34.0 mi / 7.1 mph / 2036 ft. climbing
Home: Cabañas Los Alamos

With today’s route into the town of Puerto Rio Tranquilo now 10 miles longer than I had initially planned, we were again up at 4:30am. I’d put a 50% chance on someone showing up and setting up camp after we had gone to sleep (because most other cyclists here are crazy), but stepping outside of the abandoned house revealed nothing but the full moon setting behind the black wall of mountains (by the time I fetched my camera, it had already disappeared!) It was 53°F inside the house, and despite having no glass in the window or door in the doorframe, it was definitely warmer than outside, perhaps signaling a return to normal after the strange heat of the last couple mornings.

Many iOverlander reviews about wild camping spots on the Carretera Austral say something like “it’s visible from the road, but there is no traffic after dark anyway”. Rett counted six cars passing in the darkness between our 4:30am wakeup and our 7am start, so either those reviewers are all too asleep to realize how many vehicles continue overnight, or predawn traffic (like many other things) has increased in recent years. Either way, we were completely undisturbed, and I’m sure it wouldn’t have been any different if we’d pitched our tent out in the open.

The gravel-gods chose to smile on us, granting a near-pavement-like “wet” gravel for the first 10 miles. I don’t think it rained at all overnight, so the damp surface (and resulting smoothness) must just be a result of a shaded riverside microclimate much wetter than the dry lands around Coyhaique we were in a few days ago. Combined with the mild hills, we were able to “finish” the last 10 miles of yesterday’s ride in 80 minutes, literally twice as fast as our first 10 miles yesterday. When we passed our previously-targeted campground, Rett said “yeah, that would have been impossible to do yesterday”. I disagreed; it certainly wouldn’t have been fun, and even in retrospect I would have recommended against it, but now knowing how relatively “easy” the stretch was, I think she could have made it if we’d had no other option.

When the road crossed to the west bank of the Murta River, the gravel gods suddenly revoked their beneficence, returning us to some of the worst loose and washboarded stuff from yesterday. I guess they just wanted to help us get back on track with our original plan? Which…fair! After a couple miles, the loose piles became more-compacted, but washboards remained a regular problem. Especially to Rett’s backside, since her ability to rise from her saddle while moving is a skill she’s still developing, so she was pretty much taking a direct hit from each bump. The nice “wet” gravel of the morning soon became a distant memory, with passing vehicles now kicking up thick clouds of dust. Many of the hills were quite steep, and although Rett’s stomach had thankfully settled compared to yesterday, I still helped ferry her bike up several of them. The only other touring bike we saw all day on the road was in the back of a passing pickup truck, which made Rett surprisingly angry, but I think in retrospect she will feel proud for not “cheating” (heavy air-quotes there, since there is obviously no such thing as “cheating”, but it’s still fair to take pride in our efforts).

So despite changing up the last two days of our four-day stretch from Coyhaique a little bit, we made it to Puerto Rio Tranquilo just as planned, and checked into the small-but-livable cabin Rett had found and booked for us on WhatsApp. Having no chips to eat with our roadside PB&J lunch was maybe the biggest consequence of our change, since the original idea had been that a short final day would get us to PRT by lunchtime. Instead, we went out to a hopping place for a burger and beer dinner. In the evening, a windy rain kicked up, marking a well-timed end to the perfectly-clear stretch that got us to here from Coyhaique, exactly as predicted.