Day 10: To Puerto Natales, CL

Today was much longer than the map says. We followed a different route because of a road that was very bad. Four of us also took a 170km side trip this morning over to the Perito Moreno glacier in a National park. By the time we got to our hotel I rode a bit over 500 km today.

Here are some pictures of the Perito Moreno glacier. I have never seen a glacier this large, and certainly not this close. A couple of small pieces fell off while we were there. It was well worth the trip over and back that some of us took.

After the glacier we went back to the hotel and joined up with the rest of the group. We had over 300 km mostly road to do to get to tonight's hotel. It was very windy and in some places we would ride with the bikes leaned to the right about 15 degrees because the wind was blowing so hard. It was desert grass lands. The road would often go for several kilometers or more in a straight line.

Here is a pic of the road heading off into the distance, straight as far as the eye can see.

Theses next three pictures are off both sides of the road. Just open miles and miles of flat grass lands with mountains off in the distance.

After hours of driving through the grass lands of Argentina we took a dirt road about 20km to the border crossing back into Chile again. I saw this cool tricked out Toyota truck. I'm pretty sure both Sam or Chris would love to have this truck.

Back in Chile the landscape quickly changed to vallies again. The snow covered mountain peaks seemed close enough to touch.

Eventually we arrived at the town of Puerto Natales. It is on the ocean, via various passages. That's our hotel at the left. To the right is a heavy duty cruise ship that must be for going out to Antarctica. It is built for heavy seas. There is a small airport and people fly in here to begin their sea voyage.

Here is a closeup of the cruise ship.

Here is a view from right in front of our hotel.

We stay at this hotel two nights. Tomorrow we go out to the national park, about 70 km away to see the sights.