The last few days have been jam packed with adventure, so today we are relaxing and doing nothing for a change!
We started off our adventures with a ´Free Spirit Tour´ advertised as kayaking, bike riding, walking, snorkelling, fishing... we should have known by the name that there may have been something fishy about this one!
We set off at 9am and drove to the national park in the lakes district to a small cabin where we were left for about 1hr before anyone spoke to us! (taking in the nature??). Eventually, 5 adreniline junkies introduced themselves and the tour which would involve ¨where ever the spirit will take us¨. AKA we were to choose what we wanted to do for the day. So a very obnoxious Canadian and 4 young pommey boys decided to take the lead for the group and say they wanted to ride bikes down steep hills and jump off high surfaces into the water. With that in mind, the tour operators decided to take a further 2hrs to decide how the day should operate.
Eventually we commenced a ´walk´around the lake. However the boys were doing this on the mountain bikes of course. After pushing and crawling through tunnels and scrub for 1hr, the tour guides realised they were lost! So back we went through the thick scrub (boys carrying bikes) and we finally found the track. There was a beautiful place in the middle where we were able to swim in the fresh water lake while the guys showed off and did back flips off tree branches. So after the walk we got stuck into a Argentinian BBQ which was well deserved. 2hrs later we commenced our 2nd activity involving riding bikes to meet the boys on the other side of the lake and kayak back. This sounded like it would be fun and easy.... no such luck. We had 2 girls who were´nt the fittest in the world, who didn´t know how to change gears on the bikes...hmmmmm... needless to say they fell off!
After a few more back flips into the lake we kayaked back to the cabins. This should only take 1 hr they say. Tim and I set off against the wind and were going well until we realised we had no guide to show us where to go. They had to save the 2 girls who were in the kayak and had decided to stop kayaking in the middle of the lake against the wind because they were tired and didn´t want to do it any more!!! Anyway, we tooks 3hrs to get back to camp at 9.30pm... then eventually, after a very long day we were back at our hostel at 11pm. 14hrs of torture.
Our next day was much better. We mustered up the strength to get out of bed and go white water rafting down the Manso River from Argentina to Chile. It was amazing! Our boat managed to last 10 rapids without one person falling out - which was a fantastic defeat as the other 4 boats had 1 casualty when a girl fell out and hit her face on a rock, and another boat flipped in the rapids!! We were able to swim down one rapid also which was pretty awesome. THe grade was 2-3 as the water is pretty low at this time of year but it was enough for me and we survived!! We rewarded ourselves with another all you can eat Argentinian BBQ (meat, meat, meat). Tim is in heaven over here.
So we have loved all that Argentina has given us in Bariloche, its such a picturesque place and you could stay here for weeks, but we must move on. So off to Pucon in Chile tomorrow to trek up the active volcanto, then relax in the hot springs after. Then up to Santiago and Valporasio to relax on the beach a little.
Hope everyone is well and keeping up to date with the blog. Feel free to send comments so we know you´re reading!!
Ciou
