MotoAventura to Punta
Arenas
A quick decision made me take the Route 40 to Punta Arenas in a
motorcycle.
The
adventure began when 4 Spaniards contacted with us to organize a trip in
motorcycle to Punta Arenas. They arrived with their motorcycles directly
from Spain to Santiago and then to Osorno, where we went to look for
them.
The
first night they stayed there and left early the next day to Bariloche
to continue then to the Patagonia. They went alone, without our guidance.
It was a group with experience, they have traveled in Alaska, Africa and
didn't need our support.
We helped them with the hotel reserves, information of the routes and
support.
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Day 1 : 09:00 hs.
I leave from Osorno
with a lot of energy and unknown destiny. I would sleep where the
night found me.
The idea was to
advance the maximum possible to Argentina.
Bariloche, El Bolsón,
Esquel and then to Tecka.
Five km. before arriving to the service
station in Tecka, my Africa started to give alarms of lack of
benzine. "¿What was the problem? ¡I still have the reserve!" - I
thought. Error, a funny person turned the key and it was already in
reserve, wich means, without benzine.
I couldn't push the
motorcycle so many km.. It was time to initiate desesperate moves.
In spite of the weight I managed to incline it the sufficient to
make the last drops to get closer to the key and so I was able to
make the motorcycle to move again and arrive to the station to
refuel my dear "Corralera" (nickname I gave to my motorcycle in a
moment of the trip that I will later tell).
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Día 2 : 20:00 hs.
When I was arriving to
the Mayo River I thought in finishing the first day and changing the "covers".
( I left home with a Dunlop D604 and took also soe Metzler Sahaa
3 with me ).
Noticing that the sun was still shining I decided to
continue to Perito Moreno where the famous gravel of the route 40
started, and to take advantage of the light I continued without
changing the tires.
The 134 km of the route waited for me with very
marked tracks and "camels" of loose gravel. The patagonic wind seemed
to be a hurricane. My tires literally sailed on the gravel. The wind
insisted in carring me to the threatening knolls of gravel. A constant
and very demanding fight to stay free of falls took me to Perito
Moreno, place where I would camp.
After cheking the values of
some hotels and seeing it was not worth to camp, I decided that my
body was not in its whole shape and had to sleep in a bed after taking
a refreshing shower...
They were already about 1000 km traveled.
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Day 3: in the
morning
Without delay I arranged myself to change the motorcycle's "shoes" .
The only rubber store that was open, allowed me to enjoy the pleasant
maneuvers that this change implies. The patagonic wind already touched
me in a rude way. In the town's streets you were able to see little
bushes much like the ones in the movies of abandoned towns.
Between
maté and gossips someone told me that one of the Spaniards clients had
and accident in the gravel. The wind blew him out of the road moving him
a few meters to the prairie.
At noon I finally left the rubber store
with new covers. The movement improved, but I had to keep facing the
wind with the motorcycle turned a little to the sides like a horse.
After about 130km I arrived to a town, it was more like a group of
lost houses called Bajo Caracoles. There the need to load some fuel and
to add an extra reserve can of fuel because in the next 340km I would
find NOTHING!!! |
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One option was to take a detour of 140km to enter
Gobernador Gregores to load fuel, but I decided to find extra reserves and
arrive to Tree Lakes. In this last town the fuel store is about 2 km of the
crossroads to Calafate.
During the this whole trip I thought a lot in
the state of the Spaniard and how the motorcycle would be after the accident.
After endless hours, lots of stones, dust and wind, I arrived at nightfall to
The Calafate. Nice and rustic town with a lot of foreign activity. Lots of
hotels and restaurants that own their existence to the impressive Perito
Moreno snowdrift. After seeing some hotels, all occupied, I found a room to
stay. This time there were 700km of only gravel. Enough for one day.
There I managed to find the Spaniard and their hotel. The whole town
knew about the accident and how injured the man was. Lot of contusions of many
colors and the half sleep friend after so many sedatives in his body. After
making commentaries I asked for the motorcycle.
They informed about
the damages and that the motorcycle was beign kept in a property in 350km from
The Calafate. I had passed only a few meters from it without knowing it was
there.
