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range , and Chile gets a fair bit of precipitation from the Pacific , which means that this side is a lot greener and is scattered with lakes and sea pockets serviced by ferries .
We decided to take a two-hour ferry across a lake , the same lake that Ernesto Guevara , his companion Alberto and La Poderosa are crossing in The Motorcycle Diaries , in order to head straight into San Martin de los Andes . Once again , it struck us how a geographical border or a mountain range would make culture , people , climate and the whole feeling change in an instant .
Chile might be the most expensive country of South America , and we saw better , or , lighter-on-the-travelbudget , times ahead for Argentina . We had heard about Argentinas Blue Dollar , an unofficial exchange rate that applies whenever you bring a foreign currency in cash , while the official exchange rates can ’ t quite keep up with Argentina ’ s soaring inflation . In that sense , withdrawing cash from the ATM becomes a nono unless one doesn ’ t mind paying double , and one either has enough US dollars in cash or can get pesos at the blue rate at services like Western Union .
We spent our first evening in San Martin de los Andes in front of a money exchange just to find out that they had run out of cash for the day , a usual occurrence as it seemed , but we were more lucky the next morning and could walk away with a decent bunch of notes . Another result of the inflation is that the largest bill , 1000 pesos , equals to around 2.5 dollars , which made us literally feel cashed up for the next few days in Argentina .
The Ruta-40 stretch between San Martin de los Andes and San Carlos de Bariloche is known as the sevenlakes route and it basically means endless twisties , mostly perfect tarmac and epic views along lakes and through pine forests . Seeing a native Araucanía or “ monkey puzzle tree ” was literally quite puzzling — in a good way . Everything looked so colourful and beautiful and we began to understand why Patagonia has the reputation it has .
Further south of Bariloche , we crossed the border back into Chile and some rain would greet us on the Carretera Austral . It wouldn ’ t be long though until the sun came back and the scenery did feel more lush and with steeper mountains all around ,
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