San Juan 3

Instead of leaving the campground as I had planned, I stayed and had one more great feast with Diego. I had needed to go shopping for supplies and to charge my electronics and it was mid-afternoon by the time I was ready and I decided to leave the following day. We grilled chorizos and chicken breast, and had rice with roasted pepper, salad, a bottle of malbec and torrontes, and a carmelized flan for dessert. It cost us each 26pesos ($6.50) and we were very full and very happy. When I was back on the road eating pasta and oatmeal every day I would remember all this good eating.

San Juan 2

San Juan was the last big city I could stop at before Salta. I stayed longer than I wanted but there were things I needed to accomplish that only a bigger city had the services for. I am now ready for the mountains and desert wilderness to the north.

I stayed the first few nights at a hostel in the centro of San Juan. There was a Swiss fellow (French speaking) staying there and we took a taxi out to the Graffigna Winery for a free tour and tasting. A couple Parisian girls were there and we spoke in French and we were allowed to taste some of the other varietals not included in the tasting. Afterwards the Swiss and I had a nice lunch in town across from the Plaza Espana and afterwards he left by bus for Buenos Aires.

Also staying at the hostel was Colombian named Diego who was traveling by motorcycle. He was preparing to sell the bike and was staying in the city until he had resolved certain mechanical issues. He planned to cross over the Paso Los Libertadores and to sell the bike in Santiago, Chile. Diego had graduated from the finest school in Colombia with a degree in economics and a focus on the Austrian school and we got on well and he told me of a campground 15km outside the city that had been closed but at which you were still allowed to camp. He had been there a few nights before moving into town. The campsite had potable water, electricity and use of the bathrooms. He was leaving the hostel and urged me to join him there.

I met up with him a day later. The campground was clean and quiet and located near a canal bringing water down from the high mountains. It was called “El Pinar”, meaning pine forest, and the trees were old and high and it was cool in the shade under them and the ground soft from the needles. We looked out of our tents beyond the pine grove to the Andes, and Diego and I took turns riding into town for supplies and to use the internet. At night we barbecued chorizos and steaks over a wood fire along with salad and rice or pasta and cheap, good wines from the provinces of Mendoza and San Juan. During the day we worked on our bikes and I did some reading and writing on a pine stump. It was a pleasant way to live and it felt very good to be out of the cities and back inside my tent.

I will know soon whether the time off in Mendoza and San Juan has effected my fitness. I have cycled less than 1000km in the last month. Tomorrow I head north on Ruta 40. There will be a few days of wilderness and desert before I hit the ripio and start into the foothills of the Andes. The tests of my fitness will begin there.

San Juan

I did not have far to ride and there was a tailwind that blew me towards San Juan. In the vineyards outside the city teams of men were picking grapes and stacking crates of them onto the backs of trailer trucks. It was fall and the leaves had begun to fall from the poplars and other trees and there were clouds of smoke and the smell of burning leaves and other brush.

My map indicated Ruta 40 would become an auto route 25 km outside the city, but in fact it transformed into a 4 lane road, with no change in the amount or speed of the traffic. There were good shoulders too and not littered with broken glass and rocks and it was an easy ride towards the city. Then getting off the highway I followed a winding tree-lined avenue into the center of town.

San Juan is a poorer version of Mendoza. Its avenues are a little dirtier, the trees along them a little less full, and the shops and storefronts a little beat-up. But the feeling here is much the same as in Mendoza with vineyards that surround the city and cafes and restaurants and a fine plaza at the center to sit and to eat and drink. I took a bed at a hostel not far from the main plaza. There are some issues back in the United States that require I use the internet and other city resources and I must stay until they are resolved.

Some Touring Rules

1. Roadside camp where the headlights of passing cars cannot reach you. Do this by choosing the high ground over lower. Never camp in a valley. The high side of a turn is excellent for camping and you can camp very close to the road discreetly. Sometimes your tent will be visible to truckers, due to the height of their headlights or from their cabs. Truckers are the more trustworthy men on the road and being seen by them should not be considered a serious breach of security.

