Day 4 & 6 - Traversing the Steppes and Mountain Shadows
The two intermediate days of our trip that I have yet to chronicle were similar in ways, in that they mainly were spent driving from Point A to B, one of the sad realizations when those points are a few hours apart, across country lines. Both of the drives did have interesting elements worth chronicling, however.
The main one was the staggering beauty at times during those drives. There were a mixuter of scenes, from roaring steppes as far as the eye can see, with sunlight bathed across the plains through minimal cloud coverage, to the animals that roamed these areas, from seemingly millions of sheep, as fat and cute as ever, to Guanaco's and the few rheas that we could spot between the brush and shrubs.
The second was probably the strange, if actually quite effective, border patrol that Chile and Argentina institute. Our road crossing was the 'Rio Don Gullerme' crossing, between Cerro Castillo on the Chilean side (about 45 minutes north of Puerto Natales), and Cancho Carrera on the Argentinean side. The space in-between, about 20 or so kilometers, is essentially no-man's land. Given that, no country decided that land and the roads inside it were worth tarring, leaving pot-hole ridden dirt roads.
Each border requires you to park your car in the line-up (for us, luckily, few cars were around), and going into a building first giving all your passports, then the car information that shows you are permitted to drive that vehicle in that other country. Then, the same exact steps happen in the same order at the other crossing. If anything, it is uniformly quaint compared to the time-suck operation between the US and Canada road borders, and is a great way to snap up passport stamps in quick order.
The road conditions on the hole were probably the 3rd commentable point, in how varied they were. The roads on the Chilean side were nice, concrete highways, if a bit small in there being just one lane on each side. Argentina was another story. We were warned a few days earlier to take a slight detour on the way to El Calafate, driving straight from the border to Esperanza (about 150 km), and then up to El Calafate, instead of take the new road that connects the two legs of that triangle. While this would add roughly 90km the drive, it would also avoid Argentina's treacherous dirt roads. The fact that that dirt road was a marked, international highway, is the more interesting part. These, we thought, would be fairly busy roads, and we were definitely wrong, as there was only sparse traffic. Given the road conditions, I'm not surprised.
The final takeaway is the total lack of life outside of animalia during those rides. There were only a handful of actual towns we crossed on all of the drives, both the 7 hour journey from Punta Arenas to El Calafate, and the return 4-hour journey back to Puerto Natales (which is one of the towns on the longer drive). There were even fewer gas stations. The lack of gas stations is so notable it is basically a commandment in Patagonia to fill gas whenever you run across one, with the implication that the next bunk could be hours and hours away. The whole isolation was just another sign of how different, how hauntingly special it was to be so far away from home.
The meals during these days were a mixed bag as well. On the drive back from El Calafate it was literally a mixed bag of goodies from Don Luis, a semi-upscale looking panateria on El Calafate's main jaunt. We got a mix of sandwhiches, empanadas, and assorted breads and sweets that served us well. During the drive up to El Calafate two days previous, we had timed it to be able to stop in Puerto Natales on the way. I did some quick last second Googline and identiified Cafe Antimana, a superbly rated spot for a quick bite.
Cafe Artimana lived up to reputation. It was an impeccably designed cafe inside, if a bit small, but with little touches ;like the light fixtures made out of kitchen appliances like cheese graters. The food was very good. We shared a perfectly seasoned Pumpkin Soup, and then two plates, one being a lamb tenderlion - which continued the run of good lamb, and a 'Plato del Pobre' (Plate of the Poor), which is a beefsteak, potatoes and fried egg, made with a little more flair than than those were done back in the day. Both dishes were hearty and well made, allowing us to need minimal sustenance on the rest of the drive.
The dinners each day were also quite good, both taking place in that cities final destination. In El Calafate, it was actually a journey to get there. We met my sister's boyfriend who was joining the trip that day and had flown there directly. The three of us were supposed to go to a steakhouse named Mi Rancho, but we had to push our reservation back, and while on the phone they agreed, it seemed they had second thoughts and the place was close. Our audible was to go to the highly rated Buenos Cruces, which is an impeccable mom and pop operation that served great food.
It was an incredibly homey place where the two waitresses (one of whom is a co-owner with her chef husband) seemed to know all the other guests. We had a few dishes that day, including pork shoulder (very good), a braised lamb shank (even better), and a guanoco meatloaf (another great guanoco dish - continuing a theory that cute animals taste amazing). After dinner, I went to La Zorra Taproom, which honestly could deserve its own post (I may don one especially about the various night-time bars I went to). La Zorra was designed like a perfectly American craft brewery. It was really well laid out, and serfved great beer, and was absolutely packed, despite me arriving at 12:30 and leaving at 2:00. It was a place I just had to come back to.
In Puerto Natales, it also coupled as New Year's Eve. Our hotel 'Hotel Costaustralis' was having a New Year's Eve set-meal dinner in their restaurant that was excellent (I got guanoco carpaccio as a starter, lamb chops as a main, and a dulce-de-leche pancake as a dessert, all good, and all plated really nicely on slate0. When New Year's hit, they served us all champagne. The night ended somewhat early, at 12:30, as we all had to get up early for our full day at Torrest del Paine to come, and man was that a good decision.
