We decided to go on to Argentina from Port Montt via the lakes district. We looked up the information and found that there were a series of bus and boat trips that could take you through to Bariloche. We took the route via Ensenada, Petrohue, Lake Todos, Los Santos and Peulla. The combined fares just seemed too exorbitant at the time so we decided to walk parts of the trip and pay our own way on the boat trips.

Again the intrepid travellers set off. We walked over the Argentina border. I can’t remember the distance but I know we were on the road for days. Over part of the trip it rained so much we ended up soaked through, of course our designer raincoats were pretty hopeless. We had to set-up camp in the rain and somehow or other Bob got a fire going and we managed to warm up quickly before jumping into bed. I don’t think we had much to eat that night. Thank heavens our bedding was reasonably dry and it kept that way through the night. By morning the rain had stopped so we got up and potted around getting breakfast and so on. As it happened we had camped next to a waterfall and to our surprise in the midst of our breakfast a tourist bus pulled up and dozens of people came over and marveled at our spirit.

Another incident whilst on the road. We asked at one of the small towns whether there were any places that might put up stray people such as ourselves. We were advised that up the road and on the bend there is a house that might do so. We eventually found the house which was quite grand and entered trying to find someone. Eventually we did and we told them our plight. They were surprised that anyone would point them out and turned down any opportunity to entertain us. We wondered later whether the people may have been left-wing sympathisers and the police (who gave us the information) might have been setting up Bob and I, as well as the people, putting us in an awkward position. Well anyhow they turned us out, so it was back on the road in the rain.

Eventually we reached the first lake and again we had to wait until the next day to get the ferry across. By this time we had no bread left and not a lot of food so I went into one of the resorts and asked about getting some sandwiches. The guy said we could but the price would be so and so, something I thought at the time was too much, so I said, “Oh no, we can’t pay that” to which he said “Wait there”. A few minutes later he came back with a loaf of bread from the previous day and he gave it to us. That was very nice and we did enjoy it even if it made us feel a bit like paupers.

The lakes were quite spectacular. But the individual ferry costs were so high we decided, in the end, we would have been better to take the package. The last lake, I seem to recall, was a very deep green colour very lovely. It was around this area that we met an American couple with their son 6-7 years old. They came from San Francisco and there they lived in the hills and had a marijuana plantation. The woman collected woven rugs from South America and they travelled down there quite often. The young boy was really quite special. He was very articulate and he had a bow and arrow that he was practicing with. The parents were probably in their 40s at the time and they both looked like they lived hard, pretty self indulgent lives. I wonder where they are now?

We stayed in Bariloche for one night and decided to have a swim in the lake, would you believe. I’ve never been in water as cold, it was a shock to the system. I guess the water came off the snow capped mountains, certainly refreshing. Then we sat on the shore and ate sausage sandwiches.

Again in an attempt to save money we thought we would try our hand at hitch-hiking. So we stood on the outskirts of the town with the thumbs out for a few hours and then just gave up and went to the railway and bought tickets to Buenos Aires. A trip that would take us 48 hours and would go through the famous Patagonia (desert area) and past acres and acres of grazing cattle. It was a good trip. Everyone set themselves up on the floor to sleep and so did we. Before leaving Bariloche we bought a selection of the famous chocolates and thought we could eat them throughout the trip but because it was so hot it didn’t take long for all the various flavors (Brandy, Contreau, Caramel etc.) to melt into one solid block, which we ate anyhow.

We met two interesting characters on the train. The first was an older man, probably in his 60s at the time. His name was Jack and he was from California. He told us he was an alcoholic and that he was fulfilling his final ambition to travel through the latin continent and then he planned go back home and drink himself to death. He had owned a bar and the life just got away with him. He couldn’t stay in one place longer than two days otherwise he’d find himself in a bar and unable to lift his head. He loved travelling and he’d already had one experience in an Eastern European country where he’d gone to a bar and some days later he recovered whilst they were literally throwing him out of the country. When we arrived in Buenos Aires Jack stayed with us for two nights then moved on. I sometimes wonder what happened to him.

