Patagonia'd

Patagonia’d

“No problem, there are always beds here,” said the email reply to my reservation request to a hostel in Santiago. This was my fourth bike trip and I arrived brimming with confidence. Only instead of samba, it was the sound of shuffling slippers. The hostel had morphed into an old folk’s home eight months earlier. The next morning I used a compass and my noggin in lieu of a street map to meander out of the city of six million, laughing at now easily someone had duped me.

I travel for the sheer animal pleasure of adventure or functionlust as the Germans say. Destination was secondary this time, I just wanted to see over the hill and chat to the folks on the next table. The thousand kilometers down the Pan American highway to Porto Montt was a perfect warm up before the wilds of Patagonia. The cycling cognoscenti veer away from motorways. I just wanted a road, any road, and for the next two weeks enjoyed the gritty rumble of  a juggernaut highway – swinging in to ramshackle diners for scrambled eggs and laundry-white bread rolls or the fruit stands built of recycled roofing steel and plywood overflowing with crates of produce. Two bucks would buy a kilo of cherries or strawberries. I would wobble along the shoulder eating out of the plastic bag swinging from the handlebars, trying to ignore the farm workers across the fence encased in white hazmat suits.

My fellow travellers fell into three groups: the long haul truckers, families in flashy SUVs and indigenous locals waiting patiently at the numerous bus shelters that lined the route. These bus shelters were my dining room. The ability to cook a hot meal anywhere and anytime is prerequisite. My alcohol stove made from a beer can was the best stove I have ever had. The shelters were perfect for a quick cuppa. Sipping Red Rose tea, I would intone “only in Canada... pity”, to the smiles of incredulous onlookers.  

Camping was another skill I had nailed. I always found a secluded niche to sleep undisturbed, respite miles of barbed wire and padlocked gates. In late afternoon, I would scan hedgerows for an opening, and then drop myself and the bike behind bushes or amongst the towering weeds. I slept under the stars, a tent was not necessary. I revelled rolling down the highway fast, light and cheap. The downside is that I met no fellow adventurers; they swarm to the hip hostels in the tourist meccas that are only a short cab ride from volcanoes, rafting and ‘hard rock cafe’-style waterholes.

Dossing on a South Pacific island had long been a dream. Chiloe, geographically at least, achieved that goal. It is famous for mystics and gaudily painted wooden churches. I took to back roads and explored the coast, the loose gravel and steep hills made it a tough slog. Steady rain, rickety wire fences, brambles and gorse made my South Seas paradise more Galway than Gauguin.  A comment in a travel guide describing the beach at Canoe on the west coast as the finest in the world, had me intrigued. Twenty kilometers of thundering surf with a lone couple hunkered down to observe the winter solstice; it could have been the 19^th Century. The wet campground and cold shower dampened my enthusiasm. There was a desolate ‘heart of darkness’ feel to the place. Black clouds the next day encouraged me to move on. 

The problem with high tech adventure clothing is that it enables you to keep going long after you should have stopped. By mid-morning, I was soaked to the skin from the rain and the rooster tail of water from the front tire. Luckily, I found, first a steak knife and then a jumbo-size plastic coke bottle; within minutes, I had fashioned a front mudguard. I grinned like a sailor who had plugged a reef-gutted hull. Chill set in by late afternoon despite the heat generated pushing the bike uphill. Then the road disappeared. It had been a double lane divided motorway. First, it shrunk to two lanes of muddy gravel and then down to a twelve-foot wide cutting through a hill. Traffic lights instructed drivers when to go. This was my moment to shine, for 22,000 km monster trucks ruled the Pan Am highway, finally, the mountain bike triumphed. I pushed past the waiting vehicles and into the cutting hoping the water was not too deep, lifted my legs high and sang – “Raindrops keep falling on my head...”

A campground by the beach in Quenllon was home for the next few days as I waited for the ferry back to the mainland. Once again, I was the only guest. Then there was the roar of motor bikes, four heavily loaded dirt bikes peeled in amongst the cabanas. Three were German and one Swedish, all four had their hair shaved on one side; the two men were officers on supersize oil tankers. Their girlfriends looked stunning in yoga pants and body armour. The leader carried a sleek air pistol; he would fire at the helmets of the other riders to communicate. In Santiago, they had bought the bikes for $2000 each and now they were tearing across Patagonia in days rather than weeks. I looked at my bicycle and thought to myself – there has to be something I am just not quite doing right.

 I began bike touring because I was so inspired reading about cyclists and their adventures. On Christmas Day I am wandering through Chilten, it is the deserted and still half-destroyed (mudslides from a volcanic eruption) when I am hailed by fellow cyclists. We sit on the front step of an empty building eating sandwiches and swopping stories. The Tonners are a retired couple from Alberta; they are cycling across the continent and are here for a couple of days while Roz’s gashed leg is stitched, she is 62.

Total freedom is tough, I have the means to go anywhere and every fork in the road is a worry. There was a big one coming up, I could swing east into Argentina and loop back through the lakes and vineyards. Instead I continued south in the rain. The road follows steep-sided valleys; waterfalls cascade down the rock walls, the valley floor is dense temperate rain forest. The annual rainfall here is three meters and this was a wet year. By the second day of rain, everything except the sleeping bag was soaked. The next day the road disappeared and the Bic lighter no longer sparked. Three long stretches of road were torn up and the exposed hillside cascaded down as mudslides flooding the road. I manhandled the bike through a mudslide and over a fallen tree. Motorists behind me cheered. I turned and yelled, “adios amigos.” An hour later, they rushed past, drenching me with water from the flooded potholes. 

 All day I pushed the bike up and over a mountain pass, only to find the downhill surface so rough I had to push the bike over rocks and through flooded sections. My fingers were bone white and once I fell off for no reason. A lookout shelter provided some protection for the night. The dinner special at Chez Hughie was oats a la deluge.

The next morning I found that I was only 5km from a village. I stocked up on food and dried from wet to damp. Another fork in the road was approaching. I could continue south to Coyhaique or to Porto Aysen on the coast. I opted for the coast and within days was back in 30c sunshine and more bags of fresh fruit. I stormed back up the Pan Am highway to Santiago with only a minor hiccup from a bout of food poisoning. After a few days in the city I biked to the coast and then north, stopping at beaches along the way. I was disappointed not to find campgrounds; I needed somewhere safe to leave the gear so I could enjoy the beach. Dante would love Chile; in the far south, you battle wind all day, in the middle, everything is soaked and in the north the relentless burning sun drives you to seek shade- oh, and then there are the constant reminders of tsunamis, earthquakes and smoking volcanoes. Perfect for a Bilbo Baggins.

The final day biking was a memorable twelve hour day. A dawn start enabled me to summit a pass before the heat made it a struggle. Then I am flying down the 11km of switchbacks through cactus country. I left the freeway at the city’s edge and had to use the compass to wind my way through the barrios to downtown Santiago. At a traffic light, Carlos, the owner of a touring bike rental business catches me and offers to buy my bike. I agonize over the pros and cons, and the emotional bond from shared adventures. I sell the bike, shoulder my pack and walk across town. It is late by the time I get to the hostel – only to find the city have padlocked it. I follow directions to another one, it’s full. The next one does have a bed. I came for adventure and 3500km later I can say I’ve been Patagonia’d.