updates...

Hi all, thanks for all your good comments and reading this silly thing. As we have written in the past, we are using the blog as a way of storing some photos, communicating with home, and also journaling. Patagonia has been so terrific that we hope to return sometime, so we have been particularly anal about writing what we have seen and done for a hopeful return to the area. In addition, many of our friends have expressed interest in traveling here. The guide books and maps are not fantastic for the area, so maybe these pages can help others in their travels?

So a quicky update...

17 Dec: from San Martin de los Andes, we drove to the Rio Malleo, one of the few rivers outside the parks where one can spin-cast - most of the rivers and streams within the National Parks are fly-fishing only. When we first entered the Lakes Region of Patagonia, we purchased one seasonal fishing license in Andrew´s name, figuring that Leigh would fish less frequently (and illegally - shhhh, don´t tell anyone!). In order to fly-fish, we would have needed to carry with us much heavier equipment (hip-waders, etc), in addition, Andrew has always been a spin-caster. Anyway, we drove to the part of the Rio Malleo which is outside the National Park. It turns out that this part of the river is in the Mapuche Reservation. The Mapuches are one of the few extant tribes here in Argentina - most were massacred by the European immigrants.
According to Wikipedia: "Mapuches successfully resisted many attempts by the Inca Empire to subjugate them, despite the lack of nationwide organization. The Mapuche fought against the Spaniards for over 300 years. Initial conquests of land by the Spanish in the late 16th century were thoroughly repulsed by the Mapuche, such that there were areas where Europeans did not return to until late in the 19th century." The 20 km area that we explored while Andrew fished (and I hiked or took photos) is incredible - much of the geology is just like Utah´s National Parks. Interestingly, the area is not advertised or anything - we were completely suprised by what we saw...

18 dec - From San Martin, we drove the length of Lago Lacar along another long gravel road. We parked near Cascadas Chachin (a waterfall) and walked a total of 17.5 miles to and from the Termals de Queñi. Leigh was cranky for no particular reason (achy body and lack of sleep - someone was practicing drum-rolls until 3AM and from 6AM on...).. BUT, the second we got into the thermals, ahhhh..... the world was a good place again! The water was wonderfully hot - just delightful! En route back, andrew brought in an enormous rainbow trout from the lake. We stayed in San Martin again.

19 dec - raining most of the day; we fished a little and traveled back to Bariloche via 7 Lakes Drive. We tried to catch up a bit on our email while the rain fell... We are looking forward to a good meal in Bariloche and then we head a little south for one last fishing experience before handing the car in tomorrow afternoon.

We are planning the rest of our journey...suggestions are welcome! Here´s what we have right now: we return our rental car on the 20th and head into Chile; we will spend another week in the Chilean Lakes Region of Patagonia; then we are heading off to Chiloe Chile. We are due in Santiago Chile on the 10th of January where Andrew´s mom, Kay, will join us for a bit. So we have about 2 weeks where we will spend time in the Chiloe area of Chile - we are considering a boat ride on the Navimag which travels to glaciers,but have heard mixed messages about this trip, we are open for any suggestions you may have - anyone? (Bueller?)

Be well, take care,
Leigh and Andrew