Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than by the ones you did.
So throw off the bowlines, sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover. --- Mark Twain

Tuesday, February 10, 2015

Park National Ischigualasto

08.01.2015-09.01.2015
Journey: Chilecito – Patquia – Baldecitos – PN Ischigualasto (235 km).

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In order to visit The Ischigualasto National Park it was necessary to drive about a few hundred kilometers southwards.
In the central square of Chilecito there is free wifi, which is to some extent connected to the outside world. You just sit at the table in the open coffee-house and watch the animation on the screen. You keep on watching and meanwhile, press the button "Publish", and continue watching.

Half an hour later another error message will appear stating :"Cant publish files". You press the button again and wait, read the next error message, and wait until the battery of the laptop is almost empty.

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You take the charger, and move over to the place of tourist information which has also wifi. And functioning one. And the wall provides electric current. And you continue the procedure. I think it was Winston Churchill who once said, "We shall never surrender."

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In the long run, during two hours - the post of 21.3 MB reached the Internet, and then I could start moving on again.

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The Talampaya National Park and The Schigualasto National Park, which is located nearby, belong to the UNESCO World Heritage List. You just could not leave without visiting them.

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At the entrance of the park there is a quite ok campground with shelters that protect against the hot sun. It means that the number of sheltered places is limited and availability to those who come earlier and whose can fits under the shelter. Fortunately the bus will fit. Actually it really important thing, as the temperature outside is constantly over +30 degrees and more.

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Farther there is a mountain that somehow invites one to take the backpack to visit it. But as it will be dark in an hour the experience has to wait until the next day.

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One more picture of the camp-site.

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In the morning it turns out that there are some rules for visiting the park. And driving around on their own is not to be accomplished.

By 9 am a row of vehicles are waiting by the gate of the park , tickets are checked and then all start moving on together.

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The total number of the vehicles is probably around twenty , mostly smaller cars and with Argentina number plates.

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By the most important objects stops are made and the guide explains the issues.

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Then we drive on until the next attraction.

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Plants growing beside the track are marked.

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The ground is quite soft because of the recent rain.

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“Cancha de Bochas”

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Here are some the stone balls

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"El Hongo" has become the symbol of Ischigualasto.

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A panoramic image of the surroundings.

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Further on another bunch of mushrooms.

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The road next to the red hills leads back to the gate of the park. The morning tour lasted about three hours.

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And here one can also visit a dinosaur museum.

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Herrerasaurus Ishigualastensis. Lived here about 230 million years ago.

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To visit Cerro Morado one also needs a guide, and it was a good, because alone alone, I would have had much more time to find the right track .

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Having reached about a quarter of the hill.

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At half of the road up.

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And finally at the top.

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The guide of the park.

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And one guanaco,

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Gazing….

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On the way back.

In conclusion we can say that The Ischigualasto Park to can be overviewed in one day. At 9 am the morning tour and an afternoon walk in the Cerro Morado, as the view from the top is worth climbing there.

After a brief rest a car that has a strange number plate is discovered. A closer inspection reveals that is from Surinam.

And as to some other travelers – some Germans with VW T5. And some others- with the Germans and a long conversation revealed that they have a bus of a software problem, ie the bus is a new version of the software, and they can not fly higher than 3500-4000 meters, the highest since the beginning with the problems, and the bus does not run.

I could not say anything about it at first, but they had a whole itinerary planned so that below the Andean Patagonia, the Andes where there are lower, and then up along the Pacific coast. Anyway, Bolivia, and Peru, Cusco and Machu Picchu, they were excluded from the plans. Well, the Nasca-Cusco road is three places more than 4400 meters in altitude. Do not know at this thread for more comment and recommend them other than to go to the dealership, Chile, let them look at the car. Here, after all, a very large areas at an altitude of 4000 m and above, and all sorts of things to run.

But yeah, continued to talk for longer, as they had previously visited the Baltic countries, but it is the height of a thing called immediately think that that means that you can not? On its own, after all, was also briefly the situation in Ethiopia that remained standing at a height of 3800 meters, and the power was gone, and no one meter higher, but when put next morning, smaller tires down, then climbed into the joy out of 4200, and it would probably have gone even higher than would be there was tea. And after a high-pressure pump regulation went here in the altitude of 5000 m on.

Anyway, all this talk reminded one matches are once again reminded that the two need to be as small tire with rims that will not leave again, driving in the mountains somewhere in the valley of the trap.

Continued ...

Situated 80 kilometers away from Talampaya National Park is the immediate subject of the next post.

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