Buenos Aires to Barreal

The main bus station in Buenos Aires has to be the largest I've ever seen, anywhere in the world. There must be more than a hundred seperate stalls for the constant sea of neon colored double decker long-haul busses arriving and leaving, all within the blink of an eye.

"Your bus will arrive between gates 10 & 18," is all I can gather from the grouchy old man behind some sort of ticket counter out on the dock. "Wait with those women there. They are going to San Jaun."

Once aboard I vacate my assigned seat for the front so I can see the city by night as we leave the station. Little diamonds of water begin to collect on the window as we head out on the highway. Ten minutes later the rain is slamming into us sideways as we barrel down the interstate, passing two men on a moped wearing no helemts and little protection from the storm. The wake of the bus nearly blows them off the road and they lean even further forward for protection. Andrea - the stewardess - brings a tray of little espressos upstairs reminding me that I have to return to my seat at the next stop because previously scheduled passangers have these same front seats. I can´t see anything anyways amidst the storm

Early into the wee hours of the morning I still can't sleep and make my way downstairs. Andrea is keeping the driver company and softly sings along with the radio. It's the spanish version of 'Total Eclipse of the Heart' and all I can think of is the wedding reception scene from Old School. The storm continues to pound us and the streaks of rain look like little laser beams illuminated by the headlights of the bus. Andrea turns her head away from the windshield and the one working wiper blade each time the lightening rips across the sky - lightening like I've never seen before, the type you see in fake movies or maybe National Geographic. All of a sudden our one remaining windshield wiper is violently ripped from the windshield and vanishes into the night sky. I was already questioning the visibility for the driver up to this point and now I close my eyes and think 'dios mio... tonight is the night I'm going to die'.

Fifteen hours later we finnally arrive in San Juan, jumping off point for various out-door summer activities in Argentina including trips to the fabled Valley of the Moon, which from the tourist brochures looks something like Red Rock park in Utah. My backpack is now soaked from the leaky baggage compartment below and I step out of the station and into the rain. The taxi ride into the center of town costs 2 pesos ($0.65 USD). Ironically the cab driver says it hasn't rained in San Juan for almost a year. The news on the television in the cafe where I ravenously chow down a decent meal says that Buenos Aires received 100mm of rain - which sounds like a lot - overnight. The bus for my final destination - Barrael - doesn't leave until 8 PM... seven hours from now. I walk around town a bit after the rain finally clears and snap a few very uninspired photos getting strange looks from most everyone.

Back at the bus station I'm thankful to have Steele's iPod to put me to sleep. Situated on the bus and off for another five hour ride into the mountains I realize the iPod has been on this entire time and has no more juice. I lay back peering out at the starriest of nights and eventually fall sound asleep looking like an idiot with my fancy green Thermarest neck pillow. Five hours later at 12:30 AM we pull into the small town of Barrael, the base of the Andes - stairway to heaven. "Barrael is just like Chacahua, Mexico but in the mountains," says acclaimed Lonely Planet author Danny Palmerlee. "But its winter there and its goint to be fucking COLD!"

The bus stops every two minutes at different houses throughout town, providing personalized door-to-door service. I have no idea where I'm supposed to get off at and haven't yet confirmed my reservation for my stay here with 'The Germans'. I ask one of my fellow passengers - Mario the Mechanic - and he says he lives close to them and will tell me when to get off. Drifting in and out of sleep from total travel exhaustion I eventually hear him yell out to me, "Hurry, hurry... get off here!" In a panic I grab my camera bag and my still sopping wet backpack and step off the bus into the pitch black night. Mario yells out the window to me, "walk that way to the end and turn right and you will find El Aleman' - The German."

Dogs bark at me from all sides as I zig-zag through the darkness. It IS fucking cold. I finally arrive at the Germans and bang on the door for fifteen minutes, shivering in the frozen night. Slowly, I head back into town on foot down a narrow dirt road to a place where I had seen a woman exit the bus in front of what appeared to be a hotel. I pass out at 2:00 AM wondering what tomorrow will bring. In the morning I realize that the 'hotel' I've found refuge in is really an old converted military base and I catch my very first glimpse of the snow-capped Andes out the window and through the trees. Once again I am free.