Ehemm... as you know by now we made it back to town from the Puyehue trek, and the bull doesn''t have anything to do with anything anymore. Hitchhiked and bussed back to Bariloche (this involved a night in Osorno and a loooooooong wait for a ride by the Lago Puyehue which ended in us having to camp near some river there without any food...) (plus of course the ride from Rininahue to Lago Ranco with an absolutely crazy driver. He obsiously hates his car, Palomo, and drove never slower than 70 km/hour on the worst gravel roads imaginable. Better to fly over bridges ""in very bad state"" anyway. Arnon almost slept in the car (!!!) but I just laughed hysterically the whole time, since it''s probably best to die with a smile on your face ;))

Now we''re back in Bariloche after the Nahuel Huapi trek. The longest and hardest... oooo, soooooooooo nice! Definitely a difficult trek, but still so heavily buried in snow that we didn''t make it to the very hard part. Am always learning: Stick to your old Icelandic wisdom and never travel with only crampons and not iceaxe. If we''d had the iceaxe I wouldn''t be sitting here now, but sleeping in my tent by the Refugio Lopez.

Never mind, never mind. Did anyone expect that we'd get off early for the trek? Probably not. Left town last Thursday (late...) and after a short bus ride to Villa Catedral (the main ski area hereabout) started the hike up to Refugio Frey. The backpacks were heavy with 5 days worth of food in them, and soon I felt I needed to put mine down for a minute. So, I put it down, and it landed right on top of the home of some billion hysterical ants. Before I could say s*** they were all over my pack, and me, and the biggest ant massacre in modern history began. My Bolivian sunhat is a very effectiv weapon I found out, and all my (usually repressed) murderers instincts came out in full force. A lot of pang!!!!!!! and smack!!!!! and "fardu helvitis ogedid thitt!!!" later the ants were all dead, and on we went. Nothing beats a good ants massacre to make your day :)

The Refugio Frey is a tiny winy little house set on a small saddle of rock beside a small lake. All around there are huge granite cliffs which just make your fingers itch to do some climbing on them (and in summer the place is full of climbers). Really a fantastic place. We camped in a hurry since it was getting dark and went to the refugio to cook. On the treks Arnon and I have done together we eat always the same food, every single evening; spaghetti cooked in little water (to make it burn as well aas possible into the bottom of the pot). maggi powder soup is then added to the spaghetti and still cooked in little water (the powder helps to glue the burnt spaghetti even better to the bottom of the pot, and maybe give some alternative taste to the burned one...). In this way you get a delicious (who said burnt food wasn't good???) pasta meal, and if you want some real delicatessen you add some cheese in the final stages; it melts (i.e. you'll have to imagine it does, because the cheapest cheese in the store won't do it in reality) and *blings* your gourmet dinner is ready!! As we were eating this wonderful meal a Canadian guy came in and wondered who had the yellow Marmot tent we could see out of the window. That was us, of course. Well, you see, it's a kind of a windy spot you see... what an understatement!!! While everyone else was sleeping sweetly in their tents or caves or wherever I spent the night wondering whether the wind would take only the fly or maybe send us to Bariloche again. Woke up once halfsuffocated because the wind made the wall of the tent flatten out over my face! What a wonderful night.

The following day was beautiful, sun and not a cloud in the sky. Actually the weather was like that the whole time, so I'll save those of you wading the slush in Reykjavik (or any other place) up to your ankles from more talk about sun and hot weather :) at least for the time being. Very tired morning. VERY tired morning. I want to sleep-morning. I DONT WANT TO LEAVE THE SLEEPINGBAG-morning. Arnon however left his sleepingbag and when he started taking down the tent I didn't have too many options. Getting up really was worth it though, the hike to Refugio San Martin by the Laguna Jakob was terrific. Most of it above the tree line (who needs trees, anyway??), in scenery so crude and wild it felt as if the last ice age disappeared just last week. Umm, namminamm.

From this place we'd planned to hike on to Laguna Negra, via what the Lonely Planet trek-guide calls the hardest section of the whole Nahuel Huapi Traverse. Last winter it snowed a lot in the mountains here and as you know many of the routes that by now should be open are not. We had heard in Bariloche that the snow was melting very fast by now and that crampons would be enough to tackle this section of the trek (no, never forget the Icelandic wisdom). Wrong. The hut wardens in Refugio San Martin told us the route was closed. No way. No way. It looked so good from the mountain pass we'd crossed earlier in the day - and it was closed?? Who closes it, anyway?? Soft snow, very exposed, loose rocks, you name it. When I heard the word avalanche I began to feel convinced. As we were eating our gourmet pasta (with vegetables-maggisoup, I think) (and burned, needless to say) (and with not-melted cheesechunks) a rockfall from the Pico Refugio echoed in the valley. It still looked tempting, but less so. We decided we'd go and at least check it out the next day. That's like the least you can do. It looked soooo good. Way too good; we just had to at least give it a try.

Another just perfect day. Another perfect reason for trying. Off we went (late, as usually), with the hut wardens shaking their heads and even making us sign a statement that we were doing this section at our own responsability (if not my own, whose then???) (this is all getting to American for me - or would I really sue some hut warden if something happened to me, even when he's warned me about the possible dangers??).

Gee, it's late. Continue tomorrow!