Leg Distance - 39.93km
Leg Time - 2:57:33
Total Distance -160.64km
Yesterday was one of those days that everything seemed abnormally difficult from the outset: the panniers took forever to balance (even though I was barely carrying any extra weight from the previous day), the stack (cycle-speak for the stuff strapped on to the rear rack) wouldn't stay in the middle, and a stubborn head wind made it impossible to get into a comfortable pedalling rhythm so that at times it felt like I was pedalling through treacle. To top it all off, a twinge that had appeared in my left knee during the previous stage yesterday developed into an outright pain. It's nothing more serious than a strain I suspect, but it was painful enough to be a distraction. This is what I get for tempting fate by telling people that the physical side of things was going better than I expected.
The result of which is that I have decided to stay an extra day in Rio Bueno rather than move on to Valdivia today as planned - it's a 70km+ leg and I didn't think it was time for heroics, not this early on anyway. As far as towns to stop and rest go, Rio Bueno is pretty high up. According to the Chilean tourist guidebook, it is reputed to have the nicest central square in southern Chile. Don't call your travel agent just yet though, picturesque though the square is, it obviously isn't much of a horse race - I wouldn't be surprised if someone had edited the words "out of all towns named Rio Bueno" out of that sentence in the guidebook. I am of course, being hugely unfair. Rio Bueno is cosy and friendly and laid-back and all the good things you'd want from a small town, as welcome as it was unexpected.
Plus, my accommodation is here a veritable Ritz compared to Osorno: spacious clean room, comfortable bed, a shower that works, and, more importantly, I am allowed to keep the bike inside the building. Having come into this with low expectations for accommodation, how and where I am allowed to store my bike is fast becoming the yardstick with which all digs are rated. Love me, love my bike.
It's at this point that I should perhaps break the news that the bike and I are married. Well, not literally married of course (divorce has only been legal in Chile for a few years, so there's probably a fair way to go before marriage with inanimate objects is accepted), but certainly as legally wed as a man and his bike can get. It all stems back to when I first went through customs in Punta Arenas. You see, bike manufacturing is something of an industry in Chile, so the import of expensive foreign bikes when no import duty is being paid is at best frowned upon. Certainly Eduardo, the customs man, seemed very flustered, and asked me to accompany him to his office. Well, I say office, but the place could not have looked less official if it had been set up on a donkey-drawn cart. Eduardo's "office" was on the side of a decrepit corrugated iron hangar, the remainder of which was taken up by warring factions of local feral dogs (every now and then Eduardo would look up from his typewriter as a blood-curdling yelp resonated through the building). Fortunately, I wasn't subjected to torture by the Chilean pushbike mafia (it did cross my mind, yes), instead I was made to sign a form declaring that I wasn't importing the bike for business purposes. And that, I thought, was that.
Then Eduardo made a note on my landing form. Put quite simply, this means that I cannot leave Chile without the bike. Our fates for the next few months were now inextricably bound. By law. The bike was as good as a teenage girl I'd left pregnant and Eduardo the honour-saving father in law, cocked and loaded shotgun in one hand and marriage contract in the other.
Of course, this didn't change anything, I had (and have) every intention of leaving Chile with the bike, but seeing it being made obligatory by law put things in a different perspective. I wasn't just going to rely on the bike for transport, I was also going to have to be responsible for every aspect of it's safety and well-being. Bearing this in my mind it's no wonder that the bike's comfort ranks as high (if not more) as mine when choosing accommodation.
Leg Time - 2:57:33
Total Distance -160.64km
Yesterday was one of those days that everything seemed abnormally difficult from the outset: the panniers took forever to balance (even though I was barely carrying any extra weight from the previous day), the stack (cycle-speak for the stuff strapped on to the rear rack) wouldn't stay in the middle, and a stubborn head wind made it impossible to get into a comfortable pedalling rhythm so that at times it felt like I was pedalling through treacle. To top it all off, a twinge that had appeared in my left knee during the previous stage yesterday developed into an outright pain. It's nothing more serious than a strain I suspect, but it was painful enough to be a distraction. This is what I get for tempting fate by telling people that the physical side of things was going better than I expected.
The result of which is that I have decided to stay an extra day in Rio Bueno rather than move on to Valdivia today as planned - it's a 70km+ leg and I didn't think it was time for heroics, not this early on anyway. As far as towns to stop and rest go, Rio Bueno is pretty high up. According to the Chilean tourist guidebook, it is reputed to have the nicest central square in southern Chile. Don't call your travel agent just yet though, picturesque though the square is, it obviously isn't much of a horse race - I wouldn't be surprised if someone had edited the words "out of all towns named Rio Bueno" out of that sentence in the guidebook. I am of course, being hugely unfair. Rio Bueno is cosy and friendly and laid-back and all the good things you'd want from a small town, as welcome as it was unexpected.
Plus, my accommodation is here a veritable Ritz compared to Osorno: spacious clean room, comfortable bed, a shower that works, and, more importantly, I am allowed to keep the bike inside the building. Having come into this with low expectations for accommodation, how and where I am allowed to store my bike is fast becoming the yardstick with which all digs are rated. Love me, love my bike.
It's at this point that I should perhaps break the news that the bike and I are married. Well, not literally married of course (divorce has only been legal in Chile for a few years, so there's probably a fair way to go before marriage with inanimate objects is accepted), but certainly as legally wed as a man and his bike can get. It all stems back to when I first went through customs in Punta Arenas. You see, bike manufacturing is something of an industry in Chile, so the import of expensive foreign bikes when no import duty is being paid is at best frowned upon. Certainly Eduardo, the customs man, seemed very flustered, and asked me to accompany him to his office. Well, I say office, but the place could not have looked less official if it had been set up on a donkey-drawn cart. Eduardo's "office" was on the side of a decrepit corrugated iron hangar, the remainder of which was taken up by warring factions of local feral dogs (every now and then Eduardo would look up from his typewriter as a blood-curdling yelp resonated through the building). Fortunately, I wasn't subjected to torture by the Chilean pushbike mafia (it did cross my mind, yes), instead I was made to sign a form declaring that I wasn't importing the bike for business purposes. And that, I thought, was that.
Then Eduardo made a note on my landing form. Put quite simply, this means that I cannot leave Chile without the bike. Our fates for the next few months were now inextricably bound. By law. The bike was as good as a teenage girl I'd left pregnant and Eduardo the honour-saving father in law, cocked and loaded shotgun in one hand and marriage contract in the other.
Of course, this didn't change anything, I had (and have) every intention of leaving Chile with the bike, but seeing it being made obligatory by law put things in a different perspective. I wasn't just going to rely on the bike for transport, I was also going to have to be responsible for every aspect of it's safety and well-being. Bearing this in my mind it's no wonder that the bike's comfort ranks as high (if not more) as mine when choosing accommodation.
break it to me slowly, god dam you.
ReplyDeleteAt last! I can now die happily, knowing both my children have married a decent woman (not the same though)!
ReplyDelete