But man I can't say that the mountains give me juice. I can't say that. The mountains give you sky. Do you remember the sky at night as the stars rained down to the tent in the cold mountain air on the Paso de los Libertadores? Do you remember the climbing and the wind? It was different for me. I was to ride down into a land I had never encountered and about which I knew nothing. My lord, Chile. I left an Argentina that had become my home. You, on the other hand, were coming back home and you didn't like the other side of the Andes. That thin land that goes along the ridge of the Andes, that land the Brazilian said was “all mountain and ocean.” When you ride high in the mountains you feel god has taken your air but has given you a strong wind which blows your face and chest and bicycle from one side of the road to the other. You reach the top and suddenly you sail into a very bright sunshine and it is called Chile. You ride down from the mountains and into the foothills and through the vineyards and when you stop there is fruit and the large hot empanadas sold by families and they burn your mouth but give back to you some that the mountain has taken.
There's not much that survives that mountain because most of it gets burned from the soul on the way up. A man does it alone and shouts at himself in encouragement but he can't hear a damn thing because of the wind. It knocks him over and he yells back. He yells to every side of the mountain he can see. He yells to some valley he cannot see. He yells to a blue sky. He yells to Aconcagua and feels a chill like the face of a dead friend. Some men get trapped in the city. Some men cling to bad women just so they can have a warm bed at night. Some men run, they run constantly. None of this matters in the wind. There is something altogether different to decide here. The jagged peaks climb and you look up and they continue and the wind blows a wicked pace off this tall stone that has beaten the sky and sleeps even as the wind gives its war. Some men call this a mountain. Call it a mountain, fine. The tan face breaks into the sky and fights the wind and is lonely and hides in the clouds and feels great shame because it feels great pride in the smiles and cheers from the men who arrive and leave, almost immediately. Who invaded and abandoned? The wind is always there, the cold and the sun come and go and there are still moments when the mountain is alone, still moments when it is just the mountain and the sun and no one else, just a planet with no life, the crust of the earth.
The wind ends and I hear myself think again. I look for the
water Moraline said was safe to drink and the cold river runs from the top of Argentina to the bottom of Chile. I follow
the river to a home and I camp and ride slowly to a town and the men want to
fight me despite my climb. I am lonely, more lonely than I have ever been. I
had just seen my good friend but the sun began to set and we parted. It was at the top and we spoke for 18
minutes. He spoke behind me in a low voice and I lowered my head and listened.
I know, I told him, I know. It is bad and it is lonely. I will have to do something
very different to hear your voice from now on, I said. “Just simply being there doesn't mean you
will always speak or that I can hear what you say, I tell him.” He goes silent for a long time and I hang my head down in the wind and wait for him to say something else. “The ocean,” he said, “is
where it all ends.” I look up and he's gone and I'm alone. I get on my bike and descend, sailing into Chile. I see the ocean, the long dead and unheard tears he has cried.
