Six Weeks on the Carretera Austral

Day 22– Friday March 18: Villa Amengual to Manihuales

We rose in good time, fell in to hearty fare at our fishing lodge, checked the iffiness of the weather (rain; showers; sun?), and hit the road. A relatively short day ahead: 53km. We rolled down the paved road as it pitched and rolled through the amazing countryside; as usual we were spinning alongside a river, the valley lined with towering peaks, some snow covered, some with spires jutting skyward. The road repeatedly seemed to end in a box canyon ahead, only to slide cunningly through a gap and run in a new direction. For the last 10 or 15 kilometers we crouched low on our frames and flew downhill with the wind at our backs. And so by mid-afternoon we came speeding into the town of Manihuales, a gathering of nondescript buildings with corrugated tin roofs and siding, but in one of the most glorious settings imaginable: fields and forested foothills with snow covered peaks in the distance.

We stayed at a somewhat down-at-heels hostel, the Residentiale Manihuales, ate out nearby that evening, and went to sleep early. At three in the morning we were all awakened by the sound of torrential rain pounding down on the tin roof of our hostel and driven against windows by high high winds. Famous Patagonian weather. We had dark fears for riding the next day.  

Day 23 – Saturday March 19: Manihuales yields to Puerto Aysen

Morning arrived and the rain persisted, but we headed gamely to a nearby café for breakfast. There we met a group of Italian cyclists from Modena, heading south like us. We spoke with one of their group, and he told a story of ambitious riding. What with the rush of coffee and early eats, it seemed inevitable that murmurs of international competition began to spread. Them or us. And still the rain persisted. We returned to our hostel, packed up and got ready to ride. And then, from our window, we caught sight of the Italians through the windows of their bus, their bikes tucked conveniently in the back. Jokes were made (of course!), but the question seemed well-resolved. Us. And with a happy cosmic nod the rain diminished as we set out, disappearing altogether within a few miles.

Perhaps because we were still tired from the long ride two days before, and certainly because of a nasty headwind, the ride to Puerto Aysen seemed longer than it was – about 60km. Still, as usual, each mile brought a new landscape to feast on. We passed through river valleys and finished with a long stretch of level road. Once in Puerto Aysen we repaired to our splendid digs – individual kitchens in each unit! – and we all got some washing done and enjoyed the rest of the day. Our guides catered another unbelievably good dinner and we slept, well. Tomorrow, Coyaique!

 

Day 24 – Sunday March 20: Puerto Aysen to Coyhaique

A beautiful day in the port town of Puerto Aysen, and a moderate day of riding ahead: 63km, all on paved roads. We swept out of town in late mid-morning and spun our way back to an intersection where we took the road to Coyhaique. Ups and downs, as usual – and in one valley an elaborate waterfall shrine, with a beautiful falls, a shelter, lit candles, all dedicated to Our Lady of the Cascades. We pressed ahead, making our way upwards towards a pass back over the bottom of the Andes into a different microclimate. A long fairly steep stretch of road passed through an impressive tunnel and then continued to climb for a nearly a thousand feet. Now, instead of the thick green countryside we came into a much dryer landscape with sparse straight pine forests, much like passing from Western to Eastern Washington. At the summit of the climb was a lookout platform, and we pulled over. Far below us, and still several miles away the town of Coyhaique – the largest community we had seen since the beginning of the ride – spread beneath towering peaks and hills. We mounted our bikes again and plummeted down towards our destination, the Salamander hostel.

The hostel was located some 3km from the town, down across the Rio Simpson, famous for fishing. It was mainly a backpacker and cyclist hostel, and it had a distinctly counterculture feel about it. The rooms were small but adequate, and after we’d cleaned up we sat outside on a sunny deck rehydrating. Dinner turned out to be a massive barbeque put on by our guides. Laura, our main guide David’s partner, was arriving the next day from their home in Puerto Natales, so there was further cause for celebration.

The next day would be another moderate ride, so we decided to spend the morning in Coyhaique, visiting a bicycle shop and starting out after Laura arrived and we’d had lunch.

