I'll ride the wave where it takes me

It was quite a sad goodbye in the morning from Crux. It felt strange to leave and as if there was more to say or do, but I knew it was time.
None the less the emotion surprised me and it was a quiet walk into town from our home for the last six weeks.

The road from El Bolson to Bariloche was littered with young hitch-hikers all having little luck, and we'd had to book a night in Bariloche ahead as the towns accommodation gets full - we could see now how Patagonia had changed around us in the time since we'd arrived in sleepy Lago Puelo back in December, and were glad to have dodged the busiest of tourist season by working.

We were going to use the bus ride to Bariloche to scout our entrance to the mountain trail and it's proximity to the Gendarmerie post, but both promptly fell asleep after our late night.

It was great seeing Lorna at Hostel Rodinia again, I spent the day studying the maps that Mak had dropped off there, we went through the hostel food leftovers for good road food and we drew up a shopping list for the morning.
The next day I had to visit Aduana (customs) to get the equipment sent from home, we had to buy provisions, and we had to catch a bus south down Ruta 40 to the source of the Rio Manso.

That evening we ate a huge gnocchi feast that night with her, Oli (the night-shift), Luka and Carla (the hosteliers) and the thought of sleeping out and making fire for the next week settled my excited brain.

Drawing pictures of mountain tops

We'd made an ambitious plan to walk over the Andes to Chile, and Lorna (from Bariloche) who'd come to visit us in Lago Puelo had mentioned the Rio Manso - A river which against all logic spews from Lago Steffen eastwards out of the Andes only to turn around and wriggle its way through the whole mountain range to Chile before defiantly gushing into the Pacific.

This meant if there was a trail or route following it there must be a way to walk to Chile without the ice axes, mountain tents and polar gear needed to scale the 3-4,000 metre peaks in the Nahuel Huapi area.

I had found out about a lady called Makarena Perez, who produces topographical maps for most of South America, and can print maps to order of any area she has the information for.
Looking at the Chilean and Argentine governmental websites I found there are small, foot-accessible border posts for legal entry\exit along trails by the Rio Manso.

I kept in e-mail contact with Mak, and she printed me up two maps with all the terrain and trails we needed - amazingly usefully she lives in Bariloche and we could pick up the maps on our way out. Nahuel helped me out just in time with a bank transfer to secure her services - Thanks!

The last piece of the puzzle was gear - I had expensively replaced my sleeping bag and bivi bag in bariloche, but my sleeping bag wouldn't be warm enough without some insulation and Kev had no water-proofing for his bag, and we had no tarp to cover our heads or luggage if we did see any rain. I also hadn't been able to bear the stupid prices for the simple technology of a headtorch in Argentina.

Family to the rescue - my brother, Aurian ordered me a sleeping mat (from alpkit.com, check them out) and a bivi for Kev, and my parents dug out the tarp I bivied with around Europe and Africa in 2011 with, as well as my thermos which I knew would be useful.
My mum offered to buy me a headtorch and the package was sent with all the methods I could think of to avoid the ridiculous import taxes I knew would be aimed at me.

Towards the end of our stay at Crux we made our best friends of the clients, notably Guillamina from Buenos Aires, who gave us her left over alcohol (for our stove), soap and ziploc bags, and then Sil and Anan who gave us an amazing flotsam hobo fishing setup.

On our last night we made from-scratch pizzas, fired in the clay oven Gustavo made, and fed Gustavo, Estella (his wife), three of their neices and nephews who were staying, Claudia and her friend, Nahuel of course, and Sil and Ana.

It's not big-headed of me to say the pizza was amazing (I had been honing my dough and sauce for 6 weeks by now), and the traditional round of applause (which happens every time a man manages to cook in Argentina!) was loud and moving.

Nahuel, Sil, Ana, Kev and I stayed up until 4 a.m. drinking and chatting and I couldn't think why we were leaving.