El Calafate

After checking out the sea lions in Puerto Madryn, we boarded a bus bound for Rio Gallegos, a transport hub 19 hours south that sends buses out to various Patagonia destinations, including El Calafate, where we were headed to visit the famous Glacier National Park. About an hour out of Puerto Madryn, our bus was having some issues so we stopped off for about two or three hours while it was being fixed. Jeff made some friends in the best way he knows how: a good ol' game of pick-up hacky sack. I think the little Argentine boy was humbling Jeff with his fancy footwork so it was good timing that the bus was ready to roll before Jeff got too frustrated (ha ha, just kidding...).

We arrived in El Calafate, a tourist destination with excursions for just about anything you could ever dream of paying too much to do: horseback riding, fly fishing, hiking, and glacier trekking. Being the hardcore adventurers that we are (yeah right) we decided to book a glacier trekking tour. On our first day we got up early and wandered all around El Calafate, accompanied by several dog companions that followed us all around town. We checked out the ecological reserve and were surprised to see flamingos standing around in the lake. And I thought they only hung out in the tropics! We tried getting close enough for some good shots, but our dog friends kept running into the water with the hopes of snatching a duck or some other rare and probably endangered bird. We eventually skipped out and wandered into town to check out the wares. El Calafate is entirely geared toward tourists, and their cute little shops and pricey restaurants reflect as much. It feels more like a chic mountain town than the rugged Patagonia that I was expecting.

Our last day in town we got up early for our 7:00 am tour and took the bus to see Glacier Perito Moreno. A boat picked us up and took us by the south face of the glacier before we landed on the shore near the place where the glacier trekking began. We were guided part way up the mountain where people were waiting to strap gamprons onto our shoes to help us walk around on the ice. Our guide gave us a mini lesson in how to stomp around so as to not fall off the face of the glacier and we were off! The temperature was around 50F but Patagonia is extremely windy so we kept our hats and gloves, though all that tramping around does warm you up quite a bit.

Our guide explained how glaciers are formed and I will try to give my basic understanding here: Glaciers are multi-layers of densely packed down snow, a process that occurs over many years, forming huge ice fields on the mountain. When the ice field becomes too built up, new ice on top pushes the denser glacier ice down the side of the mountain, and in the case of Perito Moreno, forces it down into Lake Argentina. They retain a blue tint because the ice is so dense that it absorbs all other colors of the spectrum but reflects back the blue color. The ice on the surface is transparent but when a few layers are chipped away, the brightest, most beautiful blue shows through, as you can see in any of the deep crevices in the middle of the glacier.

Once we neared the end of our trek, our guide led us toward a random table sitting in the middle of the glacier. He began to chip ice off the glacier with his pick and filled up a bunch of glasses before he poured out some whiskey on the "rocks" for us. What a nice treat to warm us up! We also had little dulce de leche snack cakes. Argentines really know how to do it up.

Even though our guide explained exactly how glaciers are formed and all about the blue coloration (and in English, so I definitely understood everything) I'm still completely dumbfounded and awestruck by these natural phenomena. Their size, color and general presence are overwhelmingly beautiful, and getting the chance to tramp around on one was pretty amazing! Perito Moreno is famous because every day huge pieces of ice are calved off and drop off the side of the glacier, creating a huge sonic boom-like sound and a giant splash as it falls into the water. I will add a video I managed to capture of a piece of ice calving off when I have a better internet connection.

Puerto Madryn

Destinación número 3: Puerto Madryn

We left Mar del Plata and set out for a coastal city to the south called Puerto Madryn, on the Peninsula Valdes. The peninsula is devoted to wildlife preservation and hosts large colonies of elephant seals, sea lions, and Magellanic penguins. Between August and December you can also see whales and Orca off the coast where they arrive to mate in warmer waters. We had booked only two nights in the hostel and had to choose between the two main destinations, the Peninsula Valdes tour, which showcases mostly sea lions, elephant seals and a few penguins, or Punta Tombo, which hosts around 500,000 penguins, the largest colony of Magellanic penguins in the world. For me, the choice was easy. Big fatty sloth-like sea lions or cute little penguins waddling around, bringing food to their fuzzy little babies... so off to Punta Tombo we went!

Our tour guide Mauricio picked up about 10 of us in his little tour van and we made our way to Punta Tombo, a couple hours south of Puerto Madryn. I guess I was expecting a penguin mating ground to look like Alaska with a chill in the air and little bird nests all over the ground. Punta Tombo has a barren, scrubby landscape that reminded me of west Texas (Mauricio even asked me if it looked like home... we asked how he knew that and he said he had seen “No Country for Old Men”) and the penguins live in little holes dug into the ground and stay away from the heat by hiding under the bushes and any other shade they can find. The chicks had hatched from their eggs in November and their cute gray fuzz was already molting into sleeker black and white feathers. Even though they looked half-mangy in their mid-molt state, they were still really stinkin' cute. Many of them had wandered away from their nests, anxiously awaiting some regurgitated fish from one of their parent's mouths. Yummy.

