FAQs - in no particular order of importance.

On the road FAQs - in no particular order of importance.

What about toilets?
Driving in South America is so much easier than Africa, there are Tarmac roads for a start, although we have been on some dry and dusty unpaved roads, the dust can be a real problem but mostly there are still pretty good roads. 
Toilets; most of the service stations boast the best toilets ever, very clean and definitely of a very high standard. The toilets in Peninsula Valdez information centre are spotlessly clean with the added advantage of some wonderful views of the Atlantic Ocean! If you are lucky you might see a Southern Right whale passing the bog.
In real emergencies, there is always the odd bush / tree / abandoned building/ small hill, and you have to choose carefully or be quick. Beware of thorn bushes and creepy crawlies. Sometimes, I use the van to provide some cover, I just get comfortable and the idiot behind the steering wheel always insists on tooting the horn or revving the accelerator. So childish!

Your shower awaits, Sandra trying it out.

What about  showers and stuff?


Our portable solar shower is well employed especially when we choose to wild camp in some beautiful isolated spot. 

Before setting off in the morning, Noel fills the shower bag with water, it's strapped to the back of the van, and the sun does the job of heating the water. By the end of the day, we have a bag of warm water, suitable for 2 people, but in case I need to wash my hair, Noel needs to add a kettle of warm water to supplement it. We have a shower tent that pops up in seconds, although light and flimsy looking, it does the job, just need to make sure that we don't have a shower in the Patagonian wind......see blog on Buenos Aries. We are not exactly having a difficult time with this. Most of the service stations that we stop at have fantastically clean shower facilities. Just had one of the best hot showers, it only cost 20 pesos, about a £1. In some places it's free.

Does Noel do most the driving? Yes

I do drive a little bit, but someone has to navigate, plan the route and use the SatNav. There is the onboard catering to consider like coffee and biscuits, chewing gum, as well as deciding whether we play La Boheme or Jethro Tull on our new car radio CD player, which we spent a fortune having it installed in Buenos Aires. Noel hates the SatNav, why can't we use the map and compass, he is forever complaining. If I make even the smallest mistake he calls me Vasco, I dont know why.

Map reading 

What about money?
We are spending a lot, tried to have a budget of £50 a day, but with some of the extra expenses we had, it hasn't quite worked out that way so far.

Cheap meal in local restaurant, just after crossing into Chile, but we got charged 6 Euros for 2 onions!
During the border crossing we had to hand over all our fruit  veg and meat, hence the onions for the lentil curry.

Our credit / debit cards works like magic in the supermarkets and most banks here. Some  Argentinian ATMs are not so good as they charge up to £5 for a maximum transaction of 2000 Arg Pesos (about £100


Laundry

Washing machine

Switching over to spin cycle

His underpants have gone all baggy!!

We have a  water tight container,actually a mango chutney barrel. we fill it with water, detergent and dirty laundry, it is then strapped to the back of the van before we set off. During the drive, especially over rough terrain, the laundry gets thoroughly washed,  all we have to do  when we arrive at our destination is to rinse it out and hang them out to dry.








Food
Steaks, hamburgers and chorizos ( big fat sausages!) and barbecues.

Noodles!

The pressure cooker (thank you Susan) is very well used for some easy one pot meals. Stew, hot pots, curries, lentils, all served with the odd starch and salads, nourishing and healthy.
 We have had some odd combinations though. You don't always have to have rice with chilli con carne, spaghetti works just as well. I did make a tuna and sweet corn pasta, it turned out the tin of sweet corn was actually a tin of sweet corn gruel ( I couldn't read the Spanish, just saw the picture and assumed they were sweet corn kernels). Anyway, it was horrid, though our German friends were very polite and ate most of it.
At every campsite, each pitch has a barbecue pit, just bring your own meat and get started. We have had some fantastic barbecues, steak is cheap enough for us to indulge.

Shopping
Shops are well stocked, there are large 'supermercados' selling everything and anything you need. We bought Noel a reclining chair  for his birthday.

How long will you be on the road? 
 Don't know

What do you miss?
Proper wholemeal bread.

