We flew from Buenos Aires to Bariloche Dec. 13 and you would not know it was summer when we landed, as it was less than 50F with strong winds. Six of us took a cab to El Mallin for lunch as we didn't want to deal with late Argentine dinner hour with the next day 6AM departure for the eclipse. Then we went for a walk around town. It was blowing even harder down at the lakefront.
We got splashed getting pictures at that sign.
A procession from one of the local churches was passing through the Swiss-style arch here.
Rolando St. is Bariloche's answer to San Francisco's Lombard St.
Fortunately the weather improved each day and the bus tour day Dec. 15 was clear with temps in the 60's. Our first lakeside stop featured a hardy local swimmer (lower left) in Lake Nahuel Huapi.
We passed by the mountain military training center named after Juan Peron.
Next stop was the Campanario chairlift.
Many of our best views were from the top of the 1,200 vertical lift. This bird stayed here a long time while many people took pictures of Lake Perito Moreno.
I was surprised to see that largest snowfield but guide Xavier said it was exactly leeward of prevailing wind. A similar exposure is probably helpful at the Catedral ski area.
The western half of Lake Perito Moreno is at center, with the Llao Llao Hotel just to its right.
The water at lower right is an arm of Lake Hahuel Huapi. The top rated Quiven Patagonia Kitchen is near the end of that arm and is where we had a multicourse tasting menu dinner the previous night after the eclipse. The dinner was about $20 per person thanks to the blue dollar exchange rate, 140-1 vs. 14-1 when I was at Las Lenas in 2015.
Liz enjoyed a couple of settings at the top of Campanario.
Descending the lift:
Farther down the road we get a closer view of the Llao Llao's setting.
A helicopter is flying to the right of the hotel.
Admin would have liked Abhishek Jain from NYC, who brought his drone along for pictures.
Abhi is an avid skier and had time in 2020 for his first eclipse trip due to ski season being cut short.
Even on nice days there's some wind in Patagonia.
Our guide Xavier said his son windsurfs and that championships have been held on Lake Nahuel Huapi.
Liz is with Judy Flayderman, whom we met on the Damai II scuba/eclipse cruise in Indonesia in 2016.
Judy was with us in 2017 at Jackson also. She lives in Ft. Lauderdale so we saw her at the Mars Rover launch in Florida this summer too.
The next stop was Bahia Lopez.
Any takers for the couloir at right distance?
An Andean condor was flying above the cliff behind us.
Driving away this fox was very cooperative for photos.
The lupines were in bloom many places. They were brought in from Canada, not a surprise as we saw lots of them in Waterton National Park in June 2013.
The next stop was by a chapel near the Llao Llao.
This was the only spot on the tour where we had a view of 10,000 foot Tronador volcano and its glaciers.
About 1:30 we boarded a boat where we were chased by birds most of the time.
Our first stop was at the Arrayanes forest.
These rare trees are concentrated on the Beatriz peninsula projecting south into the lake from Angostura.
Then we spent about 45 minutes on Victoria Island. Liz is by a monkey puzzle tree here.
In the 1920's several sequoia trees from California were planted here.
That's our informative guide Xavier.
Patagonian goose with chicks:
Sun reflecting off the lake about 6PM:
Sunset was after 9PM. With the clear weather we drove half an hour out of town for stargazing. Here's a time lapse picture of our group.
The Southern Cross is a top center with Alpha and Beta Centauri to the right. Exact south is at the intersection of the major axis of the cross and the bisector of the bright centauri stars, above the top of the picture.
Originally we had planned this trip independently. Mountain guide Jorge Kozulj arranged apartments and transport to the eclipse path for about 20 people. But we were lucky to get into Argentina at all with the special permits arranged by AstroTrails. Judy was the only other person of our group to come along with AstroTrails. Jorge and some of his friends camped near Route 40 the nights before and after the eclipse and were also successful. Originally Jorge planned to lead climbing clients on the Lanin volcano. But the clients couldn't get into Argentina and Lanin was socked in with cloud as it was too close to the bad weather around Pucon/Villarica in Chile.
So we met Jorge for breakfast on Dec. 16. Here he is with Liz on the plaza in Bariloche.
The painted scarves are symbols of the mothers of the 30,000 "disappeared" during the 1976-1982 military dictatorship. The yellow symbols are for indigenous people.
