I don’t know why but our path out of Mendoza seemed to take forever. We had set our sights on a wild camp spot by the side of Ruta 40 said to be one hour and thirty five minutes north of the city.
After what felt like an eternity of following Google Map’s twists and turns we were still one hour and twenty five minutes from our destination. Eventually it felt like we really had broken loose from suburbia’s low earth orbit and the highway felt like it was slowly materializing.
The architecture around here is nothing to write home about. I had imagined expansive homes and wrought iron entrances to estates and vast fields of legendary pampas but so far most of rural Argentina is empty desert or down at heel blocks of bricks and cement.
A young family walking reminded me of refugees we saw in Central America and Colombia. This far south you don’t see Venezuelans walking to escape their devastated country, there’s were most likely locals going home.
Notice the ravaged asphalt on this the great western highway connecting communities from Bolivia to Tierra Del Fuego. The road gets hot in summer and trucks squash it into trenches and there they stay never to be paved over. This highway is more a hope and a prayer than a modern communication link.
At least we haven’t seen gravel for a while even though this isn’t a wealthy part of Argentina.
And then there was the dry lake where the road forded what could be a waterway. Thus there were warnings not to risk getting stuck in excessively deep water. Fantastic.
In this dry season the real nuisance was the slabs of cement that constituted the roadway that might go underwater. They are so badly placed they made us bounce like a pogo stick so much so I could barely focus the camera.
As you can see of ranches there were none in this dry lake bed. It’s amazingly devoid of things to look at, this stretch of Highway 40.
Leaving Mendoza province there was a police check point but no one was home so we rolled straight through.
Not so on entering San Juan Province where agriculture held everyone up looking for contraband. They wanted our grapes so I ate just one (delicious) and handed them over. Well, bugger.
San Juan promises road works for the people and a new freeway…
…but no such luck. The new roadbed is ready to be paved but it’s just growing weeds. What a waste.
But we still got two lanes of our own on the old road, but there wasn’t that much traffic anyway.
Our plan was to stop before dusk at one of several wild camp offerings on iOverlander. The first one was a copse off the highway but the trees were set too close together for our van to get through so we left it for overlanders in small cars or two wheeled transport. We pressed on as darkness threatened.
Our next possibility was off a dirt road off a dirt road in a sort of open cut former quarry. It was hardly scenic but darkness was half an hour away and beggars as they say can’t be choosers. We parked.
Saturday night of a long holiday weekend and the hot dry desert air was filled with the sounds of silence.
The sun set in sky filled with illuminated clouds.
The air was hot and still and we turned on the air conditioning it was so stuffy. Later the wind suddenly picked up and blew, according to our weather app in gusts to thirty miles an hour. It was a sudden transformation with more to come.
After we walked Rusty Layne and I took refuge aboard, not hungry after our huge lunch and sweating slightly in the hot evening air. We didn’t realize it was the sultriness before the storm.
Dinner,
…followed by a movie.
The chief security officer on duty.
And so, some previously downloaded television and bed.
We awoke Sunday morning to continuing winds this time blowing drizzle across the desert in temperatures around 45 degrees.
A bit of a shock.
