San Martin de Los Andes to Hosteria 7 Lagos (Mon 2/1)

Stats:
- 50 miles
- 4200 feet of climbing
- no roadkill

The alarm rang at 7am. Arn headed to the house computer to check the weather. All looked as expected, so he booked a place in Villa La Angostura. We assumed two days out on the Ruta de Siete Lagos, so we have a room waiting for Tuesday an Wednesday nights.  

After breakfast, we rolled the bikes out to load gear. I noticed that something was not right with the front end of my bike. Given the crash two days prior, I was a bit sensitive to anything I might have damaged. Arn took a look. Sure enough, something was not right in front fork and headset. I pulled out the tools and pretty soon the handlebars were off and fork was pulled out of the frame. Arn firgured out that the bike was not set up properly in Seattle and I was missing a spacer. Without it, the heatset couldn't  get set properly and there was a pronounced wiggle or click in the front end. As a temporary solution, Arn moved a spacer from his bike to mine. This works until we need to adjust anything on his front end. 

So later then expected, we headed off to pick up fresh bread, cheese and salami. Then, we hit the bike shop in search of a spacer. This was the very first time I found Arn at a loss for words in Spanish. But really, how frequently do you come across, "head set, spacers, tighten, don't loosen that"? With a new spacer on Arn's bike and his spacer on mine, we were off. 

The ride out of San Martin de Los Andes followed the edge of the lake. The skies were clear blue and the lake was a deep saphire. The traffic was very low and people were very cautious with their passes. After a few miles of warm up, we began a long uphill. It was a beautiful 10-ish mile climb. The mountains were stunning. The road consisted of long sweeping turns and complete open vistas. The tempertures were nice and cool for climbing. At some point, Arn said, "You know, I don't mind suffering at the hands of the road grade and a good climb. I just hate traffic". I also think he hates wind and so far, there was none. Eventually, we reached the Continential Divide. There was a stream with two branches. One headed to the Pacific and one to the Atlantic. Now, as two people that have spent time around moving water, this looked more like someone (Argentine) came in and diverted a bit of water from the Pacific (read: Chile).  So, we tossed on our windshirts and enjoyed  a relatively free descent. I say "relatively" because we crossed the pass only to find wind. 

While the predominate wind direction should have placed it at our backs, we pedaled into a --- come on, you know where this is going -- headwind!  Yes, we found the wind early and it was not going to change it's direction.  Now, I am going to digress a bit. This is really going to make sense in a minute. Sea kayakers talk about, "fetch". This is the open distance over water that allows the winds to howl. There are no land masses to break or slow down the wind. Today's experience was defined by fetch. Near the larger lakes (lots of fetch), we felt it. In tigher valleys and twisty road sections, the land provides breaks and it was peaceful and calm.   Enough about wind and fetch. 

At the bottom of our descent, we found what may have been the only spot for a cold drink. We seized the opportunity and drank her last Diet Coke and Coke Zero. We continued onwards. It was a rider's paradise --- sweet surface, killer fantastic eye-popping scenery and very few cars.  Around each corner, the mountains got more and more dramatic. The flowers were stunning. There were lupine in a wide variety of pinks and purples. The astromera was bright yellow and orange. There were fields of daisies in yellow and white. There were wild pink rose bushes. The road was lined with a symphony of colors that felt like being in Mother Nature's florist shop. It was a great treat. Arn declared this his favorite day of the trip so far. 

At lunch time, we reached what was either "plan B or C" for camping. We decided to continue, but not before enjoying lunch alongside Lago Faulkner. To our surprise, there was a place to get food. We ordered a burger to share and made a couple of cheese and salami sandwiches to enjoy as an appetizer. Hey, the "A Plan" is going to be a real calorie burner! 

The ride after lunch was a short stretch on pavement and then we returned to ripio. Remember I told you that last year we rode this in the rain?  Well, the rain doesn't dish up one key aspect of the sunny day experience --- dust!  This gives a whole new meanig to, "eat my dust". We ate this one's dust and that one's dust. Pickup trucks and SUVs were the worst. Anyway, the ripio section began with a long downhill with switchbacks and tight corners. At the bottom, the road followed a crystal clear creek. Unfortunately, I remembered this section as a long flat stretch. Yes, that was because I was coming the opposite way last year.  Today, we were following the creek upstream. So, it was a constant uphill grade on a surface we now call, "in order to improve it, we must first destroy it".  Yes, they were working on the road last year and they are still working on it now. In fact, they started in 2006. Enough said about road progress. 

For me, this was the uphill that never ended. It went on and on and on. To make it more "interesting", the horseflies showed up. The first probe flew back to the pack and reported, "she's sweet --- tiramisu last night and it's in her blood"!  This prompted the pack to fly into formation and begin feasting. I had no hope of out cycling the little f$@#ing bastards. I could only slap one at a time and this was not enough. Arn proved to be a very worthy opponent --- many kills and no bites. He even smacked my back twice and killed the little f&$@ing bastards.  Or atleast this is what he claimed.   Do you get the picture? --- I really hated these things. In fact, I secretly wished for the head wind at all times at a speed high enough to drive my tormentors to the ground so I might run then over with my VERY heavy load. 

During today's ride, we met several other touring cyclists. Most seemed to be traveling alone and we were the only Americans. We met Brits, Germans, Argentines, a Canadian, and an Aussie. The road seems to belong to the Germans and we were frequently mistaken for them.  We stopped at many view points and our fellow sightseers traveling by car were fascinated with our bikes. 

Well, around 4:30pm, we rolled into "plan A" camping location. It was a very sweet spot on the shores of a beautiful lake ringed with stunning mountains. Under sunny skies, we bought two beers from the hosteria, opened a package of cookies, and started to make camp. Once things were set, we enjoyed a nice hot shower and hung out our damp clothes to air out.  Arn's culinary talents are only limited by what he has to work with and tonight was not a lot. While he started dinner, I returned to the hosteria to buy a bottle of wine.  Chicken soup with noodles was our warm up course followed by pasta with tomato sauce and the last of our bread. Nothing was left uneatten -- even the cookies (yes, I admit it, I ate most of them but in my defense it was a small package by American standards).  As we crawled into the tent, we saw that storm clouds had moved in from the far end of the lake. It was the very direction we needed head to in the morning. So, it was very unclear what would happen with our weather. I decided to play Zubmondo with Arn.  (It is a game of "would you rather" and you are presented two bad choices and you have to pick one).  I asked Arn, "Would you rather it rain tonight and we have to pack up everything wet, but we ride dry OR would you rather it stay dry tonight and we pack up dry and we ride in the rain?" We both chose "ride wet". 

To close, I thought I would summarize it this way. Today was a hard day of riding, but it was totally worth the rewards. How hard was it really?  When I was training for the bike ride up the Haleakala Crater on Maui, I would go ride hill repeats (up and down the same 1250 foot hill). I did several days of hill repeats that were 48 miles in total with 10,000 feet of climbing. This was on a reasonably light cycle-cross type bike and an excellent road surface. Each of these days netted around a 4,000 calorie burn. Today, I burned 3,600 calories.  So, it was not easy, but easy would have missed so many of the smaller joys in today's experience.