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San Carlos de Bariloche, in northern Patagonia, is one of the main backpacking destinations in Argentina and that’s for good reasons. The city centre looks like a Swiss mountain village, with streets filled with chocolate and outdoor shops and with houses made of wood and stone. The surrounding mountains offer ski opportunities in winter and great hikes in the summer, but the area remains quite expensive for backpackers on a budget.

In this post, we share with you our tips for the best things to do in San Carlos de Bariloche for free and how to still enjoy your time in Bariloche without breaking your wallet.

What to do in Bariloche for free or on a budget | The complete guide!

Visit the town

Populated for many centuries by the Poya people, the region was discovered by the Spaniards in the mid 16th century. Except for some Jesuit missions, the area remained poorly occupied for a couple of centuries. Bariloche is a fairly young city. It was officially established in the early 1900s by German and Austrian immigrants and then developed by the Argentinian government in the 1930s as a winter sport & tourism centre.

When you arrive in San Carlos de Bariloche (aka Bariloche), you are immediately struck by the architectural style of the streets. It has nothing to do with the rest of the country or even South America itself. We could easily compare the town to any village in the Alps and that’s a strange feeling.

Walking through Bariloche is like being in a European mountain town with many outdoor shops and Swiss fondue restaurants. A drastic change from all of the empty towns and cities we crossed while in Patagonia.

Tips: You can also join a walking tour for a small fee to learn about Bariloche’s German heritage or the Natural History of Patagonia (Stories walking tour) – about €15 each.

Hike Cerro Campanario

Just outside of town (17km), the Cerro Campanario Bariloche offers one of the most beautiful views of the lakes Nahuel Huapi and Perito Moreno. A cable car runs to bring visitors to the top of the hill, but it isn’t really friendly for a backpacker’s wallet.

The good thing is that you can hike up Cerro Campanario for free and still be able to see the incredible views of the surrounding lakes. It’s a steep walk but if you are not too fit, take your time, enjoy the walk in the forest and you will make it in 30 to 40 minutes. Make sure to wear good shoes because the trail can be a bit slippery at times.

Cost: Free to hike up and down (30-40 minutes) – ARS 330* (€7.30) for a return ride on Cerro Campanario Chair lift. (Open every day from 9 am until 5:30 pm)

Cycle the Circuito Chico

From Cerro Campanario, the main road continues West and splits to form a loop, called Circuito Chico (the small circuit). From this intersection, bikes can be rented, but if you really want to make it cheap you can take the bus all the way. If you want to stop a lot along the way, it may be better to rent a bike, but if you only want to go to Llao LLao Bariloche it is best to hop on the local bus or hitch-hike if you don’t feel like waiting.

In Llao Llao you can visit the municipal park to get closer to the lakes you have seen from atop of Cerro Campanario (see below point). Most of the parks cannot be visited by bike because the path is very narrow but you can access Villa Tacul within the park to view Lake Nahuel Huapi. Along the loop, you will be able to catch incredible views of Bahia Lopez, Moreno Lake and the surrounding mountains.

If you are into craft beer, you can stop at a few breweries on the way, “Cerveceria Patagonia” being the most famous one (located by the lake between points 2 and 1 on the map below)

Cost: Rental bike for the day – Circuito chico adventure – starts at ARS 699 *(€15) / you can also combine your tour with a kayak for €6 more. You can also join a bus tour if you don’t want to cycle – €15 also.

Argentina - Bariloche - circuito chico views

HikE Llao Llao

If you take the bus to the municipal park of Llao Llao, the bus will drop you close to the famous luxury Llao hotel resort golf near the Puerto Pañuelo pier. From there you can take a boat and sail across the lake Nahuel Huapi or go for a hike around the park. The boat trip is a nice attraction but not the budget-friendly type (about €65).

To go hiking, walk along the road to the right of the hotel, you will find the entrance to the park after 10 min uphill. From here, we would recommend starting the trail anticlockwise, starting your day toward the hill “Cerrito Llao Llao”. It is probably the best view you will see throughout the day.

We would recommend visiting Cerro Campanaro in the morning and having a nice picnic at the top of Cerrito Llao Llao. From there you can choose if you have enough energy to continue and visit the entire park.

Not everything is worth the effort but if we could only recommend a few places we would mention: the viewpoint at Villa Tacul, the Mirador del Moreno and the Bosque de Arrayanes. You can actually skip the Lago Escondido which isn’t that interesting.

Cost: Entrance to the Municipal Park Llao Llao – Free

Argentina - Bariloche - circuito chico view

Refugio Frey hike near Bariloche

The Refugio Frey hike near Bariloche starts at the ski station Cerro Catedral. The resort can be reached by a local bus (55 X AV. BUSTILLOS) within 30 minutes. From there, we would recommend walking the “grey” trail until the Cruce de Sensa (see map below).