On the bus ride to the airport we got our only full view of the Catedral ski area (right half of picture).
We also got a more complete view of Tronador.
We got splashed getting pictures at that sign.
A procession from one of the local churches was passing through the Swiss-style arch here.
Rolando St. is Bariloche's answer to San Francisco's Lombard St.
Fortunately the weather improved each day and the bus tour day Dec. 15 was clear with temps in the 60's. Our first lakeside stop featured a hardy local swimmer (lower left) in Lake Nahuel Huapi.
We passed by the mountain military training center named after Juan Peron.
Next stop was the Campanario chairlift.
Many of our best views were from the top of the 1,200 vertical lift. This bird stayed here a long time while many people took pictures of Lake Perito Moreno.
I was surprised to see that largest snowfield but guide Xavier said it was exactly leeward of prevailing wind. A similar exposure is probably helpful at the Catedral ski area.
The western half of Lake Perito Moreno is at center, with the Llao Llao Hotel just to its right.
The water at lower right is an arm of Lake Hahuel Huapi. The top rated Quiven Patagonia Kitchen is near the end of that arm and is where we had a multicourse tasting menu dinner the previous night after the eclipse. The dinner was about $20 per person thanks to the blue dollar exchange rate, 140-1 vs. 14-1 when I was at Las Lenas in 2015.
Liz enjoyed a couple of settings at the top of Campanario.
Descending the lift:
Farther down the road we get a closer view of the Llao Llao's setting.
A helicopter is flying to the right of the hotel.
Admin would have liked Abhishek Jain from NYC, who brought his drone along for pictures.
Abhi is an avid skier and had time in 2020 for his first eclipse trip due to ski season being cut short.
Even on nice days there's some wind in Patagonia.
Our guide Xavier said his son windsurfs and that championships have been held on Lake Nahuel Huapi.
Liz is with Judy Flayderman, whom we met on the Damai II scuba/eclipse cruise in Indonesia in 2016.
Judy was with us in 2017 at Jackson also. She lives in Ft. Lauderdale so we saw her at the Mars Rover launch in Florida this summer too.
The next stop was Bahia Lopez.
Any takers for the couloir at right distance?
An Andean condor was flying above the cliff behind us.
Driving away this fox was very cooperative for photos.
The lupines were in bloom many places. They were brought in from Canada, not a surprise as we saw lots of them in Waterton National Park in June 2013.
The next stop was by a chapel near the Llao Llao.
This was the only spot on the tour where we had a view of 10,000 foot Tronador volcano and its glaciers.
About 1:30 we boarded a boat where we were chased by birds most of the time.
Our first stop was at the Arrayanes forest.
These rare trees are concentrated on the Beatriz peninsula projecting south into the lake from Angostura.
Then we spent about 45 minutes on Victoria Island. Liz is by a monkey puzzle tree here.
In the 1920's several sequoia trees from California were planted here.
That's our informative guide Xavier.
Patagonian goose with chicks:
Sun reflecting off the lake about 6PM:
Sunset was after 9PM. With the clear weather we drove half an hour out of town for stargazing. Here's a time lapse picture of our group.
The Southern Cross is a top center with Alpha and Beta Centauri to the right. Exact south is at the intersection of the major axis of the cross and the bisector of the bright centauri stars, above the top of the picture.
Originally we had planned this trip independently. Mountain guide Jorge Kozulj arranged apartments and transport to the eclipse path for about 20 people. But we were lucky to get into Argentina at all with the special permits arranged by AstroTrails. Judy was the only other person of our group to come along with AstroTrails. Jorge and some of his friends camped near Route 40 the nights before and after the eclipse and were also successful. Originally Jorge planned to lead climbing clients on the Lanin volcano. But the clients couldn't get into Argentina and Lanin was socked in with cloud as it was too close to the bad weather around Pucon/Villarica in Chile.
So we met Jorge for breakfast on Dec. 16. Here he is with Liz on the plaza in Bariloche.
The painted scarves are symbols of the mothers of the 30,000 "disappeared" during the 1976-1982 military dictatorship. The yellow symbols are for indigenous people.
On the bus ride to the airport we got our only full view of the Catedral ski area (right half of picture).
We also got a more complete view of Tronador.