2. Follow the Dennis Coello method of bungee cord “locking” your bike. Most thieves will try to hop on the bike and ride away. This stops such thievery instantly. (from Touring On Two Wheels, a classic of the literature)

"bungee cord lock"

2.a. Even if someone were to try to ride the bike without the bungee cord “lock” they would certainly have difficulty. A fully loaded bike is very different to handle. You should have time to run out from wherever you are and jump on them and beat them senseless.

2.b. When camping slip a bungee cord through the wheel and around one of the corner tent poles. You will feel or hear it if someone is trying to take the bike. The bike should also be visible through the window of your rain fly.

3. Bring your bike inside supermarkets whenever possible and speak with a security guard or cashier about watching it.

3.a. If you cannot bring your bike inside a supermarket or cafe lean it up against the glass so you can see it through the window. The aisles of the supermarket must be arranged so that walking down them you are able to see the bike.

3.b. If you cannot see the bike from inside do NOT go inside the supermarket, café or restaurant. Pay more for whatever you need somewhere else or go without it. Your bike is your life and should never leave your sight.

4. If someone tries to touch your bike without your permission you should curse them out loudly in your native language. Everyone on the street should hear it and your cursing should go on for far longer than might be expected, even if they do not understand what you are saying.

4.a. If someone should try to mount the bike you must use extreme violence against them. You must not hesitate on this point. Mounting the bike is attempted theft. The bicycle is your life. The Hell’s Angels are known to slaughter a man for simply touching their motorcycle. You must project this extreme violence and be prepared to act.

4.b. You do not allow anybody to sit on your bike and slip his feet into your pedals. Nobody. Not ever. Not even the prettiest girl.

5. Put your passport, credit card, currencies of countries you are not currently in, and the larger bills of the currency of the country you are in, inside the secret pocket of your pants. Do this when riding every day and not wearing your pants. Keep your pants with these valuables deep inside your pannier. Keep your driver’s license and the small bills and coins you use to purchase things for the next couple of days in your money belt. If robbed just give up the money belt. Your jeans containing your credit card, passport and larger bills remain deep inside your pannier. You will lose at most 2 days worth of food purchases and your driver’s license.

5.a. Expect that your netbook computer, camera, and cell phone will all be stolen from you, damaged or broken. It should surprise you pleasantly if these items survive a tour.

6. Choose a girl that you can sense is attracted to you to entrust with watching your bike. Old ladies who want to mother you can also be trustworthy. But be careful, when the mothering instinct wears off they will only be concerned with their own security and will cheat you out of whatever they can. Men are not to be trusted under any circumstances. There is no reason for a man to be of any assistance to you whatsoever. I have even heard of a scam whereby a man dressed as a road racing cyclist tricked an American girl in Colombia into letting him watch her bike. She watched him ride away on it and never saw the bike or the man again.

6.a. A smile and a brief conversation is usually sufficient to get the right person to look out for your bike--to speak up if someone approaches it-- for the few moments it is out of you sight. At campgrounds do this with the campers around you. Make it clear you are traveling alone.

6.b. Avoid hostels with dormitory rooms. You will be separated from your bike and your panniers can be easily taken. Do not trust locks, yours or someone else’s. All your gear is essential. The camera and computer, the most valuable items, are ironically the least essential.

7. The drive train side of your bike is most sensitive if you have a derailleur. Always lean your bike up with the drive train side facing a wall or railing to protect the derailleur.

7.a. Keep your valuables inside your drive train side panniers. Because the bike is leaned up against the wall it will be more difficult to access these two panniers containing your money, computer, camera, etc. The outside panniers should contain clothing on top, specifically a pair of dirty underwear.

8. Take things out of your panniers one pannier at a time. Replace items in a pannier before opening up another pannier.

8.a. Do not get in the habit of placing items on your back rack or on top of your tent and sleeping bag. It is easy to forget those items are there. Similar to putting something on the roof of your car, you risk driving off and losing it.

8.b. Only empty your panniers inside your tent. One pannier for each corner of the tent. Repack the panniers inside the tent when you plan to leave. Do not spread out the items from your panniers outside your tent. If everything is kept inside the tent it cannot be lost.

