Day 56 - 4 volcanos and some Swiss people

 Aguas Caliente to Puerto Octay (90km)


Thursday 27th October

As much as we were sad to say goodbye to our lovely domo, we were, as always, excited to be back on the road. We'd set off fairly early, prepared for a long day with a possible 40km rippio section to get to Puerto octay, a reportedly cute German town. We were also slightly apprehensive about those sharp Chile ups and downs, inevitable when following lakes.

The road was beautiful, spring green fields with a white volcano peak popping up every now and then, and the odd lake saying hello too. We started down that awesome (this way round at least!) 4km descent, which we'd battled up a few days ago, then started tackling the hills. A few km later we saw what looked like a couple of battered cycle tourists sprawled out in a style that we know only too well.  We stopped to check they were ok - they weren't really. Two tired Swiss people, Tim and Magdelena, the morning after a night of wild camping, relatively new to south America (just 5days cycling so far), with the inevitable stomach bug that this continent imparts to outsiders on arrival. We felt their pain, discussed routes, then spurred them on and set off all four.

The next 30km was, for us, a fairly gentle potter along, wait for it... A fairly flat road!!! That went along a lake. It must be the only thing of its kind in south America!  We chatted about routes, jobs, hills, suffering and the joys of cycling with tummy bugs, where they'd come from (they camped in a water bottle distillation plant's grounds by mistake and got chased off this morning!), where they're going (ushuia hopefully), what they did (trainee doctors), how long they have (until January).
Eventually we came to Entre Lagos, our 30km point and a third of our day done. Ant and I decided to stop just outside town to pick up supplies for the journey ahead... The Swiss followed suit. A supermarket shopping experience that yielded both an empanada saga and an ice cream saga - I took the last empanadas for ant and I then felt incredibly guilty that there were none left (my guilt has not yet gone - poor Magdalena had to walk down the road to find another shop - of course I offered her ours, but she was having none of it, oh dear); revenge was had when my ice cream stick broke and I ended up with chocolate smeared all over my face - much to everyone's amusement of course!

We were hoping to wait for the others and help them along some more, but were also aware of the 60km ahead,  of which 40km had rippio potential. They didn't think they had 60km more in them so we said our goodbyes then off we pottered, slightly spurred on by a friendly workman (who might have also joined in laughing at my ice cream failure!) who said our road ahead was paved and beautiful - fingers crossed!

We soon realised we really should put more faith in workmen - the road was beautiful - stunning! Gorgeous spring green fields and trees with 4 snow peaked volcanoes peeking up all around. We frequently stopped for photos, breathed in the scenery and enjoyed a much easier 40km than we'd expected.

Then we turned a corner and had a huge long straight road, lined with amazingly tall trees and rising ever so slightly up hill with an ever so slight head wind. Still lapping up the beauty we weren't too worried we were having to work a little harder and still very thankful for the absence of gravel tracks.

Then round another corner and the road started tilting up and down just a bit more, and the wind started blowing just a bit harder... Only one thing for it... We stopped to eat a carrot! Ok so I know it sounds strange but we've been craving veg for a long time and have been carrying a bag of carrots around - why not indulge in some carroty goodness whilst psyching up for the last 20km?!

Carrot fuelled, we churned the pedals the last few km before the road turned right (this was exciting as it would mean the slight head wind turns into a slight tail wind and we needed this to lift our heads a little). We whizzed down the kilometers and soon had 8 to go, but now the map revealed an almost 180 degree turn to get into the town... Aghhh! Both shattered, the full on head wind that this resulted in, was the last thing we needed. I introduced Ant to the 1km on 1km off game spurred on by the fact the road was marked every 200m so we could clearly see who's turn it was on the front and how long they had there. This game got more exciting when the road started throwing in hills that lasted for about 750m - who would get lucky and have the downhill section on their turn?!

So mind games over, we descended into this sleepy, but very old German town, with houses build from wood that looked that they'd arrived fresh from a wild west film set, but with huge signs advertising "kuchen" - oh yes this town does cake like no other town! We cycled around surveying our new surroundings in search of a new home and saw a sign out the corner of our eye "bed and breakfast, cake, cyclists welcome" - seriously?!! We'll take it! A lovely owner greeted us (though she was mortified we caught her both without shoes and eating an ice lolly! What a crime! She hurriedly found shoes and gobbled down the lolly whole now feeling she was much more presentable and giggling in a lovely friendly way) showed us to a beautiful attic room and later we caught her making cake and jams for breakfast - heaven!

So all we had to do was find dinner, and it was late enough that we needed to find it quickly otherwise my hanger would read volcanic proportions. Naturally this meant we'd spend at least half an hour walking around the town in search of restaurants that either didn't exist or were closed (with signs clearly stating they are open - this happens so frequently we once had to check that we'd got our translation of open and closed round the right way!) and ended up back at the only (as far as we could work out) hotel/restaurant in town that was open (except a chip van which would do for seconds!) that was actually within shooting distance from our B and B.

It was a beautiful old hotel, but a very strange and slightly haunted set up. Tall grand ceilings, bare electrics that looked like they'd been installed just after electricity was mainstream, a grand staircase and a room full of old dolls and toys! They did do good food, though terrible service - but we didn't care, we gobbled down our roast pork chop, chips and tortilla and hurried back to bed - after all it was almost 9pm!!