Bariloche

It seemed like a year, but at the end of our tedious day stop on the way to Bariloche our bus did finally arrive. We were so relieved to see our big yellow bus, but our relief did not last long as somehow we had landed the most anxious bus divers in the whole of Argentina. They must have had one too many hits of speed or something, cos they were nuts. They were shouting at everybody in frantic incomprehensible Spanish, leaving Ness, Sarah and I quite confused. We got on though, sat down and began to relax until the world´s most annoying passenger sat down directly behind Sarah. He was laughing, waving, and gesturing wildly to his daughter outside to see her off. This doesn´t sound bad on the outset, but even his daughter was not as enthused as he was about his parting, and she certainly didn´t seem upset. Then this guy starts making faces at his daughter and strange slurping noises that would have been completely lost on her due to the two inch thick plate of glass between them. Forcing everyone else in the bus to listen to these sounds that in honesty sounded pseudo sexual. It was disturbing and annoying. Then the bus took off, and we all got settled to read our books, when the drivers turn off the lights in the bus and proceeded to blast Phil Collins´ music for many an hour. I hate Phil Collins. But to make things worse annoying Mc annoy-o started playing the drums with his drink bottle on the back of Sarah´s chair. Luckily I had my i-pod and drifted off relatively early.
I awoke suddenly to the bus drivers screaming at us. It was daylight but I knew instantly that we weren´t in Bariloche yet. The drivers wouldn´t have a bar of it and forced us off the bus. We were left standing cold and disoriented in a strange place without our luggage as we watched our bus screech off. Unsure of what had just happened, we stood there scratching our heads until a kindly gentlemen informed us that the bus was just refuelling, and would be back shortly. The last leg of the journey was relatively uneventful except for a rising smell of heated stale urine. It got worse and worse until we finally got to Bariloche by which time it was unbearable to be within fifty metres of the bus.
We grabbed our gear, got a taxi to our hostel, and had a shower. I am glad to say that this is the best hostel we have been to. The people are really friendy, it´s run by a New Zealand guy so communication´s a breeze. Bariloche is amazing, one of the most spectacular places I have ever been, it´s in the centre of the lake district. There is in fact a huge lake by the city, and surounding that snow capped mountains. Yesterday we took the bus to one of the smaller mountains. We caught a Gondola, a kind of sky bus, to the top of the mountain and walked back to our hostel from there. It was tiring but really nice. Then this morning nursing hangovers we headed to a national park by bus. We wandered round the lakes for a while then headed up a trail. Ness and Sarah were too buggered to go very far so they sat down whilst I explored a bit further. I ran the rest of the trail right up a big hill to the most amazing view, and then ran back leaving me beyond exhausted. Now I´m here, at the internet cafe, exhausted and hungry, so I best be off to have dinner and or a nap.

Till next time,
Chuckles