The Mission

"There are hundreds of thousands of men and women around the world who are in prison because of their race, religion, or political beliefs. Amnesty International works for all of them - the sick, the tortured, the forgotten".
“Son cientos de miles los hombres y mujeres alrededor del mundo, que se encuentran injustamente en prisión por su raza o por sus creencias religiosas y/o políticas. Amnistía Internacional trabaja para todos ellos: los enfermos, los torturados, los olvidados.”


We are on another adventure, this time, to bicycle about 3,000 km. in Argentina. We will take on the heat of the pampas, the gruelling climbs in the Andes and the freezing nights at that elevation.
Nos encontramos embarcados en otra aventura, esta vez, para recorrer en bicicleta 3.000km a través de Argentina. Nuestro viaje nos llevará desde el calor de la extensa pampa argentina hacia las agotadoras elevaciones y noches heladas de la Cordillera de los Andes.


We will do this in memory of the "disappeared", that sad time in recent Argentine history.
La razón que nos moviliza, es la de conmemorar a las decenas de miles de desaparecidos durante los tristes años de la dictadura militar en Argentina (24 de marzo de 1976 – 10 de diciembre de 1983).

Saturday, March 12, 2011

Piece of Hidden Sky

There's really no better way to truly appreciate the size of the Andes than to bike over them.  Thursday morning we woke up before dawn in Chicoana, (a native word meaning "piece of hidden sky) and prepared for what we expected to be the most strenuous day of our 9 weeks.  As we hit the road carrying 10 water bottles and a dozen freshly baked buns, the sun had just started peeking out from behind the mountains.  For the next 11 hours, we valiantly battled the heat, the switchbacks, the condors (LOL, j/k), and the narrow dirt roads which occasionally disappeared under large rockslides or had collapsed from being undermined by the river swollen by four days of heavy rain.  But we prevailed, and after starting the day at 1200 metres, we climbed over 2 vertical kms through the slowly thinning oxygen to a final height of 3457 metres, buried within the clouds.  We laid down the final kilometres through a surreal landscape of mountains, cardón cacti, donkeys, llamas, and absolute silence, reaching the village of Cachi as the sun sank below snowcapped Mount Cachi.

For a greater selection of mountain pictures, click here
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2 comments:

  1. AnonymousMarch 17, 2011 at 1:19 AM

    Hey so amazing...and how can you get a satisfying lungful of air up that high...while riding bikes??? love the photos. xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxmar

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnonymousMarch 26, 2011 at 6:10 PM

    This must have been an awesome experience!!!!cg

    ReplyDelete

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