Greetings from Puerto Madryn



A quick update to the travel diary as we prepare to eat our dinner in Puerto Madryn. The last entry left us in Buenos Aires, preparing for another day of walking and seeing the Tango dancing in San Telmo. We headed out at the crack of dawn down to see if we could once again master the bus routes round the city. We had picked from the Lonely Planet the key tourist areas to see, so thought getting a bus there would be easy. How wrong we were ! None of the buses had the destinations on the front of them, so we ended up trawling bus shelters to find ones which went to Plazas close to where we wanted to go. Trev the master navigator and map reader wins again. We hop onto a bus heading for Palermo. This is an area of BA which has lots of parks, lakes etc and where at the weekend the whole of the city seems to hang out. Our first stop was the Botanical Gardens, which were beautiful if slightly over run by cats. It was nice to meander through the shade and although we had no idea what any of the plants were the fountains and statues were great to see.

From here we walked down to the park and lake area and had a nice wander, watching the runners, roller bladers, speed walkers, cyclists and other local nutcases doing their thing. Sports bras obviously haven`t caught on over here yet !

Our next stop was the zoo, as I had read in my Hello magazine on the plane that there were 6 white bengal tiger cubs born in the last month here, these mags come in handy occasionally ! So as well as seeing the normal zoo gubbins this was something we wanted to have a nose at. We were not disappointed as while we were watching them the cubs woke up and started to play and scrap. It was fascinating and the size of their paws looked a trifle scary.

On leaving the zoo we had the old bus game again trying to find one to Recoleta, another major tourist area, but seemingly no buses go there. We pestered a driver going in the general direction and he told us where to get off and roughly what direction to walk in. A long amble later, and after I had made a quick call to blighty to catch up with Sal. We found the area we were after. It was busy with a sunday markey so we mooched around this before heading off to find the cemetery full of famous dead Argentinians in huge tomblike things. Evita is allegedly buried there along with other presidents etc.

We headed up from Recoleta to catch another bus over to San Telmo to sit and watch the tango dancing in the square. After another walk from the bus we stumbled across the tango square and market. It was full of bustle, but we managed to see a bit of tango before settling down for a couple of well earned beers in the sunshine. Our feet thanked us for that.

On returning to our hostel it was a quick shower and then a sup of some local brew called Metti and a snack of Tortes de la Frites. The drink was the tea that the locals here drink, it tasted like a cross between green tea and soggy tobacco - needless to say we both just had the one sip and passed it on swiftly to the other people gathered there. The Tortes were like doughnuts though and took the nasty taste away :o)

After chatting to the other travellers, we headed out to Cafe Tortoni, a very old cafe in town. It is still decorated in its original 19th century style and had a great buzz about it. We both had some steak which at two pound a head was delicious. We headed home after that as we had to be up at 4am to catch our flight to Trelew.

An uneventful flight, without any brekkie which we were relying on ! Into Trelew and a taxi ride up to Puerto Madryn. It is very different country here. Very flat in comparison to what we have seen and not much vegetation. Looks very much like heathland with the odd sand hump and rock to break it up. We found our hostel and then managed to hire a car, a Ford Ka, the cheapest we could get - if only we had known what lay ahead.

We headed off up the coast to Puerto Norte, the furthest point we wanted to get to to see Sea Lions. Over to Trev now to complete the rest of the diary entry.

We had been told repreatedly by the rental company īthe roads are impassable if it rains - you must ask at the entrance before going in and if they say no then you must returnī. As we drove towards the peninsula we drove through some torrential rain and were looking at the sky very dubiously - hoping that it would clear up before we arrived.. As we pulled up to the barrier at the entrance to the park the rain had reduced to a gentle drizzle and the guard squinted at the sky and told us we should be okay.

Milly was driving as she canīt look at a map in a moving car (or thatīs what she tells me anyway) and the roads were made of a very thin layer of loose shingle on packed mud .- we merrily ploughed through the occasional small puddle on the way to Punta Norte. The distance to the view point was about 100k and about half the way there the rain got worse. The road conditions steadily declined... By the time we were getting close the car was starting to slide sideways at the slightest opportunity - Milly was turning into the skids like a pro - except for the grimace of mild panic on her face as we came very close to the edge of the īroadī on occasion (given the huge deposit on the car this was I suppose understandable) I was of course sitting in the co-pilots seat shouting incredibly useful advice - suffice to say it was lucky that certain fingers on Millys hands were otherwise occupied ;)

We saw some great wildlife at the three view points, sea liions, elephant seals and penguins. Unfortunately we missed the Orcas by a couple of days.

By the end of the drive Iīm not sure Camilla could even have picked up a pint (and you know how serious that must have been1!) as she had been holding on to the steering wheel so hard for so long. The car looked like it had taken a roll through a pig pen and we were seriously concerned about our deposit.

On returning to Puerto Madryn we had a large dinner (steak for Me and Half a chicken for Camilla) and crashed for the night.

Iīll pass back to Camilla now as I canīt get used to this strange straight keyboard. Milly here, I was getting frustrated with Trevīs typing not aided by hunger, and we know a hungry Milly is an angry one !

Today we had another drive along much drier but still loose shingle roads to see a Penguin Colony at Puerto Tombo. There were thousands of penguins there as it is their breeding time. There are supposed to be over a million of penguins along that stretch of coast. I had a quick chat to one penguin who seemed to take a shine to me. I think he was eyeing up my fingers for a pre dinner snack. We sat and watched them swim and dive in the sea which was great. They didnīt seem bothered by humans at all so it was great to get so close to them. The journey back today wasnīt nearly as eventful as yesterday which was a relief, we sat and listened to tunes to pass the time.

Tonight we are off to taste some of the local seafood which I am really looking forward to. Trev is grumbling about missing an opportunity to have yet another Argentinian steak. No doubt that will be rectified when we get to Ushuaia tomorrow evening.

We hope to get some piccies on the website soon but are having trouble getting them developed onto CD at the moment.