The land of massive mountains, massive lakes, and massive scenery!

The Argentinian side

Notable towns: San Martin de los Andes, San Carlos de Bariloche, El Bolson, Esquel

San Martin de los Andes was our first introduction to the Lakes District, having driven 1,600km across the middle of Argentina. All of a sudden, the scenery changed from baron, sandy plains to dense green forest, crystal clear, Azul glacial lakes and striking snow-capped mountains and we were loving it! The town had lots of outdoor shops and pine ski chalets. We wild-camped next to a beautiful lake and enjoyed some very cold swims!

San Carlos de Bariloche isn't as pretty, and was tainted by our first Pedro-related drama which involved us visiting 17 mechanics in the town to try and fix a check engine light - if you follow us on Instagram you will know all about this! However, while we were there, we became resident at a wild-camp spot next to a river where we had a pet horse and a pet dog. We caught an Argentina World Cup game, went up the Teleferico cable car for awesome views of the lake and town, and treated ourselves to some delicious homemade chocolates.

El Bolson is a very small, authentic town where we enjoyed the luxury of a proper campsite with pet peacocks and hiked to The Mystic Fog brewery for a crisp IPA made from crystal clear Rio Azul water.

Esquel was our final calling point on the Argentinian side and after a long drive, we attempted to go and see Piedra Parada - a 100m tall rock that was formed by an enormous volcanic eruption 50 million years ago. After 50km bouncing down a corrugated, dirt track with strong winds, we arrived at the village of Gualjaina where Google Maps had promised us we would find the rock, to discover it was a further 50km of corrugated, dirt track away. So we had an ice cream, watched half of the Argentina World Cup match, and drove back the way we came, feeling a little downtrodden. Have you ever done a 4-hour roundtrip with 40mph side winds for an ice cream? We had seen quite a few travelers on bicycles, heavily laden with luggage and battling against the winds. We stopped on the way back to offer one guy the last of our Oreos and a banana. He gratefully accepted and carried on pushing his bike. We didn't see any sign of shelter for hundreds of kilometers. We arrived in Esquel to scenes of chaos as Argentina had beaten Australia to the quarter-final. We managed to squeeze through the crowds to get a pizza then drove a few kms out of town to a lake to camp for the night. The next day, we entered Los Alerces National Park, which was free and deserted as it was out of season. The scenery was awesome with another beautiful lake and some nice trails. We did a short trail to see a waterfall then found a campsite in the park to spend the night. Much to the confusion of the owner, we reversed Pedro uphill as close to the reception building as possible to tap their Wi-Fi and watch the England game.

Our original plan had been to cross the border into Chile from Esquel and drive the Ruta 7 north, however the road disappears into the sea at several points and after researching the price of the ferries, we decided to drive all the way back up to San Carlos de Bariloche (in one day) to cross the border there. We wild-camped at a very windy spot by the lake, parked as far as we could underneath a tree for shelter.

The Chilean side

Notable towns: Puerto Varas, Puerto Octay, Frutillar, Maicolpue, Valdivia, Niebla, Villarrica, Pucon

After an interesting border crossing where we drove 40km over the Andes on roads that were more pot hole than tarmac (clearly neither country wants to spend money fixing the roads in no mans land), we arrived in Puerto Varas, another very pretty lakeside town where we slept in a car park next to the lake. After a few days of bright blue skies and full sun, it started to rain and we aborted a plan to catch a boat onto Chiloe Island as the forecast was not set to improve. We also visited Frutillar which was on the other side of the lake, had an impressive arts centre, a nice pier and lots of arts and crafts stalls. At this point, we hadn't showered for four days and we were feeling a bit rundown so we found the cheapest Airbnb in Frutillar and booked a last-minute stay. We had a private room in Luis' house with his friendly dogs, chickens, and most importantly, his hot shower. At dinner time, we sat down to eat at his dining table and he pulled up a chair and announced it was time for a Spanish lesson. We quickly realised he is a retired teacher (he also insisted on another Spanish lesson at breakfast) but it was actually really helpful and he was good fun! As we were leaving the next morning, he insisted on taking photos of us standing in various places in his garden! After our photoshoot, we went to the Vicente Perez Rosales National Park where we visited some huge waterfalls and then wild-camped at another pretty lake (see the theme emerging?).

