The Power Of Prayer

Thursday 24th

Carretera Austral is wet - it rains all the time. It should be snowing - that´s what we keep getting told. Yeah it´s freezing cold and damp at night, but the days are getting warmer and the skies clearer and clearer.

Then we remember why. Roger the patron saint of travellers and his strange incantations drawing power back at the restaurant in Coyhaique. I think of the scene in Lord of the Rings where Saruman calls up a storm over the mountain pass to hinder the ring´s progress, and picture Roger doing the same in reverse to call good weather.

Another beautiful days ride past mountains draped in multicolour verdancy sugar coated with wispy cloud tops. Autumn has finally re-appeared!



Lakes, mountains.



Blue skies, clear roads.



Perfect cycling. We find some flat ground behind a fence where we can camp and there´s a building 100m away so we approach to ask permission. Another piece of luck - the house is unlocked and abandoned and demands we sleep once again under a roof. Roger´s work once more and the power of prayer? It´s clearly working.

Lucky Horseshoes - and the world´s dumbest horse

Wednesday 23rd

Wow - beautiful day....





And this is the world´s dumbest horse...



We met early afternoon when, unlike the 3 other horses he was standing with (and all other horses) who calmly walked past us, he took a fright and set off running down the road. This is the road - and horse in the distance.



So as you can imagine this is a high speed chase... sometimes up to 12km/h...

The horse had to stop and wait for us before taking fright and running some more. No matter how slow we went, he just kept running down the road. We stopped to let him past, we tried walking slowly past him, we showed him the fields to both left and right, we waited when he met other horses to see if he would stay, but no - he was just dumb. And clearly not happy judging by the bombs he kept dropping for us to avoid in the road.

We did our slow motion chase for 10kms and we felt bad for the horse, but this was just getting too funny at the same time. Then we hit tarmac and our speed increased and the chase pace picked up. He sprang a shoe and Michael got there first.



He turned to give us a steely glare



And we completed the set 500m further on when he lost number 2.



We stopped for 10 minutes to let him calm dowm with some other horses before we were able to walk past... taking our trophies with us. I hope he was alright...
Because, wow, he was dumb.

An hour later and we question the power of our "lucky" horseshoes when Michael breaks a spoke on a particularly nasty stretch of ripio and we stop early at an estancia to camp. Dumb horse´s revenge?

Hows this for a campsite photo...

What no Fish

Tuesday 22nd

We return to Roger´s to try and get his photo, but unfortunately the place is shut.

Leaving Coyhaique we hit a cruel climb that reminds us to eat food as quickly as possible to reduce weight....

Then we hit a cruel piece of road.... and push the food uphill.



We make a pathetic 33kms before using a perfect camp spot as an excuse to stop for the day. There´s a river sheltered by trees and we convince ourselves we are stopping to fish using lines and flies we got in Perito Merino from Julian (American crazy man walking from Ushuaia).

Michael fishes for 5 minutes before getting bored and going to light a fire. I manage 10 minutes and still haven´t caught the whopper. Fishing is dull and the sunset is just too distracting...

Saint Roger - patron saint of travellers

Monday 21st

We stock up. 9 days of cyclist food weighs about the same as a small horse and we debate about hiring one to carry it. We decide we need food to gain energy to carry the food. I see a rather problematic viscious circle developing here....

So to Roger´s place. Express Restaurant on the main street.



Michael and I have already eaten today (several times), but maybe a last snack for the evening.... The burgers are 4000 pesos (about #4.50), but Roger wants to talk and learn some English and he´s a really nice guy. So after a while we haggle a takeout price of 1000 pesos. A bargain and we order 2 and a beer while we wait.

Roger still wants to talk and next thing - like a magician he produces 2 steak dinner plates from under the bar and invites us to sit. Somewhat confused we agree and eat what I think was probably his and the waitresses dinner.... I feel guilty.
Well almost - it´s delicious.

Roger is a catholic missionary and uses a sea plane to reach people in remote areas around Brazil. He´s in Coyhaique at his father´s restaurant trying to get another sea plane to reach remote islands off the Chilean coast.

After food he insists on praying over our travels and we huddle in the middle of the restaurant while he invokes strange powers. It´s quite a scene....

And he won´t take money for the food. God it seems does indeed move in strange ways....

We leave full, happy, and blessed (with 2 burgers). To celebrate we spend the money on a litre of ice cream each.

I put this down as a good day and many thanks go to Roger.

Crikey - we made it to Coyhaique

Sunday 20th

The day starts badly as we come across the remains of the last cyclist to stay at the estancia...



But rapidly improves as we see the storm has cleared up, the wind has dropped and it´s perfect blue skies AND tarmac roads. Hilly, but oh how the scenery is improving and we can´t wait to get to them there mountains in the distance.



For the first day of the trip we make some easy ground as it´s just perfect conditions and we ride in to Coyhaique - the last biggish town before we get out on to the Real Carretera Austral route. We kill 65kms in 3 and a half hours - that kind of distance would have taken 8 hours further south.

We need to stock up and reckon on carrying 9 days of food out of here. The town´s closed - it´s Sunday. So I guess we are staying here another day.

Now if only someone would invent something to keep track of the days down here.... maybe call it a calendar or something. I knew that missing day would haunt me...

Don´t worry mum - I am eating

Saturday 19th

Lost a day somewhere - calendars are sooooo complicated when you´re on tour. Days come and go with nothing so prosaic as names and dates - it´s all a bit of a blur and I love it. So different to work and "real" life.

So what I wrote yesterday really happened today... and what happened before that could have happened some other time as well. I just don´t know. Maybe I´m experiencing South American leap weeks - like the leap year with an extra day.

So I´ll just play some light music and fill in the gap with a really interesting list about my favourite subject.

Breakfast
4 egg omelette with cheese, onion, tomato
1 litre of porridge with nuts and fruit.
2 large bread rolls with peanut butter and banana
coffee - lots of coffee

Elevenses and twelvses and pretty much all the time.
Trail mix (nuts, dried fruit, seeds) eaten on the go from a handlebar bag

Lunch
4 bread rolls with pate and cheese spread
half packet of crackers with pate and cheese spread

Dinner
Half litre of noodle soup with potato.
Large pan of pasta with assorted vegetables.

Tent Snacks
Packet of biscuits.
Bread roll with peanut butter.
Sweets.
1 litre sugary tea.
Anything else I managed to sneak into the tent without Michael noticing - I just know he is doing the same....

Starting to rack up the calories now.....