Patagonia Dreaming Part I -
In the Middle of Nowhere

Created April 2006, Updated 4/2006

中文版 (Chinese)

The name "Patagonia" evokes images of jagged mountains, crashing glaciers, and most often the endless expanse of nothingness (no, it is not merely the name of a company selling mountaineer outfits!). Exploring southern Patagonia in late 19th century, Lady Florence Dixie wrote, "Without doubt there are wild countries more favored by Nature in many ways. But nowhere else are you so completely alone. Nowhere else is there an area of 10,000 square miles which you may gallop over, and where...you are safe from the persecutions of fevers, friends...telegrams, letters and every other nuisance you are elsewhere liable to exposed to."

Surprisingly, more than 125 years later, the above statement can mostly still hold true. Driving away from Argentina's Lake District, we had been driving for more than 4 or 5 hours without seeing another building or even a gas station (which I had never experienced in the United States, you can always see McDonald's at the roadside strip mall at least every 50 miles or so). The road was mostly unpaved and the landscape is mostly desolate and barren. This is the place really make you feel you are on a "Lonely Planet."

Leaving Bariloche, we stopped at Esquel a little bit (where "La Trochita," the steam train from writer Paul Theauroux's "The Old Patagonian Express" ends its journey at the supposedly southernmost train stop in the American Continent.). Then continuing onto Los Alerces National Park.

After a night bush camping next to a lake in the Park, we drove for more than 14 hours to reach the Atlantic Coast. That was the moment I really experienced the "nothingness" and the dreamy feeling of Patagonia.

Unfortunately, this tour I joined did not travel all the way to the southern part of Patagonia, for which would have taken us to some of the most magnificent glacier parks and even more isolated area. Of course, it would have been too exhuasting for me to reach the southernmost point of South America by driving. I will wait until next time.

I like to give my some excuse for a return trip.

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Dusk at Lake Futalaufquen, in Parque Nacional Los Alerces. It was almost 10 pm then.

Camping right next the Lake. No, they are actually not my tents...

Cooking lunch at the roadside, halfway between Andean foothills and the Atlantic Coast. Well, you can see there is a ranch in front of our truck, so this section is not really that isolated.