seven lakes + fifty billion yellow flowering bushes = one awesome drive

When you stop and think about it, traveling through Argentina really ought to give you ecosystemic whiplash. One minute you're hiking among barren, rocky peaks and wind-deformed lenga forests, the next you're busing through a desert. Or one minute you're following winding, switchback roads through pine-forested mountains past brilliant blue lakes; the next you're cruising a dead-straight highway on the plateau above a shining lazy river.

This last juxtaposition is what we experienced on the camino de los siete lagos, a famously scenic drive from Bariloche to San Martin de los Andes in Argentina's Lake District. As the name suggests, the drive there takes you past seven gorgeous mountain lakes nestled among the mountains of the Andean cordillera. In contrast to Patagonia, these mountains were of a more traditional variety, at least where I come from, with pine forests blanketing all but the tallest peaks and normal grey granite child's-picture-of-a-roof-type silhouettes rather than the south's tumultuous, razor-sharp spikes that more closely resembled the same child's representation of their front lawn in extreme close-up. As the drive's name does _not_ suggest, however, the return trip takes you through completely different scenery with nary a mountain or glacial lake in sight -- instead, you through the steppes to the east of the cordillera that feature dramatic cliffs, winding rivers, huge open expanses, and one extremely long bridge.

We were also lucky to be there in spring, as the first day's road was bordered on both sides by an endless profusion of broom, a bush introduced to the region that produces brilliant yellow flowers at this time of year. These flowers, plus the yellow line down the middle of the (paved sections of the) road, combined in a continuous parallel yellow triplicate dance as the road wound its way through the mountains, which effect frankly overshadowed much of the lakey-mountainy scenery in terms of memorability.

Without further ado, photos of the drive.

Flowers, up close.

Flowers, up far.

One of the lakes.

Another lake away there in the distance.

The road just outside of San Martin de los Andes.

The scenery on day 2, transitioning away from mountains.

Ruta 40, Argentina's Trans-Canada Highway.
Note, neither mountains nor lakes.

Getting hillier as we get closer to Bariloche again.

Okay, maybe this part is a little spiky, or spiky after five hundred million
 years of erosion.

The Andes again. At the base of these, more or less, is Bariloche.