Day 45

Thursday 16^th December 2010

A free day in El Calafate! We woke late (ish!) and headed into the centre of town to a café / bar called Libro bar from some brunch. This was a cute book lined bar over looking the main street.

We grabbed a prime spot in two comfy armchairs and settled in for the day – literally!!! After an omelette (me – unbelievably!), a chicken sandwich (Franky) and some good coffee we decided that a bottle of wine would help the creative juices flow as we got down to some blog writing.

The wine was good, the music and ambience were great and we were up to date with the blog… so to celebrate we ordered another bottle. Hic!

By the time we’d polished that one off it was 6.30pm. We had already pre booked a table at a recommended restaurant for 9pm which put us in a difficult situation. If we went back to the hostel now we would more than likely need a Frank nap and thus wake up hung over in time for our dinner date…. Or we could just stay put. It wasn’t really a competition…. The third bottle was ordered.

After some perfectly acceptable behaviour….

We stumbled back to the hostel for a quick change and our transfer to the restaurant arrived. We had been told that Don Pichon was a in a great spot for watching the sunset, overlooking the lake and mountains. On arrival I was not happy to discover that the blinds had been pulled down over the complete wall of windows as the sun was streaming in from it’s low position in the sky and blinding the diners. We selected a table by the window and I instantly pulled the blinds up to see the vista – well that’s why we had come!!! And it was stunning!

We garbled the night away in a drunken haze (our 4^th bottle of red being ordered with tea!). I can even remember what we ate! I had lamb sorrentinos with tomato sauce – they are like pasta pouches filled with roast lamb – a testament to the numerous Italian immigrants who colonised Argentina in the early years. Franky had the steak (obviously!).

After dinner we were taken back to our hostel by the complimentary transfer completely unaware of the impression that Franky had made on some of the other diners.

The following day we were in a café getting breakfast when a Yank said to him, ‘ I was in the same restroom as you last night’ (when is that ever an appropriate opening to a conversation!?). He clarified this by confirming, ‘at Don Pichon, the restaurant’. Franky was caught so off guard all he could do was confirm that indeed we had frequented said restaurant and he had utilised the facilities during the visit. To this day we’re not sure what, if anything, had happened that made that visit to the restroom so memorable!