The other guy was really out of it and he was heading up to Equador, or somewhere like that, to a jungle area where he was to meet with the famous witch doctors that make up ‘iawoska’; a drug that had an hallucinogenic effect. He had had one before and he said an effect was that he could see his eye from the inside. I sometimes wonder what happened to him as well.

The train arrived in Buenos Aires about 2 o’clock in the morning, we (with Jack) staggered around for a while looking for a hotel and eventually came across one that seemed a reasonable price. The guy quoted a price and we agreed so I went into the room and flopped on the bed. Soon after Bob came in saying no we have to go, the guy actually meant twice as much and we didn’t want to pay that for really a few hours. When I stood up the bed was covered with a thick dust off my clothes. Eventually we landed in the central park. We set up the stove and made a cup of tea and then laid down for a while on our mats. Well at least until a policeman came and stood looking at us in disbelief and moved us on. Later in the day we found a good hotel at a reasonable price and we ended up staying there four to five nights.

It was a good basic hotel, a good price and clean. The only draw back was that it was on the 7th floor and there was no lift. Needless to say we walked up and down those stairs a few times but when you are travelling you are necessarily fit by the nature of the task, so it was a sinch. Jack stayed here as well and we invited him to share with us one of our favourite meals, spaghetti bolanaise. By this time we had become quite proficient with the little camp stove. We most often rustled up porridge for breakfast which was a great staple but the washing up in cold water was always difficult. Furthermore by this time the stove needed a good service so it was pouring out black soot which also was impossible to wash off under cold water. Anyhow, we made the spaghetti, swapping pots and timeing bits and pieces to bring it all together and Jack loved it. He raved about the meal and said he would always remember the treat we gave him.

Argentina was incredibly expensive at the time we were there. There was talk of a devaluation of the peso (which was good for tourists but bad for the locals) but it hadn’t come to pass as yet. At the time we were there it was certainly one of the most expensive tourist destinations in the world. We heard a couple of months later the devaluation had taken place and the country became one of the cheapest. The exchange rate changed from something like 2,300 pesos for US$1 to 100,000 pesos for US$1.

Buenos Aires was a beautiful city. I have never been to Paris but I believe Buenos Aires is modeled along the same lines; similar architecture. There were numerous beautiful looking cafés everywhere. I say beautiful looking because we only saw them from the outside, nose pressed against the windows. The other predominant feature of the city was ‘cambios’ changing houses. That means places where people could change their pesos into dollars or currencies of any description so as to avoid losing money when the peso would fall. People must have ducked in and out of these shops whenever they had some spare cash or needed some quick pesos.

Furthermore, we learnt about the local housing loan system which ran along the lines where, when you took a loan for say 20 million pesos then you would owe, for example, 20 lots. ‘A lot’ could be worth 1 million when you took it out but the value of the ‘lot’ changed, so after a year or so the ‘lot’ could have risen to 2,3, or 4 million, or I presume go down to 800,000 or 500,000. So when you took out the loan there was great uncertainty about what you would be actually paying back.

At this time I still had my crutch to walk with so there were times when Bob would go out and I would either stay back at the hotel or sit in a park. One day while Bob was out he saw a protest by the ‘Mothers of the Disappeared’ outside the ‘pink’ government building, Casa Rosada, which is on the Plaza Mayo. This was where the President and Cabinet met. Numerous, hundreds, if not thousands of Argentineans had disappeared under various military dictatorships and most often being found dead or simply never being found again but the mothers never gave up hope and campaigned endlessly for their sons and daughters.
While we were there we found a bookshop with some English titles so I got a history of Eva Peron which was great to read. Eva Peron’s story is amazing in itself. At the time there was a rock opera in Australia on her life called ‘Evita’. And later in the ‘90s a movie staring Madonna as Eva Peron. Travelling provides numerous opportunities to read, the problem was finding good reading material. After we had read a book from cover to cover we would then swap with other travellers.

