Nunca Te Ratidos--Never Give Up!

Oddly as it is, we entered Neuquen today somewhat bleary eyed from a long bus ride and this was the quote I read on the filing cabinet of the hostel we finally found a room at. The funny part about it was that the picture above it was colored in by a child and it was of a frog inside a pelican´s mouth. So, we assumed that the frog was then trying to choke the pelican to free itself. Approximately 17hours on the bus has left us more anxious to begin. we have a direction picked out and some possible turnoffs. for as ¨unplanny¨as i like to be, i did take a few moments to talk with some guys at a tire store (i was looking for an atlas that firestone makes for argentina) about how often we´ll come across towns and what the camping situation looks like between here and the andes. what i did discover is that after about a day of riding we will be riding up up up! the good news is that what goes up will hopefully meander down! our first few days look like delicious paved albeit slightly busier roads and then the roads turn to gravel as we start going through some of the back roads. Miguel, the man i spoke to at the tire store said that the water, once we hit the lake region, is drinkable directly from the lakes. until then, we´ll be packing an extra 10 liters of water as sources are harder to come by and it´s really really hot outside.

we leave tomorrow morning. finally. or so we think. we had to negotiate a different way for our bikes to leave buenos aires as they couldn´t come with us on the bus. 3 chicas and 3 bikes are not easily transported. let´s hope leah and i understand where to pick the bikes up tomorrow morning and lets hope that they meant this wednesday and not next wednesday and lets hope we don´t have to make phone calls trying to locate three bikes because we may not get further than ¨hola...tienes 3 bicicletas?¨

on a positive note my new friend, margo the puppet, has already proved her ¨weight¨in gold. she has blissfully entertained children and adults alike showing off her ability to eat cookies. as silly as it sounds, it gives us a means to connect with people and has made the time inbetween worthwhile.



In terms of things and scenery, i think argentina really is a gem. even though everyone says that this sort of desert kaliedescope is dreadful and uninteresting, i find plenty of things to amuse my senses. it also makes me even more excited for the ¨beautiful¨ parts of the region.

it may be a few days before an internet portal is available so until then--
jude.

ps. capitolizing in my writing has never been my thing and while i´ve given it my best effort to remember i hope that you´ll allow me to peacefully continue writing without taking the time to capitolize...