Luckyly they had already organized the transfer to The calafate and
it would arrive on Sunday
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My aim was to find them in Puerto Natales and then ship the
motorcycles to return to Puerto Montt. It has been a while since I made a trip
all alone. It was going to be an adventure because I had the idea to make the
trip only 48 hours before the departure. A madness if we consider that I
traveled about 7.000km in total.
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Day 4 : morning
We decided to go with
the Spaniards to the snowdrift while the injured Spaniard tried to
recover in the hotel. We traveled 80 km before arriving to the
snowdrift and 40 km of the road were - of course - gravel but, this
time, very good gravel and with the wind in front of us wich
guaranteed that we will arrive completely full of dust. But the
effort is
justified: it is hard to reproduce in
some photos how impressive the snowdrift is.
In the evening we were already back in town. The motorcycle didn't
arrive that day.
We decided to enjoy the town and I had to change
hotels, I only was able to find hotels for one night only. Before
going to The Calafate, it is very recommendable to make reserves in
advance.
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Day 5
The
motorcycle would be arriving at midnight, that's why we decided to
continue traveling to Torres del Paine. To not lose the habit we
continued in the route 40. Gravel and wind gave us the welcome.
We
made the entry to Chile in the passage Cancha Carrera, in Cerro
Castillo.
Once in Cerro Castillo the "surviving" Spaniards decided
to go directly to Torres del Paine. In the other hand, I was not
willing to literally be robbed by the scandalous hotels tariffs,
so I continued to Puerto Natales. The road was of gravel but
wonderfully conserved. Next to the traveled roads, it looked like a
freeway.
Arriving to Puerto Natales I started the ritual to search
for hotels. The prices in the south are not characterized for being
economic.
Note:
Maybe you are wondering "¿Wasn't he going to
camp?". Yes, that was the plan, but with the wind, the cold, the rain,
not much comfort...let just leave it that way.
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Day 6
I left towards Torres del Paine. A very
cloudly morning and the drizzle anticipated the probability of low
visibility. In spite of this I followed the road with the hope that the
weather will be nice with me. Once already in the park, the clouds tried
to not to be too selfish and allowed me to see timidly some spectacles.
The guanacos that ate in the road confidently didn't stop to amuse me.
I started to look for the damaged motorcycle since it was predicted that
the Spaniards would arrive there. And so it was. The detents of the front
suspesion where bursted and the frontal, smashed. Luckyly nothing too
serious happened that couldn't be replaced.
The really important thing was that the injured Spaniard could continue
the trip.
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Day 7
I decided to travel to
Punta Arentas, but this time in the paved road, although with a lot of
wind. The landscape has a lot in common with the Argentinian Prairie
and you can see the typical farms dedicated to the sheep breeding.
That night I found the Spaniards again in an amusing good-bye dinner.
They returned on Thursday by airplane to Osorno to continue the trip
to return home.
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Day 8
I left to Puerto Natales because I had to
ship the motorcycles towards Puerto Montt. The workers of Navimag were
very nice with me: they helped me with the damaged motorcycle and allowed
me to go in the sip to assure them myself. |
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Day 9
I began the long way to
return home, but this time I didn't have the intention to repeat the
gravel of the 40 route, so I decided to go back in the route 3,
bordering the Atlantic road Gallegos River <Piedra Buena> Olivia Creek,
where I stayed the night.
The wind was very strong, the prairie,
endless. But at least this time I would have the tires on asphalt.
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Day 10
I left in direction to Comodoro Rivadavia
to take the detour to Sarmiento. In the road you can see many oil wells
working and I couldn't stop thinking in how some argentinian politicians
could waste in the day what the nature gives on the night.
Already
in Esquel it was not much what was left to Osorno. I decided to do an
extra effort and arrive that day home. |
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They were in
total 6.630 km.
, there was no real
problem, not even a bursted tire.
I found several motorcyclists
from different parts of the world but not a single Chilean.
The
only disadvantage? The tires I changed in Perito Moreno...are being
kept on the rubber store and I have to go and get them...should
I start again? |
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