Two Beers and a Pretzel

San Carlos de Bariloche is in the center of Argentina’s ‘Lake District’, is a tourist magnet, and is beautiful.  The town is unabashedly touristy, which I find more palatable than the comercialized hippie utopia like El Bolson.  Bariloche has a stunning array of chocolate makers and some pretty darn good Italian gelato-style ice cream.  The top ranked chocolatier im Mamuschka – where they apparently have participated in world events as important as WWII Paris peace talks and Einstein’s theory of relativity…

So after getting to town on the 26th and meeting Erin & Katie again, we explored the town a bit and chilled out at the hostel to get ready for Kayaking on Friday.  We booked a 1/2 day for about $40 each in tandem Kayaks across the clearest, darkest blue lake I’ve ever been on.

Erin & Katie were paired up.

I was matched with a rather robust german woman named Ingrid.

We paddled out for about 90 minutes to a beach on a point, had coffee and cookies, chilled on the beach, then paddled back into a headwind.

Now for “Blood Runs Red on the Highway”…

Today (Feb 28th), we went mountain biking around a 30 km circuit thru the lake district with some stunning vistas, gut wrenching uphill climbs and some long and fast downhill runs.

I had bike issues…  loose handlebars, no usable first gear… then with about 8 km left to go, I had a massive, truly dangerous wipeout.  I was going down a huge paved hill and I passed from the light into the shade just as the potholes started and I was going too fast to avoid it.  I’d estimate that I was going about 40 kmh when I hit a pothole and the front wheel bent enough for me to lose control.  I hit another chuckhole and may have gone airborne.  I slid off the road and flipped over.  I don’t remember exactly what happened after that, but the rear tire was mangled.  Erin and Katie were surprized that I was standing up again after flipping over into a bush.  Luckilly I was wearing a helmet.  We don’t have a photo, but I re-enacted it back at the bike shop (happy that I didn’t have a concussion).  Note the severely bent rear tire.

I had to pay about $150 pesos for both bent rims and the bike shop dog bit me as I went in the back to clean up.  I slowly came out of shock and started remembering details of the crash.  Then the owner of the bike shop gave a video testimonial that I had done the most damage to one of his bikes that he’s ever seen…