Crossing Patagonia in winter with a low budget had been hard. Even though I had greatly enjoyed riding on snow, not being able to sleep indoors when I needed or wanted was taking the toll on me. Also the length of my fishing sessions had been often cut short by numb fingers and toes in sub zero temperatures. El Bolsón welcomed me with good company, a (relatively) warm and free place to sleep, fantastic fishing and selection of micro breweries, so in hindsight it was not a surprise that I got stuck there fore a while…
El Bolsón is famous for at least three things: hippie athmosphare, marijuana and beer. The town has a vivid community of handicraft professionals, painters, poets and musicians who enjoy the laidback vibe as well as the heavy seasonal tourism, which brings a burst of cash to them during the summer. The nature around the valley is spectacular too. Located in a valley between mountains rising over 1700m above the town, one can choose a different peak to climb every day of a week, or even walk on trails all the way to Chile, like I end up doing. The valley has two gin clear trout streams as well, where the big mamas living in the Lago Puelo 20km south of El Bolsón come to spoon in. Needless to say, I found the valley pretty comfortable to stay in, enjoying great fishing and good company. The last cold weeks of the winter were also at hand, so it was an easy decision to take it easy and wait the spring to arrive instead of chasing the warmer climate by racing north.
Snowy peaks and gin clear trout stream of El Bolsón and Lago Puelo.
I happened to be in El Bolsón during the times when the mystery around the diseppararance of Sebastian Maldonado escalated. Once a week a good proportion of the population of the town marched with banners to Gendarmeria, a sort of a Argentine security police or army, to demand information what they had done to him. Gendarmeria responded by shooting canister of tear gas into the crowd, part of them families with young kids. People also actively demonstrated against the planned nuclear power plant project into area. I joined one of the demonstrations with my new Brasilian and Argentine friends.
Argentinians are not afraid to demonstrate.
I have loved touring in South America, because for once there has not been a need to count for days and kilometers being afraid of running out of days of a visa. Every new entrance to these two countries always gives me 90 days to spend. As my route has taken me already X times across the border, I have not once thought when my 90 days visa exemption would end. Now having spent more than a month in El Bolsón though, there was a possibility of running out of days, especially as I did not know when when where I would be crossing into Chile again. Three Brazilian cyclists Freitas, Andreas and Felipe had planned a visa walk and decided to join them. Paso de Rio Puelo was also one of my alternate routes from El Bolsón onwards and as there were no information if the hiking trail over the mountain range to Chile could be done by bicycle, it did not harm to check it out by walking either.
We would walk from our house in El Bolsón along a riverside to the village of Lago Puelo and then onwards to the Chile to get our passports an entry and exit stamp of Chile, and return to Argentina. In total around 65km. We allocated for the trip three days. If done as a visa run, though, we speculated, the trip could be done in a a bit of a day. The day when we had chosen to start the visa walk was calm and sun was shining. Lucky us. On the second day it started to rain, and the rain continued the following three days. Eventually we were four full days on the trail and returned to El Bolsón soaking wet and hungry. Still, this was the most beautiful border crossing I have seen so far. The green and lush nature at the border region seemed mostly untouched. When the trail reached a side of a cliff the views to Lago Puelo and Rio Puelo were breathtaking. On our four days on the route we did not see any other people apart from the Argentinian and Chilean border officials. Rather than trying to describe what we saw along the way, shall the images below to say the 1000 words.
The visa walk from El Bolsón to Chile was simply stunning. I will one day for sure return and stay to fish the Rio Puelo.
The Route
We were one of the first people to walk the trail to the Paso Rio Puelo after winter, which meant that the trail was covered with fallen trees. Some parts were extremely steep and even needed help of hands to scramble though. Instead of trying to cycle the route, I decided to look for other route alternatives out from El Bolsón. By walking from El Bolsón to Lago Puelo, to the Chilean Immigration and back to Lago Puelo took four days at lazurely pace. By bike the route might have been a little faster, but not much necessarily. The numerous fallen trees late winter would have slowed down the progress significantly. Even by walking they slowed us down. If this route is attempted by bike, mid or late season could be better, as the trail could be cleared of fallen trees after winter. Scott Pauker did the trail on a bicycle and his verdict of the route can be found here.
