We packed up and left Puerto Madryn early. First we got a cheap local bus to a small town which was close to Route 40 which was the main road to get across the country. From this town we had to catch one more bus about half hour down the Route 40 to Gaiman an old Welsh settlement. Thought there would be a bit more at this town but there was nothing. So we waited by the road for about half an hour until a guy picked us up. Pedro took us 20km down the road to what we thought was going to be a big truck stop but turned out to be a small closed down road house where we waited again for about an hour till Deigo and his sister stopped and took us 2 hours to Los Plumars. He was quite funny they had just come from town where they had brought a puppy. He tried to teach us spanish swear words for about half an hour then gave up. It was a cute little town, I mean really little town in the middle of the desert. We had lunch and waited in the hot sun for about 2 hours until the dream ride turned up, It was a really old bus converted into a camper van with 3 Argentinians who were about 60/65 travelling to the west to go trout fishing.

One guy spoke really good english so that made it easier for us to get on through out this 6 hour trip . They were classic old dudes and they changed drivers while driving along a couple of times. They said it was a twice yearly trip and there was normally 5 or 6 of them and they'd drive 24 hours a day only stopping for petrol. A couple of them had been doing the trip for 25 years. They would travel 1700kms across the country from Buenos Aires where they all owned bussinesses for 10 days fishing. Then they pulled out this amazing slice that one of their wives had made for there trip. It was filled with Dulce de Leche (Sweet milk) it's like condensed milk but brown and they eat it over here on everything. Literally everything. I'm loving it. They also made us nice strong cafe (coffee) with condensed milk in it.

They showed us all their fishing gear and gave Junior some fly's for fishing in Bariloche. (this is where we were heading). Junior is travelling with a telescopic fishing line so we are hoping to catch a few dinners. Ha ha.

They dropped us off a this town close to where we were going . Junior gave them his NZ flag to hung up in the van.They were heading the other way so we had to find accommodation as it was getting late. We went to a few place and everything was booked out. This town is now a working town and all hotels where full up with workers. We walked for about half hour with our backpacks and starving until we finally got to the very other end of town where we found a really nice place that was pretty cheap considering the town. We met a couple of the workers and we went out to dinner with them which was ok. We ordered the hamburger with salad and got a couple of pattys some lettuce and grated carrot. Had a nice flan for dessert.

Slept well that night and was all ready to go in the morning. We waited about for a bit then a local wool buyer picked us up and took us to the other end of town which was a better place to be as it was the only other way out of town and the way we wanted to go. We were waiting for aobut 2 hours and it was windy and kinda looked like it was going to rain even though I dont think it had rained in this town for about 10 years it was so dry. Then there is was a nice big mac truck with no load. He pulled over and took us the whole way to El Bolson. 4 hours.

He was good fun and he was loving learning some English words. He stopped to fuel up and brought us some of his local food - empanadas. We decided this would be a good time to make him some of our local food - vegemite sandwich. It was hardcase watching him eat it and he done a good job of finishing it politely. Afterwards he used our spanish/english dictionary to find the best word to describe it - Amargo (bitter).

Loving this whole hitchhiking thing in Argentina as buses are so exspensive and we get to see some of the country instead of been stuck in a night bus. It's also a good way to practice our spanish