Hello everybody!
Lazy Camille is back ;) I think I can safely say I was having sort of a writer's block! Also, I didn't think it mattered that much, since I don't know if anyone is actually reading this shit! (ok, apart from a few faithful comment-writers...hint-hint ;)
Ok, what has happened since the last time I wrote?...hmmm. Well, don't worry, I'm definitely not gonna describe every move I have made. Or...
Ok, last time I was in
Puerto Iguazú, gazing at the waterfalls and being getting sunburnt.
Then I went to
San Ignacio, which is also in Misiones (I recommend you getting a map of Argentina to be able to follow this more closely ;) to see the Jesuit ruins. You see, there are plenty of those in Misiones (and many other parts of Argentina, in Córdoba as well, f.ex.).
Sani Ignacio is a very small town and I came there quite late, at approx. 1 am. The driver woke me up and said "acá estámos" ("here we are") and I looked around (med styrur í augum) and saw nothing indicating a hostel or somewhere to sleep, and basically there was not one cat on the streets (or should I rather say "dog" since they are averywhere in Argentina) and thought: "hmm, ok...now where do I sleep?" I got out of the micro (bus), put on the damn backpack and started looking more closely around for sleeping accomodation.
After having stood on the square for about 2 minutes, 2 young girls walked by. I was not going to let this oppourtunity pass me by and asked them for direction. They were so kind to walk me to a sort of hospedaje (sort of hostel)/ camping. But there didn't seem to be anybody there...
So I decided to get installed in the camping. But then the fiaca (lazyness) came up in me. "Oh god, why should I ever put up the tent when I am gonna leave tomorrow?!"So I did something I have never done before, and that is to sleep under the bare naked sky :)
So I just took out my sleeping bag (which was absolutely unnecesary - it was very hot still. Subtropical, you see), used it as a mattress (I didn't feel like looking for the mattress either ;) and slept in that silk thing you're supposed to put in the sleeping bag :) And I slept reeeaaaally well! ...apart from the bleeeeping mosquitos!
Next morning: early rise and off to see the ruins. It was quite nice, since there was almost no-one there and I felt like I had everything just for myself. Quite a luxury.
After that quick stop in San Ignacio, I went to
Posadas (capital of Misiones).
There, I had the pleasure to stay with a girl named
Laura, her girlfriend
Gloria and her mom,
Rosa. Wow, those women are what you would call in Icelandic "kjarnakonur", directly translated as "women of core", means really strong women. I had met Laura through the Hospitality Club and she welcomed me into her home with open arms, right from the start - and all of them actually :) Spent my time going out with the girls (really not much to do in Posadas, though) , eating extraordinary homemade (by Laura) gnocchi de papas (potatoe) and sitting in their kitchen in my undies in front of the ventilator, talking to Rosa and drinking lots and lots of maté! So as you can see, I did feel quite at home!
After staying there 2 nights, I went to
Córdoba Capital (most of the times, the capital of a province and the province itself have the same name). Oh dear, I was gonna do sooo much. Gp at least to 2 museums, walk around, see the sites and the churches and well, all the usual tourist stuff opne does when coming to a new place. But nooooo. I went out and partied instead! It wasn't really my fault, you know, basically aaaall the kids at the hostel forced me to come with them (as you may know, I am extreeeemely popular wherever I go ;). So, of course, I really couldn't disappoint all of these new-made friends and finally succomed to their demands. A girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do ;)
No, but seriously, at the hostel (Hostelling International,
Backpacker's) there were lots of great people from all over the world. A few crazy Americans, one Danish guy, a German guy, some Argentineans and a few guys and girls from Mexico. So this night (of my arrival), a big party was made and everybody seemed to be having a blast. I must admit that at times it made me think of an Icelandic party. Equals: lots of drinking ;) And of course I had to prove my viking-bloode and drink them all under the table with a final roaaaring burp ;) Hehe, I think I did win their respect...or intrigue, I'm not sure ;) Anyway, it was fun, but of course the day after did not go exactly as planned. Meaning: i slept until 5 pm! God, I was angry with myself! But blessfully I overheard a conversation between a peruvian guy and the guy working at the hostel about climbing and trekking and stuff, and managed to barge into that conversation, resulting that I went with Marco to a gym to climb walls. Well, hehe...I basically watched him climb after having tried and failed miserably! But is was fun. Strange to enter into a gym again - it's been quite a long time...
The next day, I went to
Carlos Paz.Carlos Paz is a small town in the province (35 km from Córdoba Capital) and is extremely touristic. And when I say touristic, I mean the place is PACKED! People come from all over the country (much from Buenos Aires) to relax in the mountains and breathe the fresh air and bathe in some of the many, many rivers and creeks. It's just like the beach...only inland and without the sea...hehe. Hmmm. And the young people also come to party. Every night, the mainstreets are packed (from high up, they really look like ants!) and nightclub people are hunting for innocent blood (=handing out leaflets :) and barely clothed women (or living toothpicks, I should rather say) are dancing (ok, moving bizarrely ;) on especially made platforms on cartops with the appropriate "aha-aha, oh yeah-oh yeah"-music. It is quite interesting. Poor women, I hope the pay is good, at least!