Punta Tombo wasn't just crawling with penguins... there were also hordes of tourists milling around, getting in the penguins' way as they made their way down toward the rocky beach to head out to the sea for food. As you can see, I also took the liberty of getting all up in their grill to get the cutest photos possible, but we were told to stay on the walkway, away from their nests and to pause to allow them to make their way across our paths and out to the shore. (Penguins always have the right-of-way.)

After several hours of taking endless penguin photos and videos, our small group made our way back to the bus and drove back to Puerto Madryn via a Welsh town called Gaiman. Apparently, some of the Welsh were feeling a bit oppressed by the English (who wasn't?) and were seeking religious freedom as well as the liberty to speak and write and worship in their own crazy, nonsensical language (these people have never heard of vowels). Anyway, some of them landed in Argentina where land was cheap and settled in the Puerto Madryn area. Their numbers have dwindled and few still speak Welsh, but their towns still have lots of Welsh structures and their tea houses. We stopped there for some tea and scones but when Jeff and I and our two Israeli friends realized we'd be paying around $17 USD each for tea and crumpets, we skipped out and found some beer and pizza instead :) So... cute town, but I still have no idea if Welsh tea is really worth raving over.

On our last day in Puerto Madryn, we decided that since we were missing out on the sea lions in Puerto Madryn we would seek them out on our own. We had heard that they sometimes beach themselves around town, so we rented bikes and decided to head to Punta Lomas, the site of a large sea lion colony about 17 km outside of town. We took off and immediately the paved road ran out and was just sand and gravel. In case you've never tried it, biking on sand is virtually impossible. We kept going for several kilometers and finally decided to take a break and walk our bikes off the road so we could take a path down to the pebbly shore. We decided then and there that there was no need to spend all day biking all the way to Puntas Lomas only to spend 15 minutes there before we had to bike back in order to make it in time to catch our night bus out of Puert0 Madryn. (Plus, upon telling the woman at the smoothie stand that we were off to Punta Lomas, she told us that we would DIE on the way unless we carried about 6 liters of water with us...) So we relaxed for a bit and headed back into Puerto Madryn. We got off the bikes and wandered out onto a long boardwalk to take some pictures. I heard some snorting and grunting and looked over the railing and saw some fatty sea lions lounging around off the stairs of the boardwalk. After seeing several thousand penguins and seven or eight sea lions, I felt like we had gotten our fix and could safely leave Puerto Madryn.

After we saw the sea lions, we hopped a bus bound 19 hours south for Patagonia. More on our travails to the other end of the earth and the most stunning landscapes on the planet in the next post.

Mar del Plata

Our first stop after leaving Buenos Aires was the crowded beach town of Mar del Plata. This is a very popular vacation spot during the summer, yet it becomes a ghost town of retirees during the off-season from what we are told. We booked a room in a hostel that is two blocks from the beach, as we didn't feel we were going to spend much time exploring the downtown area where most hostels are located. It is a cute little building called Casa del Balcon, and the staff was very friendly and accommodating during our stay.

Before we headed to the beach, we found a small pizzeria for a quick lunch. Upon taking our order, I was prompted to give my name so that we could be summoned when our food was ready. I guess they don't serve too many people named "Jeff," because when we returned the next day (we eat a lot of pizza here), I saw the cashier write "Jeef" on out ticket signifying that he both remembered us and was unfamiliar with my name. I was both flattered and amused, so I smiled, ordered, and sat down to watch fútbol highlights on the flatscreen while I waited for the "Jeeeef!" that would signify that half of a tasty mozzarella pie and an empañada were waiting at the counter.

We arrived too late to spend much time at the beach on our first day, and after about two hours of sand and sun, we went back to the room to get ready for the soccer match that evening. As per usual, this turned into nap-hour. When we awoke, we had barely enough time to scramble across town and buy tickets before the game began. We bought the inexpensive tickets, not knowing that we would be restricted to the area behind the endline where the die hard fans hang banners and chant, sing, and drum as if they had all been taking herbal stimulants to prepare for a religious ritual.

