Kayaking with the dinosaurs.

I took a day off yesterday being rather fatigued from walking, bus travel and cruising. It was great to simply chill and do not much at all. But. One day is enough, I cannot do this for long. Champing at the bit to do something, and something special I leafed through the brochures at the hostel and espied one that offered kayaking on the rio la Leona for a full day, stopping off at los Hornos where there are dinosaur bones and remnants of a petrified forest. the guides gave a thorough rundown of the geological and early dinosaur history, the birds, animals and plants in the area on the way making the run to the start seem like nothing.

When we reached our destination there was some instruction on paddling technique and fitting out when we arrive. The equipment was in good condition: we are supplied with wetsuit, undershirt, cagoule (waterproof jacket without zips or buttons), paddling skirt to keep the water out of the kayak cockpit and booties to keep us warm in the icy glacial waters.

The river was flowing at about 12km/h so paddling was not going to be much of an effort. We are off and are enjoying a nice sunny day with a light breeze.

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I realised quickly that Rüdiger my paddling partner had no experience paddling. Being a paddler since I was 16 it’s a bit difficult to deal with incompetence on a continued basis so I quickly provided a short course of instruction so we didn’t end up doing pirouettes all the way down stream. Being German he fortunately was able to understand my Aussie accent albeit after reducing the words to ‘slow’, ‘left’, ‘right’, ‘stop paddling’ . We got on fine and ended up regaling with other hostellers into the night with our tales of adventure.

My instruction proved useful as we were swept perilously close to a boulder on a bend; rapid instructions were provided to avoid an unwanted embrace – all good fun!

The river ‘rio la Leone’ was running through some rather barren countryside. The geology is glacial moraine, the silt is continually deposited and keeps the water coloured olive green. The hills rising up on the sides of the river have very little vegetation and are very interesting because of that.

The water was swift and there were some low key rapids to provide a bit of excitement without excessive risk. The biggest risk was landing or launching from the banks, a fall could mean a long swim.

After about an hour of paddling we land and take a walk. The surface is soft to around 3 to 5 centimetres with a textured pattern, it’s a pleasure to walk on.

After a few minutes: dinosaur bones ! There they are lying on the ground exposed, as they have been for probably a lot more than my lifetime. Nature has the best museum right here in the great outdoors. I was do a little bit of searching on the Internet and found a few articles on fossil sites eg BBC 'The land where life has turned to stone' and Wikipedia list of fossil sites so now there is an added dimension of fossil hunting to my travel wish list !

Along with the animals, there are fossilised plants. A piece of wood trunk, almost like it has been cut with a chainsaw is there with a very recognisable structure completely petrified with the chips strewn on the ground.

Sitting down for lunch I’m wondering ‘is this for real ?’ Here I am in Argentina out sitting with the artefacts of what they taught me from school history in books being presented all round me in evidence! No museum, no plastic models – it is the real deal.

The living detail in the form of flora is quite pretty too. The small flowers defiantly grab some life in the largely infertile soil to add a bit of cheer to the whole scene.

Mucho gracias to the guys at Kayak Santa Cruz in El Calafate you made my last day a memorable one. Both me and my paddling partner Rüdiger had a big smile that would not go away in the evening and we extolled our experiences to the hostel staff and fellow travellers.