Cincuenta y ocho.

Penguins have been caught. Details later.

Cincuenta y siete.

Sleepy squatty penguins are living near Puerto Madryn - one more long-way journey by fucking bus. Photos are ok, but penguins are not! The real kids will be in the next episode - bloody fight for the Nixon, corpses and islands war sorrowful legacy. C ya.

Cincuenta y seis.

Next two days we spent afloat. There were numerous fiords and one brave captain outside the cabin, I haven't been in right mood to take pictures, shame on me. Coyahique is a capital of Aysen Region - wild Chilean West! Indeed, cowboys and blue mountains make this place look like the start of a big adventure. There were no any large towns to the Chilean south of Coyahique, but they should be there. Wood heating at the hostel room (self-catering heating, I mean). End of the world approached and began to bite arses.

Cincuenta y cinco.

Puerto Mont - Ancud - Castro - Puerto Quellon. The first one is a just silly modern city, the most interesting thing that happened on the island was evacuation from the coast near Ancud. Because tsunami was going to kick Chilean asses and take their names that days, government decided to save souls of electors by alarming televised speeches like: "take your wife, kiss your carpet, fire up your car and get out of this place as fast as you could!". So, they took us along to the refuge in hills. Funny incident. Ancud on its own seems like the twin brother of Twin Peaks. Other places looks the same. Gloomy churches, cheap wood houses, foolish museums - supermarkets are still like shiny stars in places like these. We loaded up into the boat and came out to the sea.

Cincuenta y cuatro.

So, it happened - in Pucon, I falsified documents and climbed up to the volcano independently. And I liked it. Way back from the top was fucking whew!, fortunately, French people lent me a lovely ice-pick. Perhaps, youtube video that we watched at night before the walk (smth like "Basic climbing technique" and "Alpinism for dumbs: how to survive") came in useful too. Who-a!

Cincuenta y tres.

Lican Ray is a good spot for lava area walking. Yep, the smoky mountain is particularly cute coz it's exploding from time to time, - peasants leave off their houses, screamings in the night, fire&blood, etc. This is a land of wild rabbits, little lizards, blackberry scrubs and pine trees. Probably, it could be like Canada. Lican Ray himself has nothing interesting, except that housekeeper, an old-intelligent beauty-lefty lady from Lebanon. The woman in a thousand.

Cincuenta y dos.

As I said earlier (Did I?) railroad system of South America is almost ruined compared to XX century, so when we went to Temuco by one of the last trains, Chilean machinists pushed the button of the train whistle all the time. Here we go! Trains are the best. Temuco, the capital of free Araucania (they won all battles against Incas, Spanish, and Chileans) now's ruined too - state of life of modern Mapuche is looking like they working for trade balance surplus of China all the time of their lives (as all we are). Then Villarica. The Villarica lake, a bus station, a canyon near the town. For a couple of dollars, local old-timers can provide you information and knowledge how to get the real big fish from this lake. For giggles, I decided to do it by myself. On the road to the river, I got the asthmatic attack (spell of angry old-timers, I suppose), so that night all the fishes could keep their own plans for the future. I started to look at the mountain. Have never seen smth like that before.

Cincuenta y uno.

Dejected Valparaiso. Open-air museum&"we don't have clean towels, but everybody's welcome, irrespectively of the language, race, color of skin, religion, etc'" sort of hostel. That book of Bernard Pierre Wolff with New York's pictures was not for sale, that tiny city harbor was not for walkings (without sea-lions, but with salesmen of promotional gifts), a lot of stinky scum. On the plus side, Valpo still has some trolleybuses. It speaks in his favor, any place with trolleybuses - a trace of big culture presence. Like fucked commy USSR, I mean.

Cincuenta.

The last big (and fortunately clean) city. Just giant flag on the main square, cool underground railroad, tiny center, gorgeous carabineros, great trannie-show and provincial atmosphere. They destroyed this thing! - http://0.tqn.com/d/gosouthamerica/1/0/V/b/funicular.JPG - bastards ( I always dreamed about it when planning my big south trip years ago. It was like an alien cab, from the last Russian book of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. Bastards. So, my image about Santiago was destroyed too. The new Santiago is a place where old boys going to the cafe with leggy breasted chicks or selling their old stuff on Sundays, depends on of position in society. Be it so.

Cuarenta y nueve.

Buenos-Aires is FFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU! But after 5 months Kate came to me! So all the rest is going to hell. We've visited all local sights - flea markets, cinemas with porno movies, gay clubs, an office of alcoholics anonymous, outskirts&more outskirts. Ten days among street paupers and hills of a trash, and there was the only one corollary - es Aires de mierde. The only man that I miss is a Scottish guy, but I guess he's going well on his way, so, that's totally alright.

Cuarenta y ocho.

Close to Gualeguaychu (approximately 230 km northwest of Baires) a nail on the road pricked the last tire I bought from big Moscow bicycle shop. All my efforts to find the same tires for Chagan in Sudamerica culminated in failure. Fucked rare beast. Well. By the way, where I'm? Let LP talks - "Gualeguaychu has a famous carnival, with women, feathers, orchestras, etc, and today - what a lucky boy you're! - is a final repetition day of this happening". Alright, buddy, why not. Not so fast, amigo! Hoho, identity check, where's your fucked i.d., scum? Sure, I dropped it in the hostel room. Disgustful smell from the forgotten north lands. I spent with Argentinian police two hours in efforts to explain that I'm not so dignified to keep them company for a whole night. Their jail on the right hand was so cute, so after I got free I took direction directly to bed. Next day I left the city by bus. Stupid coppers. Without Chagan I started a new life. It wasn't really cool! Especially at the beginning.

Cuarenta y siete.

I slept two or three days at Parana, drinking mate (yes, they've got me about that), fixing the bike, walking, talking with backpackers, drinking Cerveza, etc. Usual household duties of usual homeless. Then rode away (what else could I do?). Last ten kilometers to national park El Palmar was wet&dark; be a rider on the storm - absolutely bad idea for bicycle journey. There were a lot of palms, animals, and hippies. I spent there three nights, didn't pay for last one (fucked hippy Hesus didn't pay for whole last month). Nice place, especially at nights, when animals hanging around and humanity's annulled.