MUNGO EATS Latin America

For the second night in a row, we are parked in the middle of nowhere.  We decided to stay on the Argentinean side of the Andes for a while, and there is  very little between El Chalte’n and Los Antiguos.  In fact, aside from some guanacos, sheep and way too many rheas (I will never get used to these silly birds), there is almost nothing.  Things that are marked on the map as a town, may or may not be a town when you get there.  It may only be a group of 2 or 3 buildings.  Some of the large ranches or estancias are actually labelled on the maps, because…well, because there is nothing else to label. 

Last night we decided to camp on the shore of a large lake.  It sounded like a good idea.  The water was a beautiful blue-green.  Unfortunately, it was so windy, that we barely stepped outside long enough to enjoy it.  I got Mungo out for a crazy run around, which he does whenever he is a wide open space.  Other than that, we pretty much holed up inside the van and listened to the wind howl around us. 

Tonight, we are even worse off.  We have been driving on gravel roads for the past couple of days, but today the roads were reminiscent of the the horrific roads in Bolivia, which we can only go about 25-30 km/hr on.  We actually thought we would be stopping at a campground tonight, and tried to stop at three before actually ending up where we are this evening.  The first two were in a “town”, which literally consisted of about a dozen houses, 2 “campgrounds” and a gas station.  One of these “campgrounds” was closed, and the other one was literally someone’s backyard, with a couple of not so clean looking toilets.   I am sorry, but I am getting a little tired of paying someone to use a yucky toilet.  I actually prefer to pee in the “wilderness” than go amongst someone else’s filth!!  So we left the town and headed to the next campground.  This was an enclosed area on the edge of someone’s farm and although I did not check out the bathrooms, looked like a pretty good spot.  It also was CLOSED.  So here we sit in our current camp spot, a patch of gravel on the side of the road.  There is a creek nearby, BUT if we thought the wind was cold yesterday, we were crazy, because tonight it is darn well f-f-f-frigid!!!

Tomorrow we should be in Los Antiguos, on the shore of Lago Buenos Aires, the second largest lake in South America, after Lake Titicaca.  This town is supposedly sheltered from the crazy wind.  I cannot wait to get there!!