Patagonia National Park

Our drive from Puerto Rio Tranquillo down to Cochrane was probably the most spectacular stretch of roadtrip we have ever done! Bone-shatterlingly bumpy gravel road but winding its way along turquois blue lakes and snowcapped mountains the whole time. We picked up a lovely dutch couple who were hitchhiking and spent the day stopping at every corner to take pictures and bond over our love of food and travel. Cochrane itself turned out to be a cute little town with a chilled out vibe, serving as the base for the Patagonia National Park. This National Park is gorgeous and a completely different landscape from the northern bits of the carretera. Its dry and rugged, brown and orange dominate the landcape colors. There are wild guanacos grazing everywhere and we even saw a couple of condors swooping overhead. On the second day we did a smaller hike into a gorge along a river, where Hadleigh dared to take a very short dip into the freezing waters. At the end of the gorge we encountered a group-tour of kayakers and after the guides dropped off their clients, (who were continuing their journey on foot) they were nice enough to allow us to kayak back to the starting point with them at no cost.