Once again, a month between posts flies by. Last time I checked in was a week after I moved to Reko. I had a great 4 weeks there! The ranch is 140 hectares, so there was much exploring to be done with the ranch, as well as outside the property. All kinds of hiking opportunities and mountain refuges are located nearby. I went to El Bolsón again my 2nd weekend at Reko, because I was looking to buy a reasonably priced sleeping bag and heard of a little uno9ficial street market where people sell used items and items brought over from Chile (very common to cross the border for purchasing things like electronics, camping gear, or whatever else that is way overpriced here in Argentina). This was the weekend 3 volunteers, the older French guy, Michele, and the younger French couple Pauline and Gregorio, left the ranch (although the couple intended to return after the holidays). So I took the bus into town with them and then proceeded to the market, where I failed to find a sleeping bag. But it was fine because Pauline offered to let me use hers while she and Greg were away. If a specific event or fair isn´t happening, there is really no other reason to go to town (El Bolsón) other than to run errands/buy fruit not provided by the ranch(/spend money, which I´m trying my best not to do so much). So I was easily ready to head home to the ranch before 6pm, which is when the last bus that way leaves. Well, I ended up missing the bus due to my lack of vigilance. The weekend prior, the first time I took the bus to and from El Bolsón, as well as this morning, the placard on the bus said Encanto Blanco, which is the last bus stop on the route. So about 5 minutes before 6pm a bus arrives to the El Bolsón stop with a placard for Warton (the 2nd to last stop on the same route). It sits there, and I found it curious that there would be both a bus to Warton and a bus to Encanto Blanco, and I thought about inquiring with the bus driver, but failed to. And after that bus left at 6pm, no bus for Encanto Blanco came, haha. I ended up stranding myself, so to speak, in El Bolsón. My options getting to the ranch were hitch hike or take a taxi. Although hitch hiking is super common here and apparently safe, I just didn’t feel comfortable doing it because it´s such an unknown practice to me. Thus, I ended up ¨wasting¨ 20$US on a taxi. However, since I now didn’t have to stick to a bus schedule, I took advantage of my now free time and decided to ¨not waste¨ 15$US on a couple beers before calling the taxi and heading back.
That Sunday was very relaxing. It was rainy, so I slept in and spent the rest of the morning reading. Another ranch dweller, who is originally from Spain, named Layin, arrived that day. He perpetually avoids winters by working summers as a tour guide in Scandinavia, and then coming to Argentina in the summer to live on the ranch. He is also building a house there. Later that afternoon I chatted it up with Hernán and he showed me some trails around the property along with the little house he is building. It is lower on the construction priorities, because 2 other houses that are also being built are for the two brothers, and they are much further along and need to be completed up to a certain point before they head off with their families to the coast for the summer. They both design clothing, and every summer they leave the ranch (in the care of Hernán and Layin) to sell clothing during the tourist season.
My work varied quite a bit this week, with jobs in the garden, with cutting, painting, or staining wood, and other minor construction activities. We prepped materials to finish the roof of one house the following week. I was also asked to make the group lunch for the first time, which was a challenge, but a fun and welcome one. For the most part, cooking doesn’t feel like work to me. Normally they don’t ask volunteers to make the group lunch, but since time was winding down before the families left, there time was best spent on the construction and taking care of other final business matters, so the best way I could be of help was by making lunch for everyone. Every time I cooked I was feeding an average of 12 people. The first lunch I made was pretty elaborate, croquettes of lentils and rice with a curry gravy, sautéed cabbage and a salad. I learned to simplify meals a little more as I was continually asked to cook.