What do you do to get away from each other? Plug in the headphone and you are in another room.
I tend to play spider solitaire whilst listening to a favourite opera whilst Noel spends a lot of time gazing at the goodies on eBay that he is not able to buy. Not true, he did manage to buy a wreck of a car which was used in a  famous BBC TV car programme and left Daisy to organise it being delivered.


Activities of daily living on the road 

No time to be bored. A typical day starts with simple breakfast, usually instant oats, then we pack up the van and set off. It  takes at least  an hour to get going, we can do it in less time, but Noel is not really a morning person, by the time he 's had his 4th cup of coffee in bed, we will have used up the hour. We tend not to rush around unless we have a deadline and we try not to have deadlines. Sometimes we plan where we are going but it has been known where we get in the van and realise that we haven't even looked at the map or considered what the next destination would be. It all sounds a bit hit and miss and somewhat chaotic, but it works!     

Can't see the dust and fumes, but definitely part of the lunch.

We usually stop for lunch          
 ( sandwiches and a cup of soup) somewhere scenic hopefully, but we have stopped in some not so nice places too, such as the time when we had lunch  in the middle of a very busy lorry park with fumes and dust all around us.

Rodin in Buenos Aires

The day may include some sight seeing, going to places of interest, sometimes to must see places or just visiting local shops. We try to include a 40 - 60 mins walk where 
possible.


Murals with some powerful political messages

Sight seeing in St Julien

chile

Volcano at Pali Aike National Park, Chile

Stopping in some lovely places to wild camp works well,  
it's usually free to stop at service stations where there are toilets and sometimes showers, we haven't as yet stayed in a hotel. 
Making a decision about where to stop in the evening usually happens at around midday, we may have some vague idea as to where the different stopping places are.  We have the  IOverlander application on our hand held mobile cellular telephone, which has been extremely useful. Sometimes tips and advice from other travellers offering directions and helpful hints about campsites / service stations / nice scenic spots for wild camping, as well as providing information on costs, suitability of the ground and wifi availability.

Wild camping on the clifftop, Kinh leading in the chopping up of firewood, but the
 force 10 gales did not allow for the campfire, instead we all retired
to our van to watch a video

This is 6 of us watching a video in the van

When we stop, providing the weather is good, there are usually several chores to accomplish, checking the van, setting up, includes putting up the awning, chairs and table, making a living area suitable for the rest of the evening. 

Van getting a huge amount of salty mud jet washed off

One of us will be checking out toilets/showers/ cooking facilities and the local area for safety. Mosquitoes flies and stray animals eg cats, dogs, the odd armadillo or llama sometimes charming, often a real nuisance. If the weather is wet or, more likely, windy then we tend to sit inside the van  and read or play Scrabble.

By the time we've sorted out dinner we might play a game or two of scrabble or watch a movie. Daisy has kindly downloaded lots of films for us which for which we are grateful. If we stop somewhere nice and where there are good facilities like Internet, laundry and showers, we'll take a break from driving and spend 2-3 days resting and catch up on 'The Archers', read a book, chatting and getting to know other travellers or local people. Of course if we have internet then we have the blog to do and emails to reply.
Great life!

Trucking south!

Leaving Buenos Aries far behind us now we have moved into the vast region of Patagonia.

The countryside is made up of unbelievably long straight roads with a fascinating vista of rough pampas and grassland.

The long unwinding road

Slightly alarmingly I set the satnav for a destination. And it showed that there were no turns for 120 km. It can be pretty dull and hard to stay alert. Occasionally we get stuck behind a truck. We only go a bit faster than the lorries which means that at 80 Kmph we have to have almost a kilometre to overtake. Add to this, we have discovered a design fault with our van. Apparently, some idiot has fitted the steering wheel to the wrong side! This means that Ping has to lean out and spot any opportunity for overtaking. Any vehicle that can be seen even in the distance means that we don’t have time to overtake. It can be a bit tiresome.

lots of Llamas or Guanocos

We have spoken a bit about the weather but it is worth mentioning here that although the days can be extremely hot they are not always, in fact as I write it is pretty chilly. If you also consider that a feature of Patagonia is that the wind blows hard pretty much constantly. You can have hours of unvarying wind no gusting no change of direction and certainly no respite. A couple of days ago we had constant rain and wind for most of the day. Don’t get me wrong I am not complaining as I am so aware that it is pretty chilly at home just now. It worth describing how different the conditions are here.

and cows

Cows and Llamas

On these long roads we often stop at gas stations They are well set up for travellers staying overnight. They will usually have a very pleasant little café, wifi and hot showers. So you see we are not exactly roughing it.