50 km to San Juan

It was late morning when I left Mendoza. I stopped at a bicicleteria to buy some chain oil, but didn’t find the type I wanted and decided to wait until San Juan. Putting the wrong kind of oil would just foul up the drive train after I had cleaned it. I rode east through the city center and then north along the canal to Ruta 40 which will take me to San Juan and then further north.

Outside the city it was the easiest cycling I could remember doing. The road was flat with the steppe on one side and the Andes on the other and there was little traffic and no wind. After a time the trees and greenery ended and it was parched dirt and desert and dusty scrub. Later there were some vineyards and I saw sheep at pasture and some goats along the road, but this was tough land to do much with and there were no towns or houses.

At 80km I was waved through the checkpoint where Mendoza Province ended and San Juan Province began. If it had not been for the late start I might have done the whole 165km and made San Juan today. Further ahead there were little mud huts along the road and poplar trees separated the larger properties and I began to look for a place to camp. I did not want to get too close to the city of San Juan.

I saw a little dirt road that ran off into the scrub and followed it across a mud-caked flat and behind some thorn bushes I pitched the tent. I made a cup of coffee and did some reading and later stepped out of the tent to boil some pasta. It didn’t take long before the mosquitoes discovered me. I swatted at them for awhile as the water heated but there were too many and I gave up on the pasta, taking the hot water back inside the tent and using it for a big dish of oatmeal with a sliced banana. As I finished eating the sun set and the mountains became shadows and then quickly it was dark. It was still, the night sky perfectly clear, and the moonlight showed brightly across the mud flats. I hadn’t put the rain fly up. I wanted to fall sleep looking up at the stars.

Mendoza 2

Mendoza is hot during the day and cool at night. It is a city on a desert hydrated by stone irrigation ditches called acequias that run along the streets carrying water from the high mountains. The streets are wide and tree-lined and the cafes and restaurants are busy and it is a pleasant city to walk through with its large parks and public areas.

I stayed at a hostel of bus-hopping backpackers and had a bunk in a small dormitory room of 8 beds on one of the main streets. It felt good to take some days off the bike but there were more tourists in Mendoza than any city I had been in outside of Ushuaia. I did not like all the English speaking and after a few days I was thinking about the road again. My knees felt mostly recovered from the sharp pains I had three weeks before. I missed sleeping in my tent and the quiet of the countryside. I missed cooking on my little stove and it made me nervous not having my bike and gear beside me or where I could see it. I began to feel lazy for sitting when I should have been riding.

Acequia

I looked at my map and instead of riding south to San Raphael as I had planned, I have decided to ride north, much of it along Ruta 40 and ripio, to Salta. To ride back to Buenos Aires from San Raphael would have meant riding across 1000 km of flat pampas, while the ride north to Salta will be through the desert and foothills of the Andes. From Salta I will box the bike and gear and take a bus to Buenos Aires for my flight to Cali, Colombia in May.

In Mendoza I sat in restaurants eating meat and drinking wine. My main activity was a long walk through the city, past the plazas with their great old trees and fountains, and to the supermarket for more food. To prepare for the ride north I bought another canister of butane for my stove and reloaded my food supplies. I picked up some degreaser and took apart and cleaned the chain and drive train, which I had planned to clean in Ushuaia but did not. On the ride into the city there was much glass on the auto pista and I found my front tire had flatted, just my third flat of the trip. I go to sleep tonight with the bike ready and excited to leave tomorrow for the north, to get out of the city, to get back into the mountains, to be back inside my tent with my gear around me and the stars above.

Mendoza

Rio Blanco

I awoke at dawn and it was still and quiet in the river valley. I packed quickly and began the wind-less descent along the Mendoza River. There was some climbing near a lake and then a longer climb out of the riverbed and back onto the plain and I was out of the Paso Los Libertadores. There were vineyards and poplar trees and then Ruta 7 became a busy autoroute 30 kilometers outside Mendoza. It was hot, heavily trafficked riding with only a gravel shoulder and camions and cars speeding past me. I rode into Mendoza in mid-afternoon and took a bed at a hostel in the northern part of the city. The mountains had tired me and I was looking forward to the five days of rest I planned to take.