The Caramel Trophy - a sweet traverse of Paraguay, Argentina and
Chile ending on Chile's western shore. As far as possible our plan
was to follow the route and spirit of the 1994 Camel Trophy while
cooking up some delicious expedition puddings along the way. The
exact details of the Camel expedition were a well kept secret, but
armed with a rough map, a compass and a report by one of the
expedition leaders we did our best to follow in their tire
tracks and see what all the fuss was about. The video below
should give you a good sense of what the original 1994 expedition
went through.
... and on a smaller scale ...
Our journey was of course a little bit different
to the big budget and celebrity versions above, but with just one
Land Rover and no-one to rescue us it was every bit as big an
adventure. At first glance Paraguay resembled Surrey - lush green
and yellow fields of new corn and oil seed rape - head into the
woods however you will find no teddy bear's picnic, just thick
impenetrable jungle intent on reclaiming your path. Numerous times
we cleared away fallen vegetation only to find a complete dead end
just ahead.
In Argentina the Chaco seemed to be never ending. At first we
were greeted by swamp land, complete with crocodiles and not
dissimilar to Brazil's Panatanal. The cactus and thorn bushes gave
the game away however and soon the swamps were replaced by equally
flat, dry arid, semi desert conditions. The thorns were so
aggressive, (often up to six inches long) and unavoidable that in a
single day we picked up eight punctures in our brand new
tires.
We were relieved to climb out of the desert into cloud forest at
the foothills of the Andes, but hordes of biting flies and a colony
of ants rampaging through the tent soon pushed us on - higher and
higher into the freezing wind and the incredible scenery of the
Andes. Beating even our highest trekking altitude on this trip to
date, Bee drove us up to more than 16,000 feet above sea level
across what is reputedly the highest driveable pass in The Americas.
It certainly took our breath away.
Once up high the land was dominated by salt pans (which were not
as dry as you might expect) and smoking volcanoes. After almost 24
hours stuck in what amounted to a salt crusted bog we perfected our
self recovery technique and eventually drove out smiling; just in
time for a sulphurous hot spring bath. On the final descent down to
the coast the Atacama Desert, the driest desert in the world, lived
up to its reputation. Absououtley barren, not so much as a moth
fluttered, or a leaf sprouted, yet ghost towns and odd wooden
cemeteries were all too common..
It was a different storey when we finally reached the sea. We had
survived an epic journey through an increasingly difficult land and,
our focus shifted to the ocean, all the life of the sea seemingly
came to congratulate us - pelicans, seals and dolphins paid their
respects and promptly dived into their bulging blue larder for
desert.
As for us on the Caramel Trophy puddings were made whenever
ingredients and energy allowed. Lack of an oven restricted our
creativity, lack of trees, our use of the wood burning
stove and a misbehaving petrol stove restricted our
finesse, but we were never out of options. With an almost
instant version of rice pudding coming out as the overall winner,
the moral of our storey is - simple works and tastes
best.
The 2010 Caramel Trophy