Stop 2: San Martín

I made it into San Martín de los Andes today, and while it wasn´t what I expected, it´s still a really really nice town. It´s quaint, which isn´t necesarily what I was looking for, but it´s very secluded and I plan on renting a bike and getting into the trails and what not a little bit tomorrow. It also is supposed to have really great venison and trout, so that´s what I´ll be eating tonight.

The Lonely Planet guide had led me to believe that it had a lot of restaurants and bars around the lake, and one restaurant is described as being the ¨cheapest place to eat on the lake¨. Well, there are only two buildings on the lake, so it´s not like that was a great bit of insight.

Lonely Planet came through big time with the hostel it recommended for Bariloche though, and I met some really cool people. The hostel was probably the best part of the stay, next to Cerro Campanario, which I have some pictures of right below. The views were incredible, the pictures don´t begin to do them justice, because they can´t convey how big and impressive the lakes were and how they stretched all around you. Even still, the pictures are pretty cool..

One of the best parts of the hostel was the view, which you can see in my previous blog, but the staff and the people living there were awesome as well. In fact, I probably met more cool people in that hostel than I have during my whole trip so far. I spent most of my time with a couple of English guys, a Danish couple, a Dutch guy and an Austrian, but I also had really good conversations just hanging out with a couple of Argentines, and with a South African couple last night. The hostel had a great sense of community. We found a pub owned by an English guy as well, so the Englishmen and myself went there to watch Uruguay get beat by Argentina on the big screen. On the way home I decided I was going to take advantage of the big kitchen, and buy some groceries.

I was going to make something easy, something that wouldn´t require a lot of ingredients, so I got a bag of cheese ravioli, a can of tomatoes, and a kilo of ground beef. I was paying more attention to the price than anything, and I ended up with way more beef than I expected ... I didn´t think much before telling the guy what I wanted, and I had thought a pound was 2 kilos, not the otherway around. Long story short I had an entire bag of pasta and a little over a pound of meat. I couldn´t finish it, but I definitely got my moneys worth.

I´m staying in Residencia Italia tonight, and I´m going to try to get to Mendoza on an overnight bus trip tomorrow, if I can. I´ll put up some San Martín and Mendoza pictures in 3 or 4 days, most likely.