Anyway, it has still been great. I have been here for more than a week now - ok, not only in Carlos Paz, but based here - for one reason in particular, ok two: 1-the place is great and 2-I was so fortunate to have been offered to crash at
Noelia and her husband's
Vladimir's place, but Noelia is the sister of
Sergio,
Unnur's fiancé...but Unnur is one of my very good friends in Iceland. Get it? Ok, just take a second to think now ;)
I thought that was really nice of them, since I had only met them once in Iceland! They are really great, I must say. Qué buena onda, loco! (roughly translated: "good vibrations"). Ok, to show just a bit of how great they are I will tell you this:
I was going to go around the province and visit some villages and dandy stuff like that... So Noelia proposes (by the way-I did not try to imply anything of the sort :) that we rent a car and go on a little roadtrip all together. "Okidoki!" I thought, but wasn't sure it was going to happen, since we then checked it out and all the cars in Carlos Paz were booked and/or only the really expensive ones available...
So I go and do my stuff, went to "
La Quebrada del Condorito" (a provincial park) and walked there, went then to another town:
Mina Clavero, where I strolled around in the artisan's market, got my hand read (quite accurately, actually!) and saw a band playing -
Tequilombao - (
Mauro, a guy I had met hitch-hiking was playing in it :), partied a bit and ended then up sleeping a)on a bench at the bus-station and b)on a couch in some presumably abandonned hotel reception. Yes, interesting, I know. ...but it wasn't that bad, really! A little sad, but hey ;)
Getting to the point: I had called Noelia the night before to say I wasn't coming home and all and then she told me they had actually gone to Córdoba and rented a car from there! I must say, I was very pleasantly surprised! And the next day, they came to pick me up in Mina Clavero and we started our little road-trip. That day, Vladimir drove all the way to Cerro Colorado (or "cerrhho colooorao" like the cordobeses say ;) , which is quite far and stayed in a hotel. Mmmmm, a BED again. It was quite funny, because we were a little scared that it would be quite pricy, so Noelia goes to the desk and asks if there are any rooms available. Yes, there are. And then for the price: and the receptionist (which also seems to be the dueña) says with an apologising tone: "it will be 17 pesos", and then even more apologising: "all the 15 peso ones are occupied". To give an idea of the cheapness of the place, one us dollar is 3 pesos, and one peso is about 22 crowns (Isk). In my dear Calafate, some hotels were covering more than 200 pesos per night!!!
So Noelia says to the lady in a relatively pensive tone: "hmm, I will have to consult my companions" and looks at me. "Yes, I think we should take it", as in "that seems to be an acceptable price"-tone, and we look at each other and think "WOW, that was cheaper than we expected!!!"
When we entered the hotel room we had payed so dearly I couldn't help but think (outloud): "but, WHERE is the television?". This was totally and utterly unacceptable. ;)
Anyway, we all sleep like angels and the following day we go to see the wall-and cave-paintings which are all over the place, which was interesting - apart from the fact that the guide knew absolutely (or close to) nothing about them: "well, this painting is of a guanaco, this one might be of a sun, and this is some geometrical form.", and then added: "...which we don't really know what signifies..." Well, duh, we can also see it's a geometrical form, you imbecile! The worst part is, that you are not allowed to go see the paintings without a guide, and there are like 2 tours a day. Too bad for you if come between 11 and 4 in the afternoon!
But it was still good. We also went to the museum of a certain Natahualpa Yupanqui, a folklore singer who travelled all over the world and who amongst other things got famous in Japan and sang with Edith Piaf! Hm, so many things I just don't know jack about in the world! And I bought a CD :)
Ok, this is getting a liiiitle longer than I anticipated. That is usually what happens when I start at the beginning. They say it's a guide's best quality to be able to sum up alot in a few words... Hehe, well - I guess I have alot to learn, in that sense! My point with all of this, was just to express my gratitude and appreciation of this absolutely crazy (in a good way, of course) Argentinean/Icelandic/Bulgarian couple!
Chicos, ustedes son recopados!!! Y Sergio, que buena hermana (y cuñado) que tenés!
Anyway, we get home after doing lots of other nice stuff I am NOT GOING to go into. Ok, I must only mention Vladimir's rally experience in the Altas Cumbres...hehe. Wiiiiiiiiiiii!!! ;)
Oh, and one more thing: "y acá tenemos la bombilla..." ;)
As you might have noticed, the title says "
Cerro Champaqui..."
I was actually only going to write about that (in long terms, of course), but now my writing balloon has disenflated a bit. I know what some of you must be thinking, if you are still there: "phiouhh! At last!". Or am I wrong? Hehe, only a little more torture:
I, Camille Marmié, decided the other day to go climb the Cerro Champaquí, the highest mountain in Córdoba, more precisely
2790m with all my stuff and camp on the top.
Well, it wasn't as simple as I thought it would be. It seemed to be impossible to get any sort of information on the matter whatsoever. And when I finally did, it was all wrong!
My idea was to climb up the west side and go down the east side. I had been told that the upclimbing would be about 12 hours and the going down about 6. "Ok", I thought, "that seems to be doable" and headed on.