In the past few days we have visited a couple of very interesting locations. 

Peninsular Valdes.

This is a national park that is at the end of a long narrow stretch of land. It is pretty barren but supports some visible wildlife such as llamas and Rheas these are birds rather like an ostrich. But it is the Marine wildlife that is specially interesting.

 We camped on a beach overlooking a bay that was really beautiful. We were told that Southern Right whales often put in an appearance. Sadly they did not show up for us We were told that on a spring tide they come up to rocky shelf of the bay almost in touching distance. 



Every now and again an Orca will pop in. We were disappointed not to see this but the sea lions and sea elephant were well worth the visit. These animals are seen from a short distance away but are well protected by rangers. They are truly magnificent and absurd in equal measure . I am speaking of the sea lions etc not, of course, the rangers.

Magnificent Bull Sea Lion

His wife +2.4 children

It's a tough life

The sea elephants are as ugly as sin but they are very big and imposing. So called because they have a huge bulbous nose which acts as a sounding board for their loud call or roar.

The Sea lions, I always thought in my ignorance that are like large seals but in fact the male is really magnificent when it postures he will sit up and his top half has exactly the profile of a male lion and they are really something to see. They don’t do much when they are visible on the beach as they spend their day sunbathing. Most of their activity, of course is really shown in the water. The females and babies just lie in the sun and look, for all the world like very big sardines. 

American Oyster Catcher very tame and beautiful

It is late spring here and the bird activity is great to see as the chase each other around very where. What is interesting is that they seem to be completely unconcerned about the presence of people. They come right up close and just go about their business as if you weren’t there.

It was not difficult to make friends with  this Armadillo

Where we had parked our van we had a hairy armadillo come up and mooch around our feet. He stayed quite a while. I have to say he was really cute. I guess he must be a bit habituated to the presence of tourists and food but even so it was a great thing to see. Rather like the Siamese cats in the song. “Where there is baby there is milk nearby”!

We were told to expect to see whales come in on the 1.0clock tide but, no show! I gather that whales are notorious time keepers.

Gazing out to sea .... No whales !

Despite their absence it was a lovely time we spent on this beautiful peninsular.

After a few days we headed back to the mainland and the rather featureless landscape of Patagonia. 

We were now headed to a place that I had been really looking forward to. I have known for a long time about the Welsh community in this region and I have always enjoyed the idea that somewhere else in the world is Welsh speaking area.

I had read that they even practice the ancient sport of ‘Purring’ which is where two men will kick at the shins of the other until one of them falls over. What larks eh?

I have to say that in my ignorance I did have a mental image a small tribe of hardy Welshmen clinging to the sheerface of some stony cliff and somehow eeking out a living. Not at all the case.

Before leaving home I had the good fortune of seeing a really lovely program by Huw Edwards about the Welsh in Patagonia.

Here’s the history bit...........

In 1865 a group of Welsh people about 150 boarded the Clipper Mimosa and headed for Patagonia where, led by Lewis Jones and Edwyn Roberts they set about establishing  a community which over the next 150 odd years would in turn establish several successful and important towns. What I found fascinating to learn was, that their motivation was based on the belief that that the South Walean industries were becoming so dominated by English speakers that they feared that welsh would die out if they did not do something. So they set about deliberately establishing the language elsewhere. 

Mural made by the local high school depicts The flourishing agriculture as a  result of the comprehensive irrigation system built by the Welsh settlers

Of course they brought with them their own qualities such as engineering and agricultural skills together with significant determination.

The first house built in Gaiman

During the course of developing the towns of Port Madryn, Trelew and Gaiman and others. They achieved the transformation of agriculture by implementing a complex system of irrigation canals fed by partially diverting the River Chibut. This was not universally popular as it was said that they were depriving cattle ranchers of their valuable water. Nevertheless the system was set up and still functions well today. 