I did not go to El Bolsón this weekend, and instead did some great hikes. On Saturday I walked to Warton (7km) because I wanted oranges and lemons (what I would normally purchase in town). Warton isn’t a town, but there is a tiny market, a rustic little bed and breakfast with camping, a café, and the bus stop. It is also the location of the head of the main hiking trail that takes you to the Río Azul, where the trail breaks up into other routes leading to various hiking destinations and mountain refuges in the area. I hiked the 2km further to Río Azul and spent a couple hours to bask in its beauty and read. The trail actually leads to the confluence of the Río Azul and the Encanto Blanco river. The waters were crystalline blue and icy cold from the snowy mountain sources. So that was a lovely little hike. The next day I went on a longer hike to climb Perito Moreno, which hosts a small glacier at the top. The hike starts at the little Perito Moreno Ski Center, which has a few ski slopes and is located at the end of the road that Reko is on, 4 km away. I´m not sure how long the hike to the top was, but from Reko it took me al ittle over 4 hours. Then it took me a little over 3 hours to get back. I took the obvious trail down (meant for 4x4 vehicles), but to climb up the mountain I found some smaller, and not well cleared, hiking trails. Although some parts were difficult to navigate, my persistence was rewarded by finding a sweet little waterfall, and later an area which looked like it hadn’t been utilized for a long time, but had tree stumps placed clearly for sitting, and an old sign demonstrating the area of Argentina occupied by the precious Patagonian forest in comparison to the rest of the country. The hike to the top of Perito Moreno is a bit deceiving; from the ranch you can see the ski slopes and what appears to be the top of the mountain, but once you reach the top of the slopes, the rest of the mountain and final hill to the top is revealed. From the stop of the slopes it took me another hour to reach the true summit, and boy was the view gorgeous! After staring at those slopes for nearly 3 weeks wondering what the other side was like, I finally sated my curiosity. It was immensely rewarding. There was a vast green valley on the other side faaar down below, and you could see the snowcapped Andes a little further in the distance. The wind at the top was wicked and I could barely hold my phone steady enough to take pictures. There was still a fair amount of snowy patches along the mountain side, and it felt sort of magical crossing through snow while I was wearing shorts and a tshirt! On the way down I stopped to eat a little snow just for the novelty of it. I felt so rejuvenated after that hike!
The first three days of the following week we spent finishing the roof of Gerardo and Paula´s house, which was a very interesting experience! They used volcanic sand to insulate the roof, so they had to construct a pully to hoist up buckets of sand, and I helped out by laying the sand down and leveling it out in the wooden recesses. I also helped prepare a mix of the sand with water and clay for insulated the peaked areas of the roof where sand wouldn’t stay on its own. I was covered in clay by the end of that day. After finishing the roof, various other last minute adjustments were made before the family left after Christmas that weekend. We worked on xmas day, but not a full day. The holiday celebration at the ranch was a lot of fun. The common practice is to get together with family and friends on xmas eve (la noche Buena) and have an asado (Argentinian bbq), and then toast at midnight. They had a big fire, and various friends and neighbors dropped in, and there was a ton of delicious food, wine, and homemade beer being passed around. That Saturday it was a little sad saying goodbye to the families. It felt like I was just beginning to develop a solid comfort level with them beyond the owner:volunteer work relationship. I definitely plan to include a visit to their ranch the next time I return to Argentina to see how all their projects have progressed. After bidding them farewells, I embarked on a hike to the Encanto Blanco refuge. The trail begins from a privately owned ranch located just beyond the Encanto Blanco bus stop, and when you enter the property a bunch of dogs start barking and the owner comes out of his house. It felt a little odd letting myself onto the property, but I just casually (and politely) asked the owner if I could pass through to get to the trail, and he said of course. After the 45 minute walk from Reko to the bus stop, it took another 4 hours to hike to the refuge, and about halfway along the hike the trail meets up with the Encanto Blanco river and follows it the rest of the way to the refuge. The river was breathtaking, both in its beauty and its frigid temperature. The water was crystal clear, and it was a hot sunny day, so every time I passed by a deep spot in the river I experienced extreme urges to jump in! That made me decide that I must find a river and/or lake to swim in before I leave the El Bolsón region. I arrived to the refuge a little after 4pm, and spent the rest of the afternoon sipping mate with the 2 refuge managers (called Refugeros) and various other campers/hikers there. I also got some solid reading time in alongside the river before the sun went down. The refuge consisted of a rustic wood cabin, of which the bottom floor was divided into a kitchen and dining/relaxing area, and the upstairs was a loft for sleeping if you weren’t camping outside. There was also another building for housing firewood with a loft as well for laying down sleep bags. I dined with the refugeros and other solo hikers that evening (there were a couple families at the refuge as well, but doing their own thing). That night there was a nice bonfire by the river, and I hung out until the moon finally arrived over the mountains (which wasn’t until after 1am) before heading to sleep. The refuge is located in a valley surrounded by tall mountains, and it was wild to observe, well after nightfall, how the mountains on the western side were slowly illuminated as the moon began to crest over the mountains on the opposite side of the valley. I slept in the next morning, and then went on two short hikes to nearby lookout points and a small waterfall. Then I chilled at the refuge until about 2pm, when I decided to head back to Reko.
