day 9/10/11: more buses and home

day 9 was pretty much like our trip down to patagonia: filled with buses. we woke up early (shocker) and took the 7:30am bus out of el chaltén back to el calafate. we had an hour "layover" in calafate, then left at 11:30 to head back to río gallegos. we got back to río gallegos around 4, where we had another "layover". however, this one sucked because it was 4 hours long. picture rumford, maine. now take away the ugly paper mill and substitute oil rigs. that is basically what río gallegos is like; the armpit or butthole of argentina. we went back to the carrefour to get a late lunch and some snacks for the bus. because we were taking andes mar back to puerto madryn, we were excited to get bus meals on the 19 hour trip back up the eastern coast (only starving people would be excited for bus meals). after struggling to keep ourselves occupied in the grimy terminal in río gallegos, our bus finally pulls in. little did we know, that we had, in fact, gotten ourselves cama ejecutivo seats on this bus! we had booked semi-cama seats (like a regular bus seat) but somehow were placed in these other nice seats that recline 130 degrees to sleep. it was the best surprise ever, so now we were on top of the world because a. bus meals and b. nice seats.

puerto madryn hostel

our well-deserved last meal in puerto madryn

well that was short lived because the bus didn't feed us. i'm actually not kidding. so we're on this bus for 19 hours with only one piece of bread each, the bread leftover from our time spent in el chaltén. we didn't get bus meals, blankets, water, or wine. the bus attendant handed out little packages of tea, but no cups or hot water. needless to say i was not a happy camper. we hadn't eaten a "real" meal since our stay in el calafate.

when we finally arrived in puerto madryn for the second time, we found the first hostel closest to the bus stop, dropped our stuff and literally ran to find a restaurant. well, of course it's 3pm and it's siesta time, so nothing was open. i was about to kill someone...until we found a cafe/pizza bar. we all ordered food and spent the next 10 minutes scarfing it down. then we decided to splurge and get ice cream. **note: we found out that we spend about 80 pesos on dinner in chaltén. 80 pesos for three nights of dinner=about 25 pesos per night. divide that by 3, which is 8 pesos per person aka 2 dollars a person. for 2 nights of dinner, because we stretched a pot of soup 3 days.** we laid on the beach for awhile, went back to the hostel, cooked, showered, and then strolled around puerto madryn as the sun was setting. we were all wearing our matching vests, and although we were sad to be leaving patagonia, we were also tired. we had exhausted our vacation and milked every single day we could, leaving us happy and satisfied, but also worn-out and cranky. we went to bed early, and left the next morning on a 7am bus for mendoza.


we arrived back in mendoza at 7:15am the next morning, monday. we took buses back to our respective houses, where i immediately dropped my bags, and went to the ifsa-office to print a few things. then, i went to spanish and took a history exam. it's still the week we came back, and i'm still tired! it's nice to be in a house again though and sleep in my own bed here. i took over 600 pictures while in patagonia, so i also have been sifting through those in my spare time.

an update from mendoza: little did we know, while we were freezing in patagonia, it turned to spring here! in just 12 days,  ( i combined a few, night buses aren't really that exciting to blog about), mendoza has blossomed into a green, warm (high of 82 today), flowery city. i'll have to take some more pictures of the park and streets....it's like a completely different place! also, because my host parents are gone for the week, i've been able to cook my own meals! i went to the grocery store and picked up some stuff to supplement what my host mom already left me (woohooo frozen dinners). i bought a bag of baby spinach, dried papaya, peanuts, raisins, and dried coconut (for oatmeal). i also bought more conditioner, which, surprise, cost more than half the groceries that i bought. #oneandahalfworldproblems.