Entering Chile was more dramatic change than I had expected. People looked different (darker than Argentinians) and talked different (and quite fast) and the landscape was completely different: everything was green here, quite different from the 700 km. of desert that I had covered the day before.
Having breakfast at my hostel in Los Antiguos, I met Xavi, a quite nice 43-year old Catalan from Vic that also wanted to do the Carretera Austral, and on the bus crossing the border we met Uliano, a unforgettable Italian from Bologna. Xavi and Uliano ended up convincing Paul and I not to cross lake General Carrera, but to go around it, which was supposed to be quite beautiful. The first problem: no buses were doing that route, so we had to hitch-hike. The second problem: a bunch of Israelis had had the same idea, and they were waiting one end of the village with apparently no luck (we were told they had been waiting for two days!!). We went up the road hoping that being away from such group will make it easier for people to pick us up, but we finally gave up and spent the night in Chile Chico.
The owner of the place were we stayed told us that there was a truck driver who went every morning to pick up firewood in a town on our way, so we decided to talk to him and he agreed to take us. And that was the day before my birthday.
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