphors: “sea lion”, “sea elephant”, “seahorse”, “sea dragon”. When the Spaniards arrived, they named animals all after things they’d seen in Europe. Guacanos (picture a thin orange llama) were called “camel-dogs”.
Guacano
Traveler’s Tip
The kayaking was with Patagonia Explorers and cost US $100, but included lunch, and the loan of spray skirts and water shoes.
You have to pay 70 pesos to enter the park. I heard many places that you could get your ticket stamped and re-use it, but the officials there told us no.
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