Work the following week was pretty relaxed with the families gone and fewer people around. We spent all Monday cleaning up the main construction site and organizing the wood workshop. I made lunch nearly every day, and I also painted a ton of siding (occupied 3 of my work days). I also continued working in the garden. We worked a short day on New Years Eve, and that evening was laid back and most enjoyable. We were down to being only 3 volunteers after the French volunteers left. Hernán and Layin both had parties to go to, so us three were left at the ranch to make the most of our last evening of 2015. We bought some ranch beers and made a bunch of food, and we thought it was going to be a pretty chill night, but the French couple actually ended up returning that evening to the ranch, to our surprise and delight. They brought more food, and two bottles of whiskey! We were thrilled, because 5 is a party compared to 3. We made a big fire and sat around it drinking and chatting and passing around a guitar until 5am. I was also glad they returned so that I could say a proper goodbye to them before I left Reko. Don’t think I mentioned it prior, but with the departure of the families and decline in work activities, I needed to find another place to volunteer for the month of January.
So, here I am writing you after a week spent at the last place I´ll work before coming back to the states, a small ranch outside of el Hoyo, 12km south of El Bolsón. It´s a mind bender reflecting on how quickly 8 months has passed me by. I have done so much since arriving to Chile on May 7 that it is difficult to fully comprehend at this point.
The ranch I´m at now has no name, it´s much smaller than Reko (4 hectares), and is owned by a friend of the Reko family, an Argentine Italian named Juan. He´s a super nice and relaxed guy, with lots of projects happening on his beautiful property, which is in a valley with a nearby wetlands area, and is surrounded by mountains. He has a big garden and lots of fruit trees, along with a forest of cypress, pine and other native trees. There was a big fire here in 2012, and its evidence is still clear. Juan´s house burnt down, along with some other structures, so work here has included helping with new construction, helping him move into his new house and organize it (he officially moved back in only a month ago), and tend to the garden and fruit trees. There is one other volunteer here, Guillermo, a 20 year old from France. He is laid back and speaks good Spanish. My other ¨job¨ here has been doing most (but not all) the cooking, which I´m totally down for! I make breakfast every morning, either oatmeal with various fruits from around the property (cherries, apples, or plums thus far) or that are otherwise at hand, or chapatti with jams and fruit salad, and once I made eggs and toast. He also keeps plenty of fresh veggies around, so I´ve had lots to work with when I´ve made lunch or dinner. My first week here flew by (recurring theme on my trip…). Last night Juan took Guille and me to the little town of El Hoyo to check out their Fine Fruits Festival, happening all this weekend, and marking the first of a series of local festivals, one happening every weekend in nearby towns. Next weekend is the Artisans Festival in Epuyén, then the Hops Festival in El Bolsón, the Forest Festival in Lago Puelo, and I can´t remember where the last festival takes place, but it´s the Asado Festival. Each festival is meant to highlight the town´s most prominent attraction. El Hoyo, or rather the surrounding area, is the capital of ¨frutas finas¨ (cherries, grapes, raspberries, blackberries, blueberries, etc). There were lots of vendors selling preserves, a big stage with live music, and all kinds of food stands and attractions for kids. It was cute, but basically reminded me of a small county fair in the states. I think we are going to have dinner with a neighbor and close friend of Juan´s this evening.
Needless to say, I am beyond satisfied with my new home and its beautiful surroundings, and I´m looking forward to what my last month here has in store for me!