Of course things did not go exactly as I planned: I ended up coming quite late to
Yacanto de Calamuchita (a very, very small place), where a unnamed person told me that the road to the mountain started. The thing about the "road" was true, since I found out that there was actually a road - as in "for cars" - leading all the way up tp the top! And that the base from which people started trekking, was about 30 km away or something. Hmm. Oh, well. That night I stayed in the camping of Yacanto, which although it was quite hidden, turned also out to have some hidden qualities. The dueña
Mari helped as much as she could - for information, and basically everything... she even gave some cigarettes (I was out...cough,chogh), lipbalm (it's dry up at the top), called to Noe and Vladimir to let them know I would probably come later than planned and that the helicopter would not be necesary until at least Monday evening ;)... and then she absolutely refused to let me pay for the night! Horrible people, absolutely horrible!!! ;)
So, what I did, was to start walking that road (only 42km to go!) in the baking sun and hope that someone would pick me up and bring me to the 3rd post -
Tres Arboles - where there was supposed to be (or at least I thought) a track to the base of the mountain. It turns out there was - but at that time it was starting to get a bit late, and my plan of sleeping at the top seemed to be fading away... But no! I was going to get there! And I did. I ended up walking about 4 hours on that goddamn road, curve after curve, but got quite a few lifts with some quite nice people. Gracias a Gabriel y Gabriela y el grupo con el Willy's :) And I DID get to the top walking. ...the last bit at least ;)
And oh, the sunset. Nobody but med, Mr Murphy and the setting sun on the valley of
Traslasierra (San Luis).
Then I got a bit freaked out: "where the HELL am I going to go down?!?" looking down the very steep west side. I sort of gave myself 2 options and decided to sleep on it.
Woke up at about 6, got up and watched the sunrise. Mmmm, also veeeery nice ;) A private show, once more!
Well, but what was I going to do? I had gotten some very confusing information from a guide I met going up (about where to go down on the west side) and I did have to take into consideration the fact that I had quite a heavy backpack (about 16kg, I presume), bad articualtions and notas good a physical shape as would be optimum for a 9 hour (at the best!) down a "quite" steep mountain, without a track, nor water all the way down. Hmmm, for you, the answer may seem very simple, but I had put it in my head that I was going to go down the other way! But I decided to swollow my pride and be reasonable and went down the other way - I had seen some houses down in the east side valley, without really knowing what they were. I still had a vague belief, that this might be the way the guide had told me. But of course it wasn't.
On my way down I met some guys. Yes, only men! And the first four of them recommended me to stay put at one of the ranches (the houses formed a sort of mountain village with a small school and everything) and ultimately go down the rest (because that was not the end: about 20km to go!) the day after with them and get a ride to town. Hm. That was quite interesting. Gustavo, the group "leader", a blond, arrogant, but also very nice guy, told me i would probably DIE if I went down the other way. "Interesting", thought I, but decided nothing yet.
After about 4 hours of thumpin' and dunkin' (thus my nickname "Hlunkadunka - Thumpin'dunk") down the mountain, I got to the
Rancho Ramón Gonzalez. Frankly, I was w a i s t e d. I even asked if they had a mule to take me down to
Villa Alpina, the base camp! But there was no-one to take me there...Oh, god. What do I do? I sincerely thought about continuing all the way down...before I fell asleep sitting down and with my head flat on the dining-room table. When I woke up I decided to stay. It was a really nice place. And cozy. And they had everything for everything: beds, food, beer (which I did NOT drink, for this once, btw ;), a dining room and last but not least: a great view and a really nice river running right by. Logic decision, don't you think???
And so I read, and then fell asleep again and read some more. Everything was sort of in a haze. Then I finally woke up when the guys came back. "so you decided to stay, eih? I told it was great here, I don't lie..." Oh, Gustavo is so smug! A typical guide: always, always right! But like I said: a really good guy. All in all they were four:
Gustavo (who has climbed the mountain 25 times!),
Sergio the tango-dancer (provaste el yogurt? ;),
Mario the nice guy and
Duilio, a 65 year-old hardball who had been determined to climb the mountain, eventhough people called him crazy! We ended up having quite a nice night (oh dear, the star-filled sky!!!), chatting and eating grilled lamb...namminamm-"á diskinn minn!"
Today...yes, finally!
Today, we went down to
Villa Alpina. It took us about 5 hours. I have to admit I was quite tired when we finally arrived. We all took a shower - a very welcome shower, and then Duilio was so nice to give me a ride (although I did at sometimes think I would die, he drove so fast! Well, there ain't no grandpa like Duilio!) to
Alta Gracia ("High Grace"?) were I could take a bus to Carlos Paz. And here I am once again.
Next destination: Mendoza - The Aconcagua!
Again, I have to admit that once sat down and stretched in Villa Alpina, I thanked (the) God(s) and my good reasoning for not having tried to go down the other side.
...But I am STILL going to do it some day!!!
And finally:
"In case I don't see ya, good morning, good evening and good night!"
-Thumpin'dunk
p.s. THERE ARE NOW PHOTOS FROM EL CHALTÉN!
