Well, back in Argentina again. I finished up in Chiloè a couple days ago, man that island is so amazing and dare I say it, magical, I can`t wait to go back in the summertime and do some hiking all over the western half of the island. I spent a couple nights ago in Puerto Varas, this really cool little port town a bit north of the massive and ugly Puerto Montt. I was going to stay in Puerto Varas an extra day to cruise around but on the bus ride there I was hit with a massive and inexplicable desire to get to Bariloche early and go snowboarding. So off I went yesterday morning and seven hours later pulled into Argentina`s most famous resort town next to Mar del Plata. When Bariloche first started to get developed back in the 30`s, this European architect did the place up in rad old style wood buildings that must have been ridiculously cool looking 20 years ago to rich Argentines and Europeans on ski holidays. Then all this terrible construction of high rise apartment complexes and the ugliest dance clubs the likes a which you ain`t ever seen showed up and, well, it`s just not as attractive as it used to be. it`s still a cool town with tons of shit to do like hike the in the national park next door and go skiing and drink the fantastic beer brewed 50 kilometers south in the hippy hellhole of El Bolsòn that I correctly decided to skip on this trip. I`m off to the bus station here in a minute to get my BUS TICKET BACK TO SANTIAGO WOO HOO!!! Sooo stoked to get back to the stinky Chilean capital. The chilean streetcat Puma who we adopted a few months ago gets his testicles chopped off today which means for the next week or so he`ll take a break from chewing on my arm so that his poor crotch can heal. Of course, this is good. Puma`s a tough one and has that look about him that says "I`m going to impregnate many, many streetcats as soon as you guys let me out the front door." We don`t want any little Pumas, cute as they would be, running around, so we`re going to take extra measures to hide his removed testicles so he doesn`t try to put them back in or anything. He`s very clever. Okay, enough about my cats testicles.
So way back in the beginin`s of February I was in Mendoza and met this Israeli guy who told me about this mythical hostel here in Bariloche. A month later in La Paz I met some german who told me about the same one with the exact same strange directions to get there: "Go to the 10th floor of the only building in Bariloche that has ten floors and ask for `The Hostel on the hill`. They`ll know what you`re talking about." Well, after a bit of searching I found it, and yes, it`s all it`s cracked up to be. The view of the town and lake and mountains out my window this morning was fucking brilliant. It`s cheap too, and has a great kitchen. Is it as good as Casa Aventura in Valparaiso, my current favorite hostel in the world? Only time will tell, but I can say right now it`s going to be a close call. It`s especially nice staying so far outside the crazy ass city center. Okay, I really have to pee so I`m gonna wrap this up and go get my bus ticket home.