Comandante Luis Piedrabuena, Argentina

We awoke this morning to a dead battery, apparently from driving all day yesterday with our lights on. We have been having trouble with a mount for the alternator that keeps breaking on the gravel roads, so we suspect we're not getting a charge all the time. It will definitely take some investigating. After jump-starting off our auxiliary battery, we parked on a hill (just in case) to investigate. All the wiring was checked and cleaned but nothing obvious turned up.

Sure enough when we went to start it again, it wouldn't turn over and it also wouldn't jump off the second battery. Time to push start it! We sighed a breath of relief when push starting worked down the hill we had parked on, but then in a moment of complete stupidity, I forgot to lock the toolbox on the back, and when I went to get out, I forgot that the van was in gear and stalled it. Crap! Luckily we were able to push the van and get it going fast enough to push start it one more time and we were back on the road!

Once on the road we headed further south, eventually passing over the milky blue Santa Cruz river, the only river to host an Atlantic Steelhead run. Unfortunately we're a bit early for the run and won't be able to take advantage, so we kept going until we came to Parque Nacional Monte leon, where the fifth largest Magellanic Penguin colony is located. After a short hike we crested a hill and started to hear the colony squawking. We had imagined they would all be on the beach, but to our surprise, they were up in the sage-brush like landscape tending to their nests. It was very bizarre to see penguins in a desert-like environment.

Unlike in the U.S. where you'd be able to get within a few hundred yards and look at them through binoculars, the trail went right through the colony, so we were able to get a good look at them. It was another one of those memorable experiences that won't be forgotten from the trip.

As it was getting dark we headed back north a bit until we hit the Santa Cruz again and ended up finding a campground right on the river.