We woke up early and were waiting at the office of the local military police station for the weather report from the mountain. When it came in positive we headed out and spent all day in the dirt riding up to Lago del Diamonte.
We left San Carlos elevation 800 meters and cruised fire roads for 90 minutes before we entered the park heading for the Chilean border and an inactive volcano with a lake at altitude 3,600 meters or 11,800 feet.
At the park entrance we started climbing hard through rocky valleys with blow-you-over wind.
Some of the extreme steep cutbacks were wind induced sand pits and forced a few spills. I'm serious, the wind was like my days in Rio Gallego where, if you weren't pointed into it as you stopped, you were going down; gusts of 20 to 40 knots on twisty mountain dirt roads are a challenge.
Once there it was beautiful.
We played hard core tourist, walked out to the water's edge, and drove around the far side to deliver provisions to the local Gendarmeria that the post in town had given to us - after spending some time with them they invited us to stay the night in their outpost as it was getting late and weather can be temperamental. Spending the night on a cot in a small log cabin with 6 guys, no running water and a perpetually burning wood stove just didn't sound like the ticket so we politely declined and made turns for civilization.
After we hit asphault we headed for the small town of Topungato just west of Mendoza to stage for our trip up to the border at the crossing with Chile.
A great day.
Nick
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