During halftime, we made our way to the middle of the craziness as the crowd thinned for a moment to relieve its bladder and have a sausage. When the game picked back up, we were surrounded by CABJ supporters. This team represents Boca, one of the poorest barrios in all of Buenos Aires, so of course we were treated to a cacophonous chorus of "turistas!" and "gringos!" by tattooed, leather-skinned ruffians, and we decided not to take pictures for fear of further identifying ourselves as outsiders. I made the mistake of staring for too long at a drug deal, and this caught the attention of a "scout" who was watching for cops. I guess he didn't care for my wandering eye, and most of the bashing came from his company. We pretended that they were addressing other white Americans, and picked up to find "better seats."

I've been to my fair share of sporting events, but I have never experienced such fanaticism. In 1997, I went to a Yankees-Indians playoff game in the Bronx and the Yanks hit back-to-back-to-back homers to erase a two run deficit. The crowd of 55,000+ went wild and the stadium was shaking beneath my feet. Yet CABJ fans managed to maintain this enthusiasm for all 90 minutes of a regular season game. The team was down 2-3, and around the 84th minute, a mother and her younglings made their way for an exit. Lauren and I followed suit, as we didn't want to stick around when moods turned sour after a loss. When we were about 100 meters away from the stadium, Boca Juniors netted the equalizer, which I was both sad and relieved to have missed.

http://footballchants.wordpress.com/category/boca-juniors

These videos are a pretty accurate representation of our experience.

The next morning, I ventured into town to find a market to buy food for dinner. I picked up two beautiful cuts of steak, an adobe spice rub, a delicious bottle of wine (Alma Mora Malbec, 2007), fresh pasta, and a myriad of veggies for a salad (along with garlic and yellow string beans for the pasta), all for around $14 American. I was very excited by all of this, and we cut our beach time short that evening so we could return to the hostel and prepare our meal.

¡Buen Provecho!

We managed to get up early on our third day at the beach, mainly because we had to check out of our hostel. We left our bags at the front desk, and enjoyed a full day by the water as the crowd filled in around our stake-out. All of the Argentines were drinking maté, which is a beverage prepared by pouring hot water over a crushed herb and is taken through a metal straw. It is rather invigorating, and the way they share it with one another is significant of their benevolent attitudes toward the people around them. After grabbing both a burger and a quick cold water rinse, we retired to the grassy hillside by the ocean (as many others had chosen to do) before we caught our overnight bus to our next destination, a coastal town named Puerto Madryn that is surrounded by wildlife preservations.

La Vida Buena

First Stop: Buenos Aires

Hola familia y amigos! So we are finally getting around to writing our first blog post. We decided it's easier to take in a city and then post about it when it's already in our rear view mirror so I'm writing this from city #2, Mar del Plata. More on that in the next post.

BUENOS AIRES! We were in BA from January 7 to 13 and really feel like we got a full experience while we were there. This trip is definitely different from other vacations because we are TRULY on vacation. We're not limited by time at all so we have the luxury of exploring for part of the day and lazing around for the rest of the day. We eat out, we eat in, Jeff cooks, I plan itineraries, and everyone goes to bed happy and full, if a little bit sunburned. Buenos Aires is a HUGE city. We walked miles and miles during our time there, splitting up our time to visit one of the 5 or 6 barrios each day.

Day 1-2 we focused on El Centro where our hostel was located, and where all the historic and governmental buildings are. Check out La Casa Rosada in the photo above. This is their equivalent of our White House. Our tour guide pointed out one of the balconies on the left and told us "this is where Evita used to give speeches, and where Madonna used to sing." haha... The guide also told us that there are two rumors for why the president's offices (unlike the White House, he or she (currently a she) does not actually live in the house, they just office there) are pink. One rumor is that they needed to find a paint that would not wash off and decided to mix in cow's blood to stain the exterior walls. This one probably isn't very likely. The other is that the two factions (political parties) each were represented by the colors red and white, so the blending of the two colors (and two factions in the government) created pink.

Days 3-4 Recoleta and Palermo

These two barrios are where the wealthier and middle class porteños live. La Recoleta is near El Centro and is home to La Recoleta Cemetery, a huge expanse of mauseoleums (seriously no grass at all, just wall to wall mausoleums). This cemetery includes lots of famous military and governmental people as well as aristocracy who lived in Recoleta. Evita is buried there and lots of other people we don't know much about (but recognized their names because all the streets are named for them) so we mostly just admired the masonry and got lost in the maze of graves. La Recoleta is a fancy schmancy neighborhood (i.e. Central Park South or Houston's River Oaks) but has lots of lovely sidewalk cafes and the streets are kept cleaner than the streets in El Centro. Recoleta sits next to Palermo which is full of excellent shopping and boutiques and restaurants. Palermo is a fun, hip area with lots of courtyards surrounded by outdoor bars, restaurants, and clubs. If we decide to stay in BA, we might try to find a place there if it's in our price range. It's a bit yuppie but it feels safer than other places that might be more affordable. Plus, if we're tutoring students in English, this is probably where most of our market lives.