The area in which this extraordinary community sits is, by comparison to the rest of the countryside, fabulously verdant and fertile.

We visited the Town Trelew and with all my expectations I was disappointed as what I found was a large sprawl of industry and commerce where many of the streets had Welsh names and little more to celebrate its roots or at least nothing immediately apparent to a passing traveller.

However with a bit of guidance we went on to the town of Gaiman which was a different story altogether a small town with Welsh chapels lots of places and business’s with Welsh names.

More Welsh dragons that you can shake a stick at. 

Welsh tea house 

Ah Tea!

And quite a number of Welsh Tea houses where you can have lavish spread of tea and cakes. MMMM not to be missed! 

And cakes.  There's lovely!!!

Of course Spanish is spoken too, this is, after all a Spanish speaking country.

In the past Argentiian governments have deliberately and quite efficiently managed to expunge most of the other languages in the country. However when they began to ‘discourage’ The Welsh language, I have the impression that a cry went up along the lines of ‘Come on folks we haven’t come all this way to have our language defeated. With a high degree of determination they managed to allow the language to not only survive but to actually flourish. I was delighted to meet Julian a Spanish speaker who spoke passable English but was particularly proud that as he attended the Welsh College for his other studies he was also learning Welsh.

see above

Huw Edwards noted in his program that he attended a chapel service where the Spanish speaking priest conducted the service in Welsh.

The town did once have a railway linking it to Trelew and to Peurto Madryn. That went in the mid 60s. Possibly one of the ‘Beeching cuts?’ There was a plan put forward to build a tunnel through part of the town which for some commercial reasons was quite threatening to the town. The local community said no,  to it. The industrial backers were insistent and confident and built the tunnel anyway. Again it is a testament to this plucky little community that now possesses a railway tunnel that has never had a train through it! Although now closed the engine shed still stands, as does the station, though it is now a small and interesting town museum.    

The old engine shed.  Some say that Ivor the engine and Llewelyn the dragon moved here on retirement

The old station now a museum run by a very nice man

 Railway tunnel, never used

                                                              This nice old town really has such a character all its own But make no mistake this is no cultural museum piece it is a working commercial town and Trelew may have disappointed me for not being outwardly ‘cultural’ it is however a true testament to the real life success and pride of this collaborative Spanish/Welsh community, with such a rich tradition of defiance.

Having had our fill of tea and magnificent cakes we moved on.

The next drive was quite scary. Ping had taken over the driving for a bit that certainly relieved the boredom. But seriously though folks! The roads manage to become flatter, straighter and less inspiring than ever making it really difficult to maintain concentration. Ping had become troubled by my snoring while at the wheel so decided, wisely, to take over, and very glad I was too.

We have just passed through the largest town in the region Comodore Rivadavia. This is a busy commercial centre with a strong military presence.

The towns slogan seems to be written on every street sign ‘Malvenas Fueron son y seran Argentinas!’ Which as far as I can translate means The Malvenas are and always will be Argentina! Something to think about.

Believe it or not, this is the local high school!

Papa Noel  on the last day of school

 We are now in a neighbouring town which is pretty seaside resort. Very quiet as the season has yet to start. We think the Christmas / Summer holidays start next week. Our camp is run by the local council and is very good indeed for the first time in a while we have mains electricity running water hot showers and red hot wifi. Wow all the comforts of home!

There are school groups come here to camp or to have a days outing. One such group of younger kids had a visit from Santa who arrived on the roof of the local Fire engine. It was a real blast.

So I guess now as we have still quite a way to go to Ushuiaia we may not have another postcard from us.

I must note that, having complained about the flat boring roads, to our amazement as we leave this town we are treated to the most lovely arid desert mountain scenery. All is well!

So let us wish one and all a very; Feliz Navidad y Ano Nuevo !!!

                        

                              Very merry Christmas and happy New year!!!

Cheers!!!

Important!

Some folks have sent us emails and we have either not received them or the replies have gone astray.

If you have sent us anything and you feel you are owed a reply do please keep trying. We really love to get emails and make a point of replying to all of them.

When travelling like this it is often difficult to get wifi at all and sometimes it is very week. So it can be quite hard work keeping up. Please don’t give up on us 

We really love to hear from you.