FRIDAY, OCTOBER 19
I have gained a day. I had a Friday yesterday. Now I discover that today is Friday. One day in six months is no big deal. I ride out of Rio Grande with regret. The Hotel Argentina has been good for me. Losing the bike documents dumped me into a deep depression. Graciela dug me out. Wind is standard in Patagonia. So is the cold. I ride across sheep country, cross rivers, pass by ponds, see the occasional farmhouse tucked into a clump of trees, wave to a Hereford bull (he ignores me).
The tail end of the Andes squeezes in from the west. Snowcaps march across the horizon. A forest of strange conifers trails moss. A huge lake opens to the right. I enter a World War One battlefield. It is a scene of grim devastation in which shattered trees are tumbled one on another. The few trunks that remain standing are stripped of branches; their peaks are shared and ragged and resemble the rotting teeth of some huge prehistoric animal. What happened?