We are still in Rio Grande with Monica & Marcelo and are very grateful to them for looking after us and letting us stay with them. We are having a good time getting to know them and their friend Carlos who is also staying here, but we try not to look out the window at the sea too much and think about time ticking away.

Barry has tendonitis in his right wrist, due to his dry suit wrist seals being too tight. This is our 3rd day off after it flared up the second time. It gets better every day but tendons are very slow to heal and realistically it is going to be at least 3 or 4 more days before he will be ready to kayak again. He is taking ibuprofen pills and applying ibuprofen cream, icing it regularly, and has a neoprene support on it, and he´s resting it as much as he can….  We intend to wait until it feels fully better before kayaking again and hope that it will not flare up again. We´ll then continue with the trip and hope to complete the circuit & experience all the different environments that TDF has to offer. If we have to change our flight and stay longer then we will do that.

On a positive note, we have permission from the Argentinian Prefectura to kayak in their waters, although they still have to inspect our kit before we set off. We had to sign a piece of paper saying that we took full responsibility for anything that might happen to us in Argentinian waters – fair enough but I gulped when they told us we had to pay the equivalent of US $80 to get a notary to witness our signatures.

 Today we drove back to Cabo Espiritu Santo to collect our kayaks. We couldn´t bring them back to Riao Grande 3 days ago because Monica & Marcelo use a trailer to carry their kayaks, and of course they didn´t have that with them when they came to see us. We hid the kayaks in some bushes in the dunes above the beach but we were worried about them, just in case they were damaged in the wind or someone found them and claimed salvage rights. Fortunately they were fine but we are happy to have them with us now. It is an interesting drive up there, its about 170km, 70km of it on a long flat dirt road with almost no traffic on it. We saw guanacos, oil wells, flamingoes, geese, cows, sheep and a fox, and about 5 cars. Thanks to Marcelo, Barry & Carlos for some of the photos.

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