Puerto Octay has a huge German influence with quaint wooden houses built on the hillsides. We ended up at a 'cafe' which was just a lady's front room - we arrived at the location on Google Maps and had to ring the doorbell for her to open up - we were desperate for coffee.

We then drove to the coast to an indigenous Huiliche town called Maicolpue, with no lakes! We wild-camped for a few nights in a small beach car park, enjoying strolls with the many stray dogs, albeit slightly horrified by the tsunami warning signs that adorned the shore. The waves were big and kept us up for some of the night. We went on a big hike from Maicolpue to Playa Tril Tril on the other side of the mountainous coastline. The track was not well-trodden and after scrambling up some parts that had obviously subsided, getting scratched by overgrown vegetation and having our faces engulfed by spiderwebs (taking it in turns to be the one who walked at the front and took the brunt of the silky traps), we arrived at Playa Tril Tril. We both fell pretty bad at some point on the track but we won't cry about that. Back at our beachside park up, a kind shop owner tried to console us after an England defeat and offered for us to fill up our water tanks with his tap.

Valdivia and Niebla don't really fit in with the lake theme, but we're going to stick them in here anyway! Valdivia is a town known for its bustling fresh veg and seafood market on the side of the river, and its sea lions! We camped on the road on the outskirts of town outside some enormous mansions and got the feeling they didn't really want us there. My highlight was Justin walking down this posh street with a bag of his own poo looking for a bin. We drove round the coast to Niebla and Parque Oncol, a privately owned nature reserve. We paid to camp inside the park and after 5pm when it closed, we were the only ones in the entire 2,800ha park! We hiked to the highest point through some interesting forest tracks and then enjoyed a campfire and a VERY quiet night.

After our detour to the coast, we were back in the land of the lakes (phew), and active volcanoes (aaahh!). In Villarrica, we stayed in a lakeside car park accompanied by some other overlanders with an awesome view of Villarrica volcano, silently steaming in the distance. We loved this town - it had lots of nice coffee shops, restaurants, market stalls, and vintage clothes shops. It was still very alpine-y but more charming. We drove a short distance to neighbouring Pucon, another interesting town with a similar imposing backdrop of the volcano. We wild-camped at a muddy beach besides Carbugua Lake. The next day, we entered Huerquehue National Park and did the biggest hike on offer - Cerro San Sebastian. This was a 15km, very steep 1,300m climb but the views at the top were worth the knee pain. We could see 5 volcanoes and 5 lakes, there was still thick snow at the top and we had to do some rock climbing to reach the summit. We spent another night at the muddy beach, relaxing with a refreshing lake-water shower, homemade curry and a local beer. The next day, we walked round to the other side of the lake to the only white-sand part and made an effort to not do very much and let our cartilage recover. However, that night there was some very strong, very sudden winds, and we managed to freak ourselves out that the active volcano we were sleeping underneath was erupting (it had been on amber warning for a few weeks following some small earthquakes) and decided at 1am to drive to Pucon as we had no escape route at the lake. As we drove onto the main road and got a clear view of the volcano, there were flames coming out of the top against the pitch-black sky. Back in Villarrica on our way out of Patagonia, we visited some of the artisanal markets and bought ourselves a llama mascot for the van, Justin bought a tiny guitar and we stocked up on groceries for the next few days. We could have spent a while there doing outdoor activities, but nothing there is free. However, this is not the end of our lake-y adventures - in a few weeks we will be back down in Patagonia to do more epic hikes (this time flying further south as it was too far and tedious to drive!).