All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Patagonia: Part II

Camping? Party of two? Not this time.

As the kayaks bobbed in the shallows stuffed with both the essential (tent, sleeping bag) and the non (table, chairs), I stole a glance at Casey to gauge his mood. His quizzical look suggested he’d developed the perfect algorithm for packing a tandem kayak and was grappling with whether to make a suggestion to the boss. The magnanimous Casey remained silent. He looked my way, I gave him a smile, but I had my own concerns regarding the trip:

(1) We’d have to be social.
(2) We’d have no work to do.
(3) We’d have no power over the direction of the trip.
However would we survive?

Like ducklings, we’d be forced to follow as our guides determined where we’d sleep, what we’d eat, and how far we’d travel in a day. Casey quickly adapted to this stress-free lifestyle, though later he would lament Diego’s persistent choice of taking the safest route downstream.

As we pitched our tent that first night on the shores of Nahuel Huapi, Dani advised us to relax while they prepared empanadas and popped the cork on a bottle of red wine. We combed the beach, snapped some photos, drank some mate out of the community bombilla, and watched our guides go to work. We’d made a terrible mistake. This was not camping.

Day two we hit the Rio Limay. I mentally prepared to paddle team America to exhaustion but our guide has something else in mind. Once safely on the river, the guides relaxed. When it became clear that the river would take us where we needed to go, I began my own Chernobyl meltdown. What would we do all day? Why had I stuffed the NSF papers in the inaccessible hatch?

But rivers have always had a strange and wonderful impact on the spirit, and the Rio Limay was no exception. Confronted with the clarity of the water, the world suddenly comes into focus. Pizza dough-ball sized rocks in shades of gray glide beneath you on the river’s bed. You stare transfixed. You forget your list of things to do. Rock, water, sky: that’s all there is.