Philpott-SouthAmerica

 Awoke again to beautiful day in Angostura. We new we had a long days driving so we got away early, and in to town to shop for dinner and then to spend our last Argentine Pasos before crossing back to Chile. We also bought 4 sweet treats in a bakery and had a nice coffee in a cafe before heading off.  The drive was once again was fantastic scenery and way different than we had  expected. We reached the Argentinian border and were processed quickly and back on the road to go over the pass into Chile. It was an amassing road that climbed high up into snow country. The roadside was lined with pumice like volcanic debris from a large volcanic eruption they had in that area less than ten years ago. Large areas of mature trees had died as a result of the eruption. We passed over the top and into Chile but it was a long drive down hill to the Chilean border control post. The documentation went smoothly but their biosecurity control took away most of the food we had purchased for dinner that n

 Except for the first three, these were all taken on the drive from San Martin to Angostura today.  There was not a cloud in the sky today and it actually got quite hot. Changed my thick jersey for a tee shirt. The first time since we reached Patagonia. We cross back into Chile tomorrow. We are on countdown now. Not sure whether I’m happy or sad about this. We have had a great time but home is home and you can’t beat it. We passed through the view pull off area again today where we first met this friendly face and he was still there. We made morning tea in the back of the car and I’m sure he would have helped himself if we had not shut the door

 Only 8 days to go until we fly out of Santiago home on the 31st. We went out to dinner in El Bolson, planning to have one of Argentinas famous streak dinner and and a large beer but miss read the menu and ended up with a type of steak based pizza. It was still good but it was Election Day and the restaurant was not sell alcohol on Election Day so we missed out the beer as well. The election here was an interesting affair. It was down to voting for one of two president options. The people we spoke to considered neither was any good and they had to chose the least bad one. The chap who won we understand is a Donald Trump, Boris Johnson type of character so I don’t hold out for much improvement here.  There is a lot of corruption and inflation is running rife. When Anna was here 5 years ago, she got 20 pesos for her $US. The official exchange rate now gets you about 350 pesos to the dollar. They have this black market system going on here and you can change US dollars in the street and y

 We awoke in Puerto Guadal to an improving day and headed out to Chile Chico which is the last town before you cross the border into Argentina. The travel guide indicated that the road was treacherous with nowhere to stop. It clearly was quite narrow with tight corners in places but we had plenty of places to pull over a fill the camera with more photos. The road was so much fun to drive and the views terrific that I would happily drive it again.  Once agin the supposed 2.5 hour drive took us about 6 hrs. We stopped and talked to a couple about our age who were driving a 6 wheel 6 wheel drive Mercedes Camper. They had shipped it over from Europe for then trip. It has got us thinking again about where to next.  Driving a camper around this part of the world would have been great. The towns, both large and small leave very little to be desired but you are forced to stay in them. In a camper you could free camp in so many great spots, it would make the whole Patagonia experience even bett