South America
The joy of waiting (Drive Day 225: Feb 9th, 2004)
We have no idea which day or event is the most important and it is delectable not to care. Each day brings more time to absorb Argentinean rural culture. Even waking at night to walk through the campground to the bathrooms is accompanied by the soft sounds of tango playing from radios. The local classifieds are a window to another world – where horses cost more than cars, and the newest cars for sale are from the 80s.
Follow this bonus-material blog and ride along on a one-year road trip that inspired the memoir The Drive: Searching for Lost Memories on the Pan American Highway. On sale now. Get yours through the buy-the-book links at the bottom of the landing page on my teresabrucebooks.com website or here or here. Planning a road trip? Buy the audiobook here. Like The Drive’s Facebook page and tweet back at me @writerteresa. Like travel anthologies? I’m in a brand new one called Alone Together: Tales of Sisterhood and Solitude in Latin America which you can get here.
The proper hat (Drive Day 224: Feb 8th, 2004)
I have never been happier to own a decent cowboy hat. Because not wearing one would mark you a rube in Junin this time of year. I see almost every kind imaginable: from improbably white, distinguished straw toppers to rakishly angled wool fedoras. Hats are obviously the second most important accessory behind the facon knife, not-so-discreetly tucked under the belt at the small of your back, immediately accessible for emergency lasso cutting or slicing through a hunk of grilled beef. Luckily for us, the makers of fine hats and facons have set up a blocks-long market through the center of town.
Follow this bonus-material blog and ride along on a one-year road trip that inspired the memoir The Drive: Searching for Lost Memories on the Pan American Highway. On sale now. Get yours through the buy-the-book links at the bottom of the landing page on my teresabrucebooks.com website or here or here. Planning a road trip? Buy the audiobook here. Like The Drive’s Facebook page and tweet back at me @writerteresa. Like travel anthologies? I’m in a brand new one called Alone Together: Tales of Sisterhood and Solitude in Latin America which you can get here.
Off to the races (Drive Day 223: Feb 7th, 2004)
Growing up in Oregon, I’ve seen rodeos. And this trip started with watching my brother-in-law Michael ride in the Prescott Arizona Independence Day rodeo. Junin’s Festival de Puestero is a tad more competitive, it seems. Like hold on to your reins and ride as though lives depend on it competitive. My mouth gapes until I choke on swallowed dust and learn to watch like a local – with cool appraisal and nonchalance.
Follow this bonus-material blog and ride along on a one-year road trip that inspired the memoir The Drive: Searching for Lost Memories on the Pan American Highway. On sale now. Get yours through the buy-the-book links at the bottom of the landing page on my teresabrucebooks.com website or here or here. Planning a road trip? Buy the audiobook here. Like The Drive’s Facebook page and tweet back at me @writerteresa. Like travel anthologies? I’m in a brand new one called Alone Together: Tales of Sisterhood and Solitude in Latin America which you can get here.
Cowboys start filling up the campground (Drive Day 222: Feb 6th, 2004)
We wake to an almost full campground and the sounds of horses snorting in the morning air. Overnight Junin has become a staging ground for gauchos. And a fashion show. Men, interested in the latest accessories? Try an exquisitely woven belt through which you stash a silver-cased knife known as a “facon.” Extra points for intricate filigree and embroidery.
Follow this bonus-material blog and ride along on a one-year road trip that inspired the memoir The Drive: Searching for Lost Memories on the Pan American Highway. On sale now. Get yours through the buy-the-book links at the bottom of the landing page on my teresabrucebooks.com website or here or here. Planning a road trip? Buy the audiobook here. Like The Drive’s Facebook page and tweet back at me @writerteresa. Like travel anthologies? I’m in a brand new one called Alone Together: Tales of Sisterhood and Solitude in Latin America which you can get here.
A revelation: all progress is not forward (Drive Day 221: Feb 5th, 2004)
Yamil and Magali inform us that we left Junin de los Andes a week too soon: next week is the famous Festival de Puestero. Apparently it’s the rodeo to end all rodeos and no Argentinean can call himself a gaucho if he doesn’t dress up and ride.
In every road trip I have ever taken, even those that involve a circuit, the idea is to keep driving forward. See new things. Never waste time backtracking unless you’re lost. I’ve never questioned this unwritten rule until now. But we have already “completed” the original mission: finding the camper of my childhood. We are not obligated to follow a map or check off boxes on a bucket list. Even the idea of “finishing” the Pan-American Highway because my parents couldn’t does not come with a schedule. It feels rebellious, pointless and sublimely irrational for two non-horsey types to return to a town for a rodeo on the recommendation of two kids we met two days ago. Which is precisely why we say yes to going back. Scrapping schedules and delighting in detours is a privilege only road trips offer. It would somehow be a crime not to revel in it. The campground is still waiting for us, as if the fish and the birds knew we’d come to our senses and return.
Follow this bonus-material blog and ride along on a one-year road trip that inspired the memoir The Drive: Searching for Lost Memories on the Pan American Highway. On sale now. Get yours through the buy-the-book links at the bottom of the landing page on my teresabrucebooks.com website or here or here. Planning a road trip? Buy the audiobook here. Like The Drive’s Facebook page and tweet back at me @writerteresa. Like travel anthologies? I’m in a brand new one called Alone Together: Tales of Sisterhood and Solitude in Latin America which you can get here.
