December 1998 to January 1999
( www.mabot.com )

The plan started off with a group of four, three of us with no altitude experience, going to climb the highest mountain in the Andes: on Aconcagua is the story. There's also a little bit on a pizza oven we made.

Christmas and recovery in Mendoza, a few days in Santiago, then we headed South to the lake district with a team dwindled to two.

First stop Pucon, a picturesque little town near the active Volcan Villarica, we couldn't miss that.

Then over the spine of the Andes to Bariloche, a transplanted alpine tourist-town on the shores of Lago Nahuel Huapi. We contented ourselves with watching fingerpainting since we couldn't afford the chocolate shops.

The country's best rock climbing is around nearby Refugio Frey, unfortunately mostly too hard for us. So after a break in town and a day's glacier practice with a solo Canadian, we headed up Cerro Tronador.

We hopped on an overnight bus back to Buenos Aires, where we proceeded to rectify our having under-spent our budgets so far. I had a plane to catch, Iris had a friend to meet before going on to Bolivia.

There's also a page about the pictures.