Los Angeles

It is a beautiful sunny Saturday morning in a small valley about 10 km N of Los Angeles (Chile). We stayed overnight at a lovely guesthouse where the focus is on  locally grown (mostly home grown) produce and high quality food.  As I write I am sitting next to an arbour with grapes hanging down and a gentle breeze. The spot was recommended by our Chilean rental company as friends of theirs. We showed up last night with no warning and fortunately they had a room. A delightful couple they have provided a very peaceful and comfortable stop. 

Alex and I are struggling with sleeping which may be related to the time shift of four hours but I suspect we remain a bit nervous about what we have begun. We are riding well as a team and learning to be the cautious Canadians in a country of fast paced driving.  But a lot of unknowns loom.  As a step to reducing the uncertainty we have reserved rooms for tonight and tomorrow.  Sunday we will cross into Argentina and then will plan out the next few days from there.  We have an asphalt route planned through Argentina so we just have to pick the stopping points and get some accommodations in place.  We love the internet.

The bikes we have are in excellent shape and handle well, quite similar to what we expected. The roads are similar to Canada with the exception of toll booths every 100 km or so.  The first toll booth challenged both the operator and us to make it through but we have worked out a suitable system of stopping, stripping off gloves, fishing out the toll (usually 600 chilean pesos), stuffing the certificate in our tank bags, and rolling on.

Several things are remarkable. One is the different landscape that although reminiscent of the Okanogan  in places, it is a narrow strip of land between the Andes and the sea.We also noted the remarkable difference in region over a small area. I expected less change but we passed through a fruit growing area, a managed forest zone and back into agricultural land. We are near the southern end of the vineyards but they tend to be higher up and we are riding the valley so have seen few grapes.

We do notice the large number of small towns, roadside bus stops and people who are beside the highway apparently in the middle of nowhere. Obviously we are seeing a small core in the middle of a thriving valley.

So we will mount up shortly for a short ride (400 km) to Osurno.