Company: Chalten Travel
Type: Economy
Price: AR$ 857.75 + AR$ 1,422
Duration: 11.5 hours + 13 hours

Details: The bus picked us up from outside our hostel (Rancho Grande) around 7.30pm and took us along a very bumpy road for quite a while. Seats were not too uncomfortable for day travel, but the bumpy roads made sleeping impossible. The air conditioning was minimal but luckily it cooled down once it got dark. We had one toilet stop at 12.30am, but there was no food offered or shops open.

We arrived in Los Antiguos at 6am, and after a very quick toilet stop (again, there were no shops open for food) we transferred to another bus at 6.15am. The bus was basic and a little run down but the seats still reclined and there was decent leg room. As it got light we noticed how straight the roads had become, and how baron and uninteresting the landscape was. We took the opportunity to catch up on some writing for our blog, and watched a couple of films on the laptop. We were given a Dulche de Leche treat to keep us going and around 3pm we pulled into another stop and this time there was food for sale. By this point everyone on the bus was starving so there was a polite scramble to get hold of the goods! It was also only a 20 minute break after having spent over 17 hours on buses, which definitely didn't feel like enough. Eventually, the scenery around us became incredibly lush and beautiful and we pulled into Bariloche at 7pm, feeling a little put out that we had had to spend so much money on a below par bus experience but excited to explore the beautiful lakes in the surrounding area.