Day 5 San Telmo and La Boca

San Telmo and La Boca are barrios south of El Centro with more of a blue-collar flavor. San Telmo is known for its tango hot spots, so we went to a Sunday afternoon antique market and checked out an outdoor tango show (see video attached at the bottom). We got caught in the rain and sat under an awning and ate our lunch that we put together from a sidewalk supermarket: mini baguette with yummy sliced salami, Argentino cheese, and a tomato. Oh, and a bottle of cheap red wine, of course. The whole lunch, including wine, cost us $4 USD. After the rain stopped, we wandered for several hours until we found La Boca, one of the more photographed areas of BA. Many of the buildings are covered in corrugated metal and some are painted in super bright colors and murals, so it's a lively place to see. However, the majority of the neighborhood feels very sketchy so we weren't sure where we were headed for the first hour. Finally, we heard some music and singing and walked up to a big escena turística: lots of outdoor cafes and each one had their own tourist enticement, either a couple dancing a very dramatic tango, people singing and playing guitar, overdressed tango dancers posing with tourists... we were not to be won over by the tourist trap so we walked over to the river to finish our lunch bottle of Malbec. Jeff pulled out his trusty Swiss Army corkscrew and enthusiastically yanked the cork out of the bottle, spraying wine all over his only pair of shorts. Jajajajaja... not a happy camper. So we took the Subte (their metro/subway aka subterraneano) all the way back to our hostel and called it a day.

Day 6 - La Reserva Ecológica

There is a huge ecological reserve between the city and the Atlantic Ocean, so on our last day in BA we walked along it and took in the naturaleza, although we couldn't go in because it had rained heavily the night before and the reserve was closed (probably due to excessive mosquitoes and muddy trails). We met a Cubano who asked us for an intercambio (exchange), i.e. he would play us a song on his guitar and sing for us in exchange for some plata ($). He was quite entertaining, although his song's plot line sounded suspiciously similar to R. Kelly's "Trapped in the Closet"... hahahaha. A very nice exchange though, I would say, and he gave us some good recs for what to do and where to stay in Chile.

So... there are some amazingly cheap markets here with all sorts of leather goods and jewelry but we haven't bought much since we have huge backpacks to carry as it is. We'll probably wait to buy stuff once we have our own place. We've walked ALL over and now at least we have a good idea of what to expect if we decide to hunt for an apartment in BA. The barrios are all very different and are far enough from each other that choosing one will pretty much center our lives around it unless we take the Subte to other spots for work and what not. We noticed some ads on Craigslist for English speakers. The pay is not good (about $5-$7USD an hour) but that's pretty much what we were expecting and we're open to the idea of it, if we decide to live here. We're also tossing around the idea of doing some of our own advertising for private tutoring but we probably will check out some language schools once the academic year gets started again at the end of February.

This is a long post but I wanted to paint you a picture of what we've been up to. I'll try to give shorter updates more frequently for the rest of our stops.

Fun BA Facts:
1. Stoplights are more advanced here: in addition to going from green to yellow to red they go from red to yellow to green! Maybe this is so all the motos and standard transmissions can get ready to go.

2. Every time you buy a coke (or anything at the store really, but that's all we buy), whether a can, plastic, or glass bottle, they give you a straw too! All the cool kids drink their cokes from straws.

3. There are no stop signs at all. If an intersection doesn't have a traffic light, I guess it's fend for yourself.

4. Wine is cheaper than beer per volume! Yay! And good too. A $2 bottle is just as tasty as a $10 bottle at home and spending more than $5 on a bottle is really splurging.

5. Pretty much the only beers served at bars around BA are Quilmes (Argentine for cheap, low-quality beer), Isenbeck (supposedly premium Argentine beer), Stella Artois, Budweiser, Corona, Warsteiner, and Heineken. So basically mostly imports, and not even great ones at that. Good thing the wine is so cheap!

6. The widest avenue in the world is here, at least 10 lanes in each direction with 3 sets of medians, 140 m across (and our hostel is on it). Actually Brasilia just built a wider one but our tour guide said that's a secret and that Argentines will beat us up if we say that out loud.

7. Napkins are more like pieces of paper you would write a note to someone on. Or tissue paper for a gift. Really not very helpful for all the greasy sausage sandwiches we like to eat.

8. The people here are very friendly and interested in where we're from and where all we plan to travel, but their intensity for their soccer teams is pretty intimidating.

More on our first fútbol experience and Mar del Plata in post número dos. Ciao!