Day 25 – Monday March 21: Coyhaique shopping and a long descent

Early the next day we rose to breakfast and packing up our gear; the plan was to taxi into Coyhaique and after lunch return to the Salamander and set off on our relatively short ride to El Blanco, just shy of Balmaceda. All went according to plan: we visited a bike shop in Coyhaique and then wandered into the main part of town, stunned by the abundance of goods and number of shops. Coffee, not Nescafe, at a café with pastries and cakes. A North Face store. Craft stalls selling everything from alpaca wool things to silver jewelry.

Laura had arrived, and we all got to greet her, now own our best behavior. We all met for a splendid lunch at a small restaurant and then taxied back out to our Salamander b&b to get into our riding gear and start riding towards El Blanco, our next stop. The route climbed uphill for a very long time, following the course of the Rio Simpson; then, after a number of false summits, plunged downwards for miles to the little community of El Blanco, our destination. The descent can only be described as epic; some of us reached over 70km/hr on our mountain bikes with knobby tires. Happy days…

The El Blanco Hotel turned out to be a real find. For many years a fishing lodge, it had fallen on hard times and virtually closed, only to be rescued by a Santiago businessman who refurbished it. It had just opened in January and there were still some tags on the furniture. The main floor consisted of a brand new, vast kitchen, a large dining room and a big communal living room with a glowing fire. The bedrooms all had private baths, and it was near good fishing. We relaxed into it, preparing ourselves for the last of six consecutive days of riding. We hardly knew what awaited us.

Here's the blog from Day 26. Alas, we can't get to a place where the internet signal is fast enough to support sending pictures, even resized ones. And it's impossible to tell when a blog has been sent -- hence the doubling up.
I'll send along a couple more if this works. We can save the pictures for later.
It's very very remote here -- and wonderful. But we pay the price in modern conveniences...
--John

Day 26 – Tuesday March 22: One epic ride from El Blanco to Villa Cerro Castillo

During the night the temperature dropped into the thirties; it rained some too, and the wind picked up. Still, we met for breakfast hoping that our forecasts about stormy weather ahead might be faulty.  After breakfast we received good luck send-off hugs by the cheerful white-haired ladies who ran the hotel; then we headed out. Our luck held for a while:  the rain dropped off entirely and a tail wind chased us up towards a high pass through the mountains. After summiting the first 1000 foot hill, however, the long winding road became the long windy road:  we dropped elevation for a bit but now had to gain back what we’d lost, and more, making our way westward right into the teeth of a considerable headwind. The going was tedious and slow even on the downhills. Sometimes we were buffeted so powerfully that our bikes were blown right into the center of the road, with us leaning into the wind to keep from being blown away. At last we turned south again and began climbing with the wind at our backs. We were now at snow level: it lay on the pine shrubs next to the highway and tiny flakes drifted down. All around us towered steep rock walls that reached hundreds of feet in the air. We finished the last uphill part of the ride shaking with cold.

Our descent began just after we passed through a narrow cut in the rock, and the scene that spread out below us was astonishing. We had broken through the side of the mountains, and the road switchbacked downwards in an unbroken serpentine for nearly two thousand feet. We could see for miles below to the valley of the Rio Ibanez, where the village of Villa Cerro Castillo was located, and beyond to other ranges and valleys. The epic struggle was over; now we could collect our reward, plunging down the steep grade for the last few miles of the ride, stopping only for pictures.

We arrived at Villa Cerro Castillo (The Village at the base of Castle Mountain), a ramshackle collection of buildings marking the end of the paved road. Still cold from the mountain pass, we gathered for coffee in the only café and then proceeded to our hostel, the Teushenkenk, where we’d be staying for three nights. Mario and Soledad Ruiz, our delightful hosts, opened up their home to our tired crew. The electricity was off for the whole village and it was growing dark. We rehydrated by candlelight, ate in camplamplight, and collapsed into bed just as the electricity surged back on. A good sign…

This was not our biggest day: 66km and 3244 vertical, but it was our sixth day of riding in a row, and we all needed a couple days off. R & R was coming up. We were looking forward to each R.