The trail is quite easy at first, but gets a bit more technical towards the end of this first part, with rocks that need to be climbed. Turning right onto the clear “green” path, you will enter a beautiful forest of giant yellow and orange trees (if you get there in autumn like us). From here, it’s all the way up but the walk is, in reality, an easy stroll until the Refuge Frey and the Laguna Toncek.

At the Laguna, we froze! So make sure to take a good jacket that will protect you from the wind. The day we went the wind was so strong and cold that we couldn’t stay outside for long and spent most of the time inside the refuge!

We were quite happy to walk back down because we absolutely loved the landscape of this hike. The autumnal colours, the discrete noise of the birds and the wind made us feel like walking through an enchanted forest.

As we didn’t want to walk back the same way, we thought we would hike around by the Playa Munoz and the Cascada de Los Duendes. Instead of taking the grey trail, we started our way towards the Lago Gutiérrez to take the “dark green” path. It was a mistake and we wouldn’t recommend it this way. It may be better to go back to Cerro Catedral the way you came.

In fact, the end of the “dark green” trail is quite steep and leads to the purple and brown paths that felt like an eternity… despite us thinking we would be able to reach Cerro Catedral it turned out we ended up on a dirt road where there are no buses to go to Bariloche. In the end, we had to hitch a ride back to town, very tired and annoyed that we didn’t use a map…

Visit the Chocolate shops

If Bariloche is known as the “little Switzerland” it is also because of its chocolate. It’s the real deal here and the main avenue, Mitre, is known in Argentina as the “Avenue of chocolate dreams“. Every year during Easter, the town even holds a chocolate festival!

There are so many chocolate shops that we had to choose one to keep us from spending too much and avoiding bankruptcy…or a blood sugar alert. We visited “Rapa Nui” where we bought 80% Cacao, white chocolate and a medium ice-cream box with flavours of chocolate (of course), blueberry and Maracuya (passion fruit). It was so good that we came back twice.

We justified it all as a well-deserved award after all of the day hikes we had done in the area… excuses, excuses!

Cost: 45 ARS (€1.26*) for 100g artisanal 80% chocolate – 85 ARS (€2.37*) for 250g ice-cream, 3 flavors

Hitch-hike the 7 lakes / or take a bus

To keep our budget under control we decided to hitch-hike the famous 7 lakes route to San Martin de Los Andes instead of taking a tour. You can also rent a car with other people in order to split the cost. If you can’t afford a tour or car rental, take the local bus to San Martin De Los Andes, but be aware that it won’t stop at the lakes. You will only be able to see them from your seat.

For those interested in how we hitch-hiked the 7 lakes road from Bariloche to San Martin de Los Andes, read below.

We left Bariloche with the local bus (#71/81) and stopped on the main road before the bus turned right to the town Dina Huapi (the driver knew where we wanted to get off).

We didn’t really know what to expect and thought that we would be lucky enough just to get a ride to the 7 lakes and see them through the windows. But we got lucky as a group of European travellers stopped their rental car to pick us up in exchange for participation with fuel costs.

(Un)Fortunately, we missed the turn to start the route and ended up driving the wrong way through a gorgeous canyon and passing the astonishing clear blue Lake Traful. We drove via Villa Traful on a dirt road and got back onto the correct road to start the route from lake #1 (of 7) to the town of San Martin de Los Andes. It turned out that lake Traful (which is not part of the official “7 lakes”) was probably the most beautiful lake we had seen that day, and it was completely empty of tourists.

Here is the list of the 7 lakes you can see along the road: Lago Lácar – Lago Machónico – Lago Falkner – Lago Villarino – Lago Espejo – Lago Correntoso – Lago Nahuel Huapi

Cost: Hitch-hiking (€6 for fuel) –
Guided day-tour of the 7 Lakes: between €40 to €150 depending on the tour
Public bus to San Martin de Los Andes from Bariloche (no stops at the lakes): 590 ARS (€13)

Argentina - Bariloche - 7 lakes Traful
Argentina - Bariloche - 7 lakes 1

Other things to do around Bariloche | Higher budget

Cerro Otto

There is a cable car to go to this mountain resort and enjoy the views of Bariloche and the surrounding lakes. There are also many activities available, such as a hanging bridge, a forest maze, sledge tracks, funicular, or taking pictures with the famous San Bernard dogs. We didn’t do it as this activity represented a fortune for our budget at the time of our visit & our currency exchange rate.

Cost: 650 ARS* (€15) – Cerro Otto Cable Car – Return per person – activities not included

Sailing on the Lake Nahuel Huapi

From the pier at Puerto Pañuelo, you can take a boat and navigate on the lake to Puerto Blest, at the border with Chile. You can also take a full-day tour with a boat ride to see the Arrayanes Forest, Victoria island and Patagua Lagoon

Cost: Have to be part of a tour – around €90 pp

Rent a kayak/paddleboard

Around Bariloche, there are a lot of lakes where you can go kayaking or SUPing for a few hours. It is a great option if you want to see the landscape from a different point of view. There are a few companies renting kayaks directly in town or along the Circuito Chico route. You can also rent a bike and a kayak from the same place for a better price.

