After leaving Futa, John Cornwell gave Jim and I a ride to Esquel, where we took the bus to Bariloche. Jim is my new travel buddy for the week. We were heading north at the same time. Worked out well.
Jim and I took the bus from Esquel to Bariloche, spent the night in Bariloche, then left the next day for Mendoza. It was an overnight bus, so we came prepared with valium I had leftover from Peru. The 17 hr. bus ride seemed like nothing.
Along the way, I won the Bus Bingo game and won a bottle of wine! Woo hoo! Ha ha.
We arrived in Mendoza at 10 am and found us a hostel to plop our crap in, then walked around town. We found the rafting companies that our friends worked at... but not our friends. I ended up going to the hospital and getting my brain checked out cuz I was having these crazy headaches over the last week or two. The test revealed............ nothing. Well, at least I don't have a brain tumor.
The next day, Coleman showed up at our hostel! YAY! We found out about a moonlight raft trip at Argentina Rafting, where my friend Sylvio works. We talked Coleman into coming with us. We left earlier than the party bus so we could hang out with our friends and secure a spot on the moonlight float. When we got there, no one we knew was there, but Argentina Rafting was super friendly and told us where to put our stuff and what was going on. We met a guy named Mario from Argentina, who works at Clear Creek Rafting in the summer and knows Wiese and Casey! Small world.
The party bus left at 8 or 9, We went to the put in to load boats and help them get ready. They had an 8 boat float. We also loaded Jim's shredder and my board. The people all showed up around 11 pm, and about an hour later we were ready for the rio.
There were 8 boats, 8 safety kayaks, a shredder, and me on my board. The moon was full and bright...... until we put on.... it went behind the clouds and never came back out. Darkness. Lots of darkness. Pitch black on a river I'd never seen before. The river has a lot of sediment in it, it's brown, so there's really no whitewater to key off of either. Just darkness. Woo hoo.
The run ended up being pretty mellow. I was just following the barely distinguishable rafts in front of me. I got chundered in a hole I didn't see. Ha ha. It was funny. The run ended at the lake with about 1 km of flat water.
Once everyone was all showered and changed, the party began. The band started at 3 am. They kicked ass! Everyone was dancing. Coleman, Jim and I were drinking beers. Good times. The band stopped playing at 6, when the bus left to take everyone back home. About another hour later, people started going to bed. 
The next day, Jim and I took the shredder out with the commercial trip. We put in higher than we did for the moonlight run. We had SO MUCH FUN shredding!!! We were coming up on a rapid that they were taking pictures of, and Jim's all waving at the camera as we're heading into this pretty big hole. "Something big! Something big!" was all I could say before I fell out... ha ha.... then I got halfway back in and we hit another wave and I fell out again! Pretty hilarious.
It was a great last day on the river in South America!
Later that day, we got a ride back to Mendoza and I packed up all my crap because I was taking the bus to Santiago the next morning so I could catch my flight. We met up with some friends we made the day before at the midnight float, and Jim had a friend from Buff Joe's, Mike (five o), who came to hang out too. Small world. Mike was working at Argentina Rafting totally by coincidence and neither of them knew eachother was there until they ran into eachother. Coleman was a little punk and didn't show up to hang out.
We went to a bar called Moe's... like Moe from the Simpsons.... totally randomly awesome! It's like a tienda in the front, but a bar in the back... so you buy your beer at the tienda and then go in the back and drink it. What a concept!
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