Tag Archives: volcano

Carretera Austral – Part II

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January 7, 2019 – January 14, 2019

(Grab a coffee, tea or beer…..it’s a bit of a long post……)

We camped for a night in a small town called Puyuhuapi, situated at the end of a long fjord, in a small area behind a woman’s house. We were there with several other tourists, all of which were either travelling by bike or by hitchhiking. It had been very rainy, and I was thankful for our warm camper but felt guilty about our luxury when I walked by the chilled tenters on my way to the bathroom. But they were young, and they had a wood stove to gather around, and a little discomfort can increase the sense of adventure….ha ha, easy for me to say as I sipped my warm coffee from the comfort of our toasty camper.

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Las Lajas, Lago Alumine, Wild camp, Piedra Mala in N.P. Lanin

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December 2, 2018 – December 8, 2018

Driving so many kilometres, often on rough roads, means that there is almost always something that needs to be adjusted, repaired or replaced. Probably about 50% of the time when we arrive at a camping spot, one of the first things Derek does after we are set up is get his tools out and work on something. The fridge is finicky and doesn’t always work, screws rattle their way out of the camper and need to be tightened or replaced, one time the electrical connection for the solar panels on the roof was loose or filters need to be replaced on the truck. Sometimes it is more complicated, like when we noticed that the camper batteries were completely discharged and not being charged as we drove anymore. The computer chip governing the relay had quit and so Derek wired a manual bypass… we now have a manual switch in the cab that we need to remember to turn on for charging camper batteries when we start to drive, and off before we shut down the engine so that the fridge doesn’t end up draining the engine batteries. He is one handy guy!

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Lago Caviahue and Volcan Copahue

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December 1, 2018 – December 2, 2018

Our guide book for Argentina is not very good. It highlights a few regions of Argentina, but is more focused on luxury hotels and expensive restaurants, and gives only a few highlights of things to do, in only a few regions of the country. So we didn’t really have a plan for what we wanted to see and do in between the larger, well known sites in Argentina. We looked at our map and at iOverlander, and decided to head to Lago Caviahue for a night.

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Chimborazo, Leather and Banos.

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July 27, 2018 – July 30, 2018

We decided to head back inland.  Surprisingly, given that we were at sea level and not very far from the equator, it was cool in Puerto Lopez (the cold humboldt current from the south moderates the coastal temperature), and we were anxious to get back to the mountains.  We headed towards MtChimborazo.

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Quilotoa Loop

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July 21, 2018 – July 23, 2018

The Quilotoa Loop is a 3 or 4 day backpack that you can do, partly on trails, partly on roads, that takes you through small indigenous towns and stunning mountain scenery.  Backpackers generally do the loop staying at hostels found all along the way.  We decided that instead of stashing the truck somewhere, renting gear, and trying to find places that would accept us with the dog, that we would drive the loop with our truck and camper.

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Cotopaxi

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July 19, 2018 – July 21, 2018

Leaving Mindo we took a slightly longer route to avoid driving through Quito again.  We were not sure what we would be getting into, as we were going to be off main highways. As it turned out, the roads were paved, nice and wide and had a decent shoulder. This made for an easy, enjoyable driving day.  On average, the main roads in Ecuador have probably been the best we have experienced in all of Latin America.

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Mainland Panama

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May 8, 2018 – May 20, 2018

Arriving back on the mainland from the islands of Bocas Del Toro, we were happy to see our truck exactly as we had left it.  We began the drive inland, and within minutes of leaving the small village of Almirante, a roadside police officer was signalling for us to pull over.  He approached the car, and informed us that we were speeding and this was an infraction. It looked like we had left the village several kilometres ago but apparently the speed limit here was still 40 kmh.  He asked for Derek’s driver’s license and passport.  He asked Derek to get out of the car to show him the reading on the radar gun which, was laying on the hood of the police car…70km/h!..funny, we hadn’t seen him anywhere near the cop car or the radar gun which was on the other side of the road, as we had approached.  Derek was pretty sure we hadn’t been going 70 kph anyway but didn’t say anything….it all seemed a bit fishy.

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Costa Rica, Good to See you Again!

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April 16 – April 19, 2018

The crossing into Costa Rica on the Nicaraguan side was chaotic to say the least. We had no idea where we were supposed to park, which building we needed to head to first and we were immediately approached by “helpers”, people who hang out at the border, walk you from one building to another and tell you what you need to do next, all for a propina (tip). We had not used one since we had accidentally used one when crossing into Belize (we thought he worked for the border agency and didn’t realize we needed to tip him until the process was almost complete).

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