puerto natales

Hello hello! We are once again in Puerto Natales! Just arrived yesterday. Took us 4 days to ride about 250 km. Not sure what that is in miles, but in total we´ve gone about 650 km. Let´s see. I think we left off in Punta Arenas. We were originally planning on heading out of Arenas on Saturday but we partied a little bit too hard friday night with our hostel friends from the UK and the US. We ended up relaxing all of saturday and had a great evening that night chatting and enjoying our time there. Sunday morning finally rolled around and we left the hostel at about 1130. We left Punta Arenas for good at 1230 and to our great surprise enjoyed virtually no wind. We pushed it hard that day and ended up riding about 70 km where we camped in the mountains near Monte Gallina. My left knee had started hurting, somewhere along the way I think I tweaked it. Thomas´ right knee has been killing him almost all of the trip, I think the cold weather doesn´t help much with that. Just as we got the tent up, the rain really started coming down.
The next morning was the same. Wet, soggy, and cold. We rolled for 15 km before meeting two cyclists on the road headed for Punta Arenas. The rain had let up but both of our knees were hurting. They told us there was a villa about 14 km down the road, so we decided to shoot for that, get some food and rest. While there we had some drinks and sandwiches and by chance another cyclist was just rolling in headed our direction. It was Jacob, a cyclist from Holland we met when he was headed south to Ushuaia and we were 3 days out heading north. As it turns out, he took a bus from Ushuaia to Punta Arenas and he had just left that day. It was exciting to see him again and also exciting to finally meet another cyclist headed our direction. He was planning on staying in Villa Tehuelches for the night while we decided to head out and ride while the wind was dying down. It was a nice ride as the day was ending, we squeezed in another 20 km.
The following morning we were packing our stuff when Jacob rolled by so we packed up quickly and headed out as a group of 3. That day the wind was bad and it was a major effort to keep pushing. You still have to pedal hard on downhill portions, otherwise the wind stops you. It´s really like riding uphill all day long. At that point, we had about 25 km until me arrived in Morro Chico. That was our first goal of the day. It took us about 2 hours but we finally got there and took some lunch at a local restaurant. After that Jacob headed out ahead us and we caught up later on while Jacob was chatting with a German cyclist heading south. He told us there was a nice hotel about 25 km from where we were and so that became our next goal. Again we rolled out in a 3 person group. The wind was atrocious but we formed a pace line and that was really exciting as all of us would take turns at the front We worked hard but it was not bad fighting the wind in this manner. Eventually we stopped to take photos and eat something. The winds gradually became less and less and the ride down to the hotel was quite enjoyable. I love riding at that time of the day. Early to late evening in the late day sun. We saw a sign that told us we were only 66 km from Puerto Natales! I couldn´t believe it. Once to the hotel we took a triple room, took showers, ate food, and drank beer. The owners were super nice and the same hotel had been handed down several generations since 1929.
The following morning we had breakfast, the owner took photos of us, and we headed out on the road for the final leg into Natales. The wind was not as bad as the previous day and for most of the day I felt pretty decent. It wasn´t until the afternoon that I started feeling tired. I think it was the previous days ride finally catching up with me. We stopped for a food break and sat down for a short time before making the final push into Natales. It was such a good feeling to have finally made it to town. The fatigue really almost disappears as soon as you see your destination. We arrived in town a little bit after 4 pm and by 5 pm we had a nice room and were up the street at our favorite pizzeria ( La Mesita Grande: http://www.mesitagrande.cl/ ) eating wood fired, brick oven pizzas and drinking local microbrew. Really, you cannot ask for anything better.
Today we´re here in the town, relaxing, checking emails, writing new entries in our blogs, and trying to upload photos and videos. Sometime within the next few days we´ll be heading out of Puerto Natales to head to Torres del Paine, an extremely beautiful Parque Nacional. Most people agree it takes a full week to explore and appreciate all it has to offer. That´s our next goal. Not sure when we´ll head out for that, but we´ll keep you posted. Hope this has been informative! That´s all I´ve got for now. I´ll try to upload some photos sometime today or maybe tomorrow as well as a few videos. Hope everyone is well, and thanks for reading the blog! Chao!


Zach