Sitting in the power seat in Mercedes proved to be more addictive than I imagined. Once we arrived in Bariloche I saw the rental car signs and got the nervous twitch. We sifted through the agencies and options and settled on a sporty red Ford Arauco for seven days. It had all the papers to drive across the border into Chile - because on road trips you just don't know where you might end up. As we headed out of town we followed a popular route called "seven lakes drive" which everyone we met raved about. Unfortunately for us the weather turned sour and it began raining soon after leaving town before we could appreciate the natural beauty of the lakes.
The first town we stopped in once in Chile was Pucon, the adventure capital of South America. We found a hotel (as it was still raining and Columbus was still pouting) which had a microwave, SCORE, so we went in search of a store to buy microwaveable food such as popcorn, etc. Yes, microwaves are exciting as we don't often get the luxury of using them.
The following day (Day Four) the rain let up slightly so we set out to find an adventure activity. We had heard one of the longest zip lines in the world was near town so off we went. After about 25 minutes of driving we came upon a police check-point - not a problem, except we left our passports, car papers, and international driver's license in the hotel room. We nonchalantly turned just before the check-point and drove 25 min back to the hotel room gathered the documents and again drove the same 25 minutes only to find the road block and officers gone... We arrived to Trancura and tightened our harnesses for 3 km of zip line. It was fantastic, you went so fast and one line alone was one kilometer long. Oprah got over her fear of heights and came along but pics don't really do this justice.
The remaining drive back to Bariloche had some amazing views. In the end all the driving was worth it, we saw some amazing things, and even returned the car with 21 km below our allowed 1400 km.
The Lake District of both Argentina and Chile is truly fantastic - even on the bus ride out of town Jenn and I craned our necks soaking in the jaw dropping beauty around each turn.