Some Quiet Time at Home

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Day 96 - Wednesday, February 5th
Punta del Este to Buenos Aires, Argentina

Tradition

Punta del Este was a nice stopover, but none of us had the bankroll to afford another night, and friends and family were eagerly awaiting us in Buenos Aires.

The weather had improved over the day before and the winds were dying down. We reached Montevideo, the capital of Uruguay, by noon. Similar to Punta del Este, the road into the city cut back to the water and passed through an affluent neighborhood with high-rise apartment buildings on one side and pleasant beaches on the other.

We followed the signs to the port; there was a high-speed ferry across the mouth of the Rio de la Plata to Buenos Aires and we weren't sure what time it departed. The last cars were loading on when we drove up, but the ticket price of $100 each for the 4 hour ride put us off. We learned there was another ferry to Buenos Aires that left from Colonia, 120 miles up the river, that left at 4:00 p.m. Much cheaper to drive, but if we missed that, it was another couple of hours to a point where the river was narrow enough for a bridge; here in Buenos Aires the river was wider than any other river in the world.

We figured we had time for lunch and drove into the downtown area. A cheap diner was just the ticket. As usual, we all ordered the same thing, a gigantic tortilla de papas. David couldn't even finish his and took the leftovers with him, strapped to his bike like a spare tire.

The road to Colonia was long and straight and took a little longer than we expected. Once we reached Colonia, we headed straight for the port and got in line to buy passage for us and the bikes on the ferry. David stayed with the bikes while Gary and Alex went nuts dealing with the tickets. The computers were down, everything was being done by hand, and there was general chaos. We couldn't get a straight answer from anyone about anything. It was a bit of a bummer to pay $60 for the passage, but we got on the boat.

The ferry was one of those large, high-speed hydrofoils that holds around a hundred cars, has a well-stocked duty free shop, and airplane style seating in the enclosed passenger deck. There was no outside deck; when the boat gets going full speed, it moves at over 60 mph, and the winds are strong enough to blow you off the boat.

The deck attendant told us to park against the metal bulwark, and he then strapped the bikes securely to the side with a thick hemp rope. When the boat took off, we learned why such precautions were necessary. The river was choppy and the boat pitched voilently from side to side. We weren't allowed on the vehicle deck when the boat was moving and envisioned the bikes falling over and sliding from one side of the boat to the other, slamming into cars.

We kept our fingers crossed during the 1 hour crossing, stumbling around the passenger deck and chatting with fellow passengers. A trio of Brasilians who had seen us at the Brasil/Uruguay border asked us all about our trip and got very interested in the internet aspect. Our excitement at getting to Buenos Aires grew exponentially with every passing nautical mile, and when the skyline of Buenos Aires came into view, it was appropriately crowned with a celestial spread of sunbeams streaking through the cloudy sky. For Alex, it was a long-awaited homecoming; his family, his aunt, now lived in Sao Paulo but he grew up in Buenos Aires. And David, who hadn't seen his aunt in 17 years was nervous about meeting her anew. Gary was just plain excited as hell.

The boat docked and we raced below deck to find the bikes safely stowed, still tied to the wall. If we thought Uruguay was an easy border, Argentinian customs was just a lame excuse to give someone a job. Even the official admitted customs in Argentina was muy facil. In 10 minutes, we all had our paperwork and were ready to ride out of the port.

A friendly police officer in the port that had lived in Ushuaia for many years gave us some advice for our journey south; he told us it was 3700 kms (wrong by a few hundred) and the the police at roadside checkpoints would look for any excuse to solicit a bribe (never happened). He also told us how to get through the city to Route 3 heading south, repeating himself ad nauseum till he made sure we understood (which we had right away).

David called his cousins and got directions to their area with plans to call again when we got close. We'd learned from experience that the little maps in the guide book are not very helpful in monstrous cities, so we relied on the directions and Alex's memory as we navigated through this one.

And Buenos Aires is a huge city. The wide avenues and boulevards are crammed with cars, taxis, and buses. The buildings are towering modern constructions of steel and glass. The people are extremely cosmopolitan and crowd the sidewalks looking very determined and focused on getting somewhere or doing something. Gary found it much like New York City and was loving it. Similar to Sao Paulo, the city was a delightful collection of sights and sounds, modern and clean with a well-designed urban plan. We must have passed a half-dozen green leafy parks on our way to David's relatives.

Also like Sao Paulo, there were motorcycles everywhere; every make and model cruised along with us in traffic with a heavy slant towards enduro bikes. One particular bike blew past us that we'd never even seen before and nearly gave us whiplash trying to catch a decent glimpse of it, a Honda Africa Twin. (Sorry Kawasaki, but if this bike sold in the U.S., it would be a tough decision.)

The pre-arranged meeting place was an Esso station on Rua Libertador, a pleasant commercial street that happened to contain numerous motorcycle dealerships. Perfect neighborhood for us. As we waited for David's cousin to come escort us back to her house, we filled up with gas and had our first rude awakening that Argentina was EXPENSIVE. Gas was $4 a gallon. Gulp! And we had how many miles to Ushuaia? About 2000? Looked like we'd be going without food for a while.