As I was saying the cost of living was so high at the time in Argentina a normal cup of coffee was US$2.50, which was very high then for tourists, so we tended to get the cheaper version which was called a ‘chickito’ at the cost of US$1.50. Over the week we were there that was all we bought, one chickito each. We cooked all our own food and made all our own coffees. That was another aspect of the trip that was terrific though. Because we cooked our food most often we sought out the local markets to get our supplies and the markets were usually a great place to visit.

In Buenos Aires we passed some antique stores that housed ancient relics. I can’t remember now what they were precisely only that they looked authentic and valuable, the kind of items that would normally be held in museums but in troubled economies people always find a way to get a price for them; the highest bidder.
We spent hours in Chile and Argentina looking for museums only to find the door securely locked. We eventually found one in Sao Paulo, Brazil. This was a great example of the local colonial past as it stored numerous artifacts from around the world, you could see priceless treasures that were probably indiscriminately stolen or bought for minimal amounts. I remember this was the one and only time I had seen an example of Egyptian culture in the way of a cask with a ‘mummy’ enclosed.

From Buenos Aires we went north to Rosario which was our friend Eva’s home town. This was a small town which was located on a river. It was a lovely river and a pretty town. From here we set off north to the Iguazu Falls via Pasadas and San Ignacio Mini. I think we travelled by train up to Pasadas and then by coach. We stayed in a camping area in Pasadas and then found our way out to the old Jesuit ruins at San Ignacio Mini. I remember one of the locals, a young woman, making a disparaging remark about the size of our tent in the camping area. It only weighted 1 kilo so it was very, very small, indicative of people who could mean trouble was the insinuation.

The ruins at San Ignacio have become famous in the movie ‘The Mission’ with Robert de Niro. The Jesuits originally set up the mission in 1609 and over 400 years had gone through an epic history of grandeur and decline. Various buildings remained that bear testament to the founders. Huge structures built from either stone or large bricks that stood, at some points, in the vicinity of 10 metres high with beautifully carved features and murals.

The countryside had by this time become jungle it was thick, sandy dirt which I believe became impassable in the rainy season. I think we went up to Port Iguazu to reach the falls. The Iguazu Falls are on the Parana River and lie between three boarders: Brazil, Argentina and Paraguay. We saw the falls from the Argentian side and then went on through the boarder to Brazil. It’s amazing how characteristics of a country become immediately obvious at the boarder. The Paraguayian officials wore ten gallon hats and boots to match. And the most distinctive feature of the Brazilian side were the numbers of children on the street.

The Iguazu Falls were spectacular. They are said to be the most beautiful in the world and well they certainly are fantastic. I think we chose to look around on the Argentinean side because of stories of looting and ambush on the Brazilian. We walked around all day, from morning to night, looking at different parts of the falls. There was a central part called the devil’s (diablo’s) throat but on the way there were many, many smaller parts of the falls that were all different and many very beautiful. Probably one reason why they looked so good was that there was plenty of water flowing over, giving both a fullness in supply and often a noisy rush that added to the drama.

I mentioned earlier that on the trip I had my Super 8 camera and have three 20 minute films (now on video) which document the trip. My mum, in particular, loves this part of the film, the day at Iguazu. Because the falls lie in a jungle area there were also numerous, if not hundreds, of varieties of tropical butterflies and tropical orchids. I managed to get some examples of the butterflies onto film. The combination of the falls, the colourful butterflies and the jungle setting, comes across rather exotic. The devils throat is an appropriate name for the central part of the falls, its just amazing how much water goes over here. A landing is set out as far as they have dared to give tourists the best view. We could see on the Brazilian side medium to small boats going out terrifyingly close to the drop so as to get an even better look. We trembled just watching from afar. Another unexpected delight was the flocks of some kind of black bird soaring through the spray that came out as the water fell and splashed to the bottom.

The falls marked the end of that part of our trip. We left Argentina from here and then set off onto a new adventure into Brazil, then Bolivia, Peru, Equador and home. We had been travelling about 4 months and had what became a further 5 months to go. We spent 2 months in Brazil, 1 month in Bolivia, 1 in Peru and approx 1 in Equador.