29.1 mi / 6.6 mph / 2897 ft. climbing
Home: Esteban’s AirBNB

The roar of the churning Baker River was the only sound we heard all night. Even in the colorless pre-dawn light, it still glowed with an unusual brightness. We were up early as usual, but not as early as we would have been if our day-of-the-week timing hadn’t been as lucky. The Carretera Austral is continually being improved (well, during the summer season), and this summer they are doing major work on a 6-mile stretch in the middle of today’s ride. So major (including blasting) that they close the road to all traffic between 11:30am and 3:30pm. But only on weekdays, and today is Sunday! So we wouldn’t need to rush to avoid getting stuck for hours.

In some earlier year, a section of the highway had been chip-sealed, a surface we haven’t seen anywhere else on the Carretera (or South America for that matter!) It began yesterday at Puerto Bertrand, and continued today for miles as we followed the Baker River downstream (not without some steep up-and-down hills, but relatively flat). In New Zealand, it was always annoying to be on chip-seal, since it was slower than proper asphalt, but here, when gravel is the alternative, it feels like a tremendous luxury!

The broader construction zone began before the closure zone did, and despite it being Sunday, there was still active work happening, enough for us to be stopped twice for 10-15 minutes at a time. But as is often the case in construction zones, the widened gravel surface was in good shape, though it still covered some pretty brutal hills that were burning Rett out.

We made it through the far end of the closure zone by 11:15am, so we would have been ok even if we’d been riding on a weekday. But it was nice to not have the stress of a deadline hanging over us for the whole morning. But apparently they hand out “You Beat the Deadline” awards 7 days a week, so (along with our lunch break), we were granted 5+ miles of new asphalt! The stretch coincided precisely with the boundaries of Patagonia National Park (Chile’s newest), so perhaps it’s a case where the National Park system has a bigger budget than the highway department, or maybe they have some kind of mandate to protect plants and wildlife from the eternal dust-coat that comes from living next to a gravel road? Either way, we were glad to have it, since the hills remained a challenge even on the smoother surface!

For the last couple weeks, if a particularly gobsmacking scene is laid out before our eyes, Rett asks me if the Carretera Austral beats Peru yet (with the implication that for her, at least in that moment, the answer is “yes”). My answer still remains “no”, mostly because the mountain-and-water scenes, while coming with an unprecedented density, are just more “conventional” than the scenes in Peru. But today brought some of that feeling of massiveness that I associate with the Peruvian Andes, along a more-Peru-style road (with some switchbacks in and out of valleys).

So then it was perfect timing to see our first “new” wildlife in this country where it feels like we’ve seen a shortage. At first I thought it was a huemul (Andean deer) that we’ve been seeing signs for (but not yet encountered). But no, it was a guanuco, and then three more! That finally completes our quad-grid of South American camelids, after encountering many examples of the first three in Peru: the domesticated alpaca, its wild cousin the vicuña , the domesticated llama, and finally its wild cousin the guanuco. Even though we saw no signs at either border of the National Park, I guess someone most of told the guanucos where the boundaries lie?

Our AirBNB room was still being cleaned, so we found a place serving beers to celebrate our successful completion of Phase 4 (out of 5) of our Carretera Austral, and arrival to the next “safe zone” of Cochrane (all without Rett’s bottom bracket completely dying!) Rain began shortly after we checked in (eventually dripping through the roof in the kitchen of our rather ramshackle and oddly-laid-out “cabin”), meaning that once again we had perfectly-timed the weather for the last three days of riding.

Days 2-4

Home: Susana’s AirBNB

The AirBNB we had wanted to stay in wasn’t available on our first night in Cochrane, so that’s why we went with the cheap “it’ll do” option for one night. But that meant we had to move, and we killed time by getting lunch, visiting most of the grocery stores in town (where we found little produce better than 3rd-class), and sitting in the Plaza.

One of the “grocery stores” just off the plaza is also a hardware store. Maybe I can find a zipper there to jerry-rig a replacement for the busted one on our tent? Well, it turns out it’s not just a hardware store, it’s pretty much an amazing everything-store! The hardware section couldn’t help me, but maybe it would be worth it to buy a cheap tent from the “outdoor” section and just take its zippers? But then in the far corner I found a section with clothing, and fabric, and thread, and…yes, there are boxes of zippers that the ladies brought out for me! Even with the longest ones, I would need to somehow use multiples, which might not work…hmm. And then another lady remembered that they had bulk zipper tape! How much? Uh, I dunno, six meters? Four zipper pulls? Perfect! After just two nights of camping with Rett’s door stitched shut, I might be able to fix it, which I never thought would be possible in this remote place where it’s impossible to find a head of broccoli that isn’t a shriveled yellow blob.

Our new AirBNB was much nicer and larger, and included a little covered courtyard where I would spend many hours hand-stitching two zippers on top of Rett’s failed and my failing ones. We were lucky to have it too, since on two afternoons in a row, we had people looking to move in (the first just saw it as “available” on booking.com, but I think the second had actually booked it!) It seems our host is listing it on multiple services and doesn’t quite know how to block it off yet. Thankfully she made us feel like it was entirely our own. And we discovered one more grocery store in town just two doors down, which perhaps was the best one despite its small size. Lamby definitely thinks it was the best, since they were the only place that had Rett’s Tuareg cookies, and Rett immediately bought out their entire supply of 9 sleeves! I liked it because the clerk didn’t charge us anything for the marginal celery (which turned out to be reasonably edible).

We had booked four nights in Cochrane to rest up for our final phase and wait for the next good weather window. But it turns out it was even more important in order to receive the bike part that I had ordered from halfway across Chile to be shipped ahead to Cochrane. The guy at Viaje en Bici had originally told me that with express shipping via the Chilean postal system, it would arrive on Monday (our 2nd day). Since I was a bit slow on finalizing the order, I wasn’t surprised that by the end of that day the tracking still showed it sitting in Coyhaique where it had arrived on Friday (after initially passing through the capital, Santiago). But then, it didn’t move on Tuesday either. Shit. Maybe it’s a case where the final tracking just never got updated?

So Wednesday at noon I went over to the post office to inquire. Well, not the post office, because the address that “Correos Chile” lists as the post office is a cafe, and they’re apparently no longer the post office. But they directed me to a small business around the corner that is apparently the new post office. Well, no, it’s a print shop/electronics store, but they also have a shelf where they receive packages. The girl working there was super-helpful (even speaking English), but no, my package wasn’t there. Shit again. But wait, come back around 4pm, because she’s received a bundle that she’ll scan in then, but if not, the next bus should arrive tomorrow (yeah, we’re supposed to leave tomorrow!) So yeah, it turns out that there isn’t even a postal service vehicle delivering these packages, they’re just carried on buses, and thus only arrive two or three times a week. Ah ha, that at least explains the “stuck in Coyhaique” status! (and I’m sure the daily road closures into Cochrane don’t help either!)

Without a lot of hope, I returned at 4, and she greeted me with a big smile: my package was there! Show my passport, sign a register, and that’s how you receive packages as a foreigner in a remote corner of Chile! Luckily Ivan at Nomade Bikers was open and working at that hour, so I quickly brought Rett’s bike over to him(I think it’s literally the only time someone besides me has done work on either of our bikes!), and he got it turned around and ready for me to pick up in an hour. Phew! All fixed up with essentially no time to spare. Thanks Cochrane!