Ana Maria pulled up in her car and we all introduced ourselves. David didn't remember meeting the South American branch of his family and was very excited. We followed her to her beautiful house on a quiet residential street off Rua Libertador.

Her mother Gerti, son Diego, and daughter Paula were home to greet us. Her husband Daniel arrived soon after and warmly welcomed us to their home.

Diego, you handsome little devil

Paula smiling pretty at the dinner table

They invited us to make ourselves comfortable in the living room and we easily launched into pleasant conversation about everything from Argentina to Argentina: Argentinians are very proud of their country and culture. Actually, we talked about other things too and had a very nice time all evening just hanging out, David drinking his beloved maté and pouring over maps of Argentina with them.

Alex went off into the night to stay with his own relatives. It took him a while to get all the way across town, but his memory served him well and he was soon welcomed into their home. Alex and family chatted most definitely about things Argentinian until well into the night.

Miles - 211 {and our 4th boat}

Doggy Toy with toy

On our one day off in Buenos Aires, we got a lot accomplished, but we really didn't get a lot accomplished. Amongst all the driving around, making phone calls, and preparing for our ride south, we didn't really get too far with any one task.

Our various projects for the day included: prepping our bikes for the long multi-day drive south, checking the price of KLR's (in case we needed to sell ours after the trip to afford flights back home), finding Gary a new tankbag, making reservations at our hotel in Ushuaia, getting maps of southern Argentina, posting to the internet. This is how we did:

David managed to get his oil changed, whereas Alex discovered a small oil leak by his front chain sprocket and Gary ended the day with another flat tire (what is going on?).

KLR's aren't too common in Buenos Aires, but we did find a guy interested in buying two of them, although for much less than we had hoped. At any rate, selling a used bike purchased in another country is technically "illegal" (shhh!), but we don't want to know the details.

Gerti's Profiterole
We came back to base camp for some of Gerti's prized gnocchi, profiterole and some of her historical views of Germany and Argentina but the food was so succulent we hardly said a word.

After stopping in at a dozen well-stocked motorcycle shops in the neighborhood, no one had carried tank bags, except for one small shop tucked away somewhere on the other side of the city (good luck finding it).

Our contact, Belen Zubieta, at the Las Hayas Resort in Ushuaia informed us that the hotel was booked solid on the 17th and 18th and there would be no room for us if we were there on those days. Our intended arrival date was the 14th however, so we should be alright (cross your fingers!).

We raced through the streets to downtown, desperately trying to keep Ana Maria's car in sight as it led us to the Auto Club de Argentina (ACA). Man, can she drive. It took all our big-city driving skills and a decent measure of luck. We made it to ACA just before they closed and bought some detailed maps of the southern regions and got a list of campsites along the way (camping - can't wait!).

David had checked out an internet café which had just recently closed its doors for good, but Diego vaguely remembered something at a shopping mall somewhere. We checked it out and found a small internet café on the top floor. The man in charge agreed to comp our charges, and we said we'd return soon. They closed at midnight, so we had some time to go home and prep the journals.

Dinner was served once again with a huge helping of interesting conversation. In between the parilla and gnocchi, we learned about Ana Maria's interesting past. As a young woman, she had moved to Israel to escape the worsening political and social situation in Argentina, but Israel was frought with its own problems and she returned to her home country after 4 years.

She and her husband, both quite liberal, recounted for us the paranoia, mistrust, and terror that plagued the country in the previous few decades as the government attempted to eliminate "enemies of the state." Sadly, they remembered friends that hadn't been seen or heard from since. We shook our heads in wonder how such an abuse of human rights could have occured in virtual broad daylight in such a modern and cultured society; and we realized how similar our forefathers must have felt a half-century ago in Germany.

We rushed back to the Alto Palermo Mall and the internet café. The man we'd struck our deal with wasn't there anymore, and the other's didn't know anything about letting us use the computers for free.

Daniel and Ana Maria
Ana Maria and Daniel said they'd be happy to cover the charges, and so we began. We commandeered three computers in a mad flurry of finishing up the html's, uploading to our website, and getting and receiving e-mail. When we were done, there was nothing left but some melted plastic and a bent microchip.

Probably the thing that gave us the biggest smile of the day was receiving an e-mail from Jay. Seems he'd just made it to Ushuaia, and his tale of wonder and woe was a hoot to read. We knew Jim had made it a few weeks ago, getting his victory e-mail before we left Bolivia. Now that we were the only ones left, the challenge was on. But at the same time, knowing our teammates had made it filled us with pride that already the Riding to the Moon trip was a success. 2 out of 5 ain't bad, right?

We went to bed that night with smiles on our faces, dreaming of the windy, cold, and rainy 2000 miles to come. Thanks for the warning, boys!

Miles - 20

From here on out, we begin our final push for Ushuaia. It has been an exciting trip so far, and we hope you all are enjoying coming along. We hope that along with our long drive to the tip of Argentina, anyone who hasn't made a donation yet to either charity will do so. Click below to find out how, and thank you.