Cost: with Circuito chico adventure, you can rent a kayak for 1 hour for less than €15 or combine it with a bike rental to visit the Circuito Chico.

Extreme sports

For those into extreme sports, you will have the choice! Bariloche is an excellent place to go White River Rafting (Class II/III), Skying, Horseback Riding, Mountain Biking, Sailing, Rock Climbing etc.

How to get around Bariloche

To move around Bariloche there are many local buses that all use a top-up card called “SUBE”. The buses do not accept cash. The SUBE card is also used in Buenos Aires and the other main cities of Argentina. Therefore, if you are planning on travelling around Argentina, it is worth buying it as it becomes useful the longer you stay.

Many tourists who don’t want to buy the card, ask the locals to use theirs in exchange for money. We have seen many backpackers entering the bus and asking locals for this favour (sometimes 10 in a row on the same bus!). It is quite risky if nobody can help and the next bus is an hour later. For the locals, it might be quite annoying at some point to be constantly asked to help because backpackers don’t want to buy the card.

The SUBE card can be bought and topped up in many shops in Bariloche. In 2018, the card cost: 30 ARS* (€0.84). Strangely enough, there was no possibility of topping it up at the bus terminal of Bariloche. This put us in a bad position of having to walk all the way to the city centre for about one hour with our backpacks. We later topped up the card with 200 ARS and it lasted the 5 days spent in Bariloche.

Tip: If you come from Buenos Aires or El Calafate, add some cash onto your SUBE card before you leave. This way you can take a bus to the centre of town and avoid walking or taking an expensive taxi.

Where to stay in Bariloche

Argentina - Bariloche - Totem

Travelling to or from Bariloche

Bariloche to Mendoza

By plane: there are 2 flights a week with the company LATAM – The price starts at €70 one-way (with a stop in Buenos Aires – 6h trip on average). We are not sure this is worth it.
By bus: there are a few buses per day – prices depend on the service on board. Examples as of August 2018:

  • CATA Internacional: departs 1.30 pm – arrives the next day, around 7 am (17hr trip) – Price starts at €25
  • Andesmar: departs 1pm – arrives the next day, around 8.30 am (19.5h) – Price starts at €30

Bariloche to El Chalten

By bus: there is one bus per day (only operating in summer) – Departs at 6:30 am – arrives the next day, around 7.30 am (25 hrs) – Price starts at €75.

Bariloche to San Martin de Los Andes

By bus: there are a couple of buses a day – Takes about 4 hours – The price starts at €13.

Bariloche to Puerto Varas

By bus: there are a couple of buses a day – Takes about 4.5 hours – The price starts at €26
By boat: you can take a cruise to Chile from Bariloche – It takes about 10 hours – The price starts at €300.

Bariloche to Pucon

By bus: you will need to take a bus to San Martin de Los Andes and change to Pucon. The bus is in direction of Temuco –  Takes about 6 hours – Costs around €20. This is the one we took to get back into Chile.

RELATED | Argentina, budget and travel tips.

San Carlos de Bariloche is one of the main tourist destinations in Argentina and that’s for good reasons. The city centre looks like a Swiss mountain village with streets filled with chocolate or outdoor shops and houses made of wood and stones. The surrounding mountains offer ski opportunities in winter and great hikes in the summer but the area remains quite expensive for backpackers on a budget. https://talesfromthelens.com/2017/10/19/bariloche-on-a-budget-argentina/

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Jenny

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Jen – Owner, writer & photographer – has lived for the past 10 years across Oceania and Ireland while also travelling long-term in Latin America, North America and Europe. She has visited more than 60 countries and set foot on every continent in the world!

>> Favourite countries: New Zealand, Bolivia, Iceland.
>> Wishlist: Svalbard, Japan, Botswana, Alaska.
>> Philosophy: “We travel not to escape life, but for life not to escape us.

Jen is a coffee nerd, passionate about photographywildlife and outdoor activities. Her organisation and curiosity make her a great travel companion always looking for DIY and off-the-grid adventures. For more info, check out the About page.

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6 thoughts on “What To Do In Bariloche For Free or On A Budget”

  1. Hi guys!
    Thanks for a great post and for sharing all those amazing tips! Argentina is for sure not cheap so it is very useful to your budget tips. I will keep them in mind for when I one day visit Bariloche – think it is necessary with the hikes to get some “space” for chocolate 😉

  2. Hi guys! Loved this post, I’m argentinian and travelling my country for the first time, I’ve been around Asia, Europe and Australia twice and now i get to travel my own country. Great Pictures and perfect information. Thank you!

  3. Thank you Nuri, your country is really beautiful and we wish you the best travelling around. We are glad the article was useful to you. cheers

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