My own transport hell

On this morning, I was reminded of my old friend from Bristol, Dan, who, when discussing the advisability of mixing drinks, used to chant "Beer then wine, feel fine. Wine then beer, oh dear...". It is fairly logical from this point to realise that wine then beer then beer then wine, almost all of different varieties, is not going to be a good thing. Hence, my morning was spent in a state that might charitably be described as "woolen-headed", as I grabbed a minimal breakfast, checked out and settled my bill, said farewell to Aga and stumbled into town, headed for the bus station. After checking my bag onto my coach, I made a quick dash back to the nearest ATM, stood nervously in the queue (ATMs in El Calafate almost always run out at the weekends, so on a Monday morning everyone was stocking up again...) and was then very surprised to bump into Ross, my travelling companion from northern Argentina, in the street outside the bank. It turned out he had been down to Ushuaia and also Torres del Paine, over the border in Chile, and was now headed north. This time, unfortunately, we weren't due on the same bus, and I think he's now further ahead than me, but it's always nice to see a friendly face.

Having frantically grabbed a soft drink from the supermarket and run back to my imminently-departing bus, I settled in for almost 5 hours to Rio Gallegos. During this time, my hangover unfortunately kicked in properly, leaving me with a massively churning stomach that wasn't helped by being on a bus. Similarly, my mood was not brightened by the discovery that most of the nearby seats were occupied by a large family of Argentines, the screaming child section of which proceeded to make the ensuing hours into something akin to my own personal travelling hell. 3.5 hours in transit in Rio Gallegos didn't help much either. It's a bleak place, under a steely Patagonian sky, and the most interesting thing in the vicinity of the bus station is the Carrefour supermarket. Though the latter did at least allow me to partially sate my desire for food, any food, to settle my stomach some more. After this, boarding the long overnight bus up the coast felt like a real release.

I had, as has become my practice for overnight trips, paid the extra for the Cama service, so I had a seat on my own without having to scramble over everyone, reasonable legroom, and the joys of an onboard meal service and movies to look forward to. In an even-more-surprising twist, the food was actually halfways-edible, and I had the luck of getting a second helping as of the Israeli couple sitting just across from me, Ben and Michel, the latter was vegetarian so didn't want the beef that we were served. After that, we were treated to the Keanu Reeves film Constantine, which isn't quite as bad as it might sound, and then I actually managed a certain amount of sleep on the bus.