13TH - 16TH JANUARY

It took around three and a half hours to get to Rio Gallegos and the bus ride was fine, apart from watching another bout of Pirates of the Caribbean! This is the third one we have seen on an Argentine bus, but at least it was the one I hadn’t seen before. Talk about dragging out a fairly bland story and when we got to the end of the film we realised that they have planned for a third in the series! Still we shouldn’t be doing anymore bus travel by the time that one comes out!

We took a taxi to the hostel which was brand new and wasn’t entirely finished. Our bed needed constructing but we only had to wait around 30 minutes for the finishing touches to be completed. We weren’t expecting too much from Rio Gallegos as it didn’t have a particularly good write up in the Lonely Planet but we figured it couldn’t be that bad. Rob and I had been on edge all day as

Cath was going into the hospital for a minor op. We knew it wasn’t anything too major but were worried none the less. We had been checking emails for as long as we could in El Calafate and heard nothing, so once we got to Rio Gallegos our main priority was to check email again. Still there was nothing on the email front so we decided it was time to call home. Rob spoke to his Dad and thankfully everything was fine, Cath was at home and all was well. This news cheered us up no end and we decided to go out for something to eat. We had some great food and a few jars of good old Quilmes!

The next morning we headed off to check out the sights of Rio Gallegos. We walked along the newly renovated riverfront and were nearly blown away by the wind. Wow, we thought the wind had been bad at El Chalten but it was nothing compared to this. It was now starting to dawn on me how grim the Drake Passage