The secret to drinking mate (Drive Day 220: Feb 4th, 2004)
Magali and Yamil have no place to be and neither do we, so they decide it is time to teach us the proper way to drink mate. You’re supposed to shake the mate leaves in the little metal cups with two handles, designed for passing. Then invert it against your palm to settle out some of the dry tea leaf dust and create an angled path for the water to slide down into the mix, not disturbing the carefully placed dust. Then you block the end of the silver straw as you slip it into the mug so that nothing blows up into it until you draw the first slurp of water. It still tastes a bit grassy and bitter to me, so Magali shows me how to put a teaspoon of sugar on top of the leaves and leat it slowely dribble through, offering your boyfriend or just a sip only after a few rounds of water pours have distributed the perfect amount of sugar. My English, tea-loving granny would be impressed, except for the shared sipping part. But hey, what’s a little saliva when you’re already sleeping on top of strangers?
Follow this bonus-material blog and ride along on a one-year road trip that inspired the memoir The Drive: Searching for Lost Memories on the Pan American Highway. On sale now. Get yours through the buy-the-book links at the bottom of the landing page on my teresabrucebooks.com website or here or here. Planning a road trip? Buy the audiobook here. Like The Drive’s Facebook page and tweet back at me @writerteresa. Like travel anthologies? I’m in a brand new one called Alone Together: Tales of Sisterhood and Solitude in Latin America which you can get here.
Piggyback campers (Drive Day 219: Feb 3, 2004)
That feeling of isolation turns out to be a mirage. When I wake up to use the campground outhouse in the morning, I almost step on a tent pitched under our camper steps during the night. It’s laughably bizarre – I’m afraid of waking whoever is inside and literally leap over two snoring campers. Gary figures they must be young people who were drunk when they arrived or newbies so afraid of wild animals that our camper seemed like protection.
It turns out that’s just what Argentineans do – it’s a communal, collegial culture and the assumption is that happy campers love company. Which is how we meet Yamil, a 24-year old aspiring musician and his med-school girlfriend Magali. We spend the entire day together: hiking, swimming, trading CDs, learning that Argentineans think the voiceover artist who does Homer Simpson in Spanish is much better than the American original.
I am suddenly acutely aware of how easy it is to become isolated traveling in a private vehicle in this wide-open country and of how much we would have missed if we did the American thing and stuck to ourselves. That mate-sharing thing? I don’t even wipe the straw anymore when its offered by our new compadres.
Follow this bonus-material blog and ride along on a one-year road trip that inspired the memoir The Drive: Searching for Lost Memories on the Pan American Highway. On sale now. Get yours through the buy-the-book links at the bottom of the landing page on my teresabrucebooks.com website or here or here. Planning a road trip? Buy the audiobook here. Like The Drive’s Facebook page and tweet back at me @writerteresa. Like travel anthologies? I’m in a brand new one called Alone Together: Tales of Sisterhood and Solitude in Latin America which you can get here.
San Martin de los Andes (Drive Day 218: Feb 2, 2004)
It is hard to leave a place as River-Runs-Through-It, movie-set beautiful as Junin, but we assume the next town bearing a similar name will be worth the drive. Turns out the drive needs no added bonuses; the trail of seven lakes is a destination in itself. In the space of 40 kilometers, the entire scenery goes from expansive Montana to piney, mountain Oregon, with bright blue lakes instead of wide open rivers. San Junin de los Andes is to Argentina what Vail must be to Colorado – a place for wealthy skiers and socialites to enjoy the mountains from resort lodge comfort. We, in our dusty camper, are distinctly underdressed so we stock up on some overpriced groceries and find a campsite on the shores of still-lovely Lake Lacar. It is far enough from espresso shops and art galleries to bore the winter jet set, so it feels like we have this national park all to ourselves.
Follow this bonus-material blog and ride along on a one-year road trip that inspired the memoir The Drive: Searching for Lost Memories on the Pan American Highway. On sale now. Get yours through the buy-the-book links at the bottom of the landing page on my teresabrucebooks.com website or here or here. Planning a road trip? Buy the audiobook here. Like The Drive’s Facebook page and tweet back at me @writerteresa. Like travel anthologies? I’m in a brand new one called Alone Together: Tales of Sisterhood and Solitude in Latin America which you can get here.
Touting trout (Drive Day 217: Feb 1, 2004
I haven’t been a meat eater quite long enough to cook a huge slab of beef over our campfire. And why would we, when there’s fly-fished trout? I’m not saying we ourselves caught our dinner, but charcoal grilled fish on the banks of the river it came from – can’t be beat. The sun sets late here, around 9pm, lighting up the hail from a sudden storm like flashlight beams through falling crystal.
Follow this bonus-material blog and ride along on a one-year road trip that inspired the memoir The Drive: Searching for Lost Memories on the Pan American Highway. On sale now. Get yours through the buy-the-book links at the bottom of the landing page on my teresabrucebooks.com website or here or here. Planning a road trip? Buy the audiobook here. Like The Drive’s Facebook page and tweet back at me @writerteresa. Like travel anthologies? I’m in a brand new one called Alone Together: Tales of Sisterhood and Solitude in Latin America which you can get here.
Fishing in the shadows of volcanoes (Drive Day 216: Jan 31, 2004)
There is something so simple, artistic, even literary about fly fishing and yet existentially frustrating. I love the noise the fly makes when you tug it out of the water, like a sucking “pop” and then a “zing” as it whizzes through the air and a “snap” when your arm hits one o’clock and the line whips out behind you. Gary gets two strikes but I am too distracted by the magic hour illuminating a snow-capped volcano right in my line of sight.
Follow this bonus-material blog and ride along on a one-year road trip that inspired the memoir The Drive: Searching for Lost Memories on the Pan American Highway. On sale now. Get yours through the buy-the-book links at the bottom of the landing page on my teresabrucebooks.com website or here or here. Planning a road trip? Buy the audiobook here. Like The Drive’s Facebook page and tweet back at me @writerteresa. Like travel anthologies? I’m in a brand new one called Alone Together: Tales of Sisterhood and Solitude in Latin America which you can get here.
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