Tango Trekkin

Since we are having a bunch of thunderstorms today in Punta del Este, I have a few minutes to write more of an update...

After 4 or 5 days of partying in BA, we went on a day trip over to this town in Uruguay called Colonia...Although this was a relaxing, quaint place, I would definately not put it on my "must see" list.

After taking a ferry back to BA, we flew out the next day for Iguazu Falls on the northern border with Brazil. From the moment I stepped off of the plane until the minute I left the place, I was overwhelmed by how hot and sticky it was there. Fortunately, our accommendations there, at the Hostel Inn, had a pool and air condition in our room. The whole scene at our hotel was a pretty raucous party - with loud techno music blaring and drunken backpackers lounging around the pool 24 hours a day. It was a very social place and we got to meet a bunch of folks from all over the world.

The falls, themselves, were spectacular and well worth the trip up north. It was like taking Niagara Falls, multiplying by 2 or 3 and placing it in a pristine tropical jungle. It honestly ranks number one as the most beautiful natural site I have ever seen!

The next day, we flew back to BA and then took an overnight ferry to Uruguay again. After a hectic connection in the middle of the night in Colonia (where we had to fight for 2 hours to get our baggage), we slept on a comfortable bus on our way to Punta del Este - reputed as the "Ibiza of South America".

Although, the beach here is definitely doesn´t meet the international standards of the Caribbean, it´s a clean place comparable to the US east coast in the summer. The night life, though, is anything but comparable to the east coast of the US. I went out dinner last night with Shane and Arielle at around midnight and had to wait a half hour for a table. When we finished dinner around 2AM, the streets could not be more crowded. At this hour I was pretty tired so I headed back to the room. Shane and Arielle, though, grabbed some Coca Light and headed out to some huge Techno party that was supposed to last all night at a hanger at the International airport.

When I woke up today at 2PM with the thunder clamouring, those guys were still asleep so I am looking forward to an update from them later today...

Steve

So, it is hard to believe that I have only been travelling around in Argentina for a week. Buenos Aires has is such a comfortable city that I already feel at home here. We have all been enjoying our time so much, though, that we´ve had little time to waste on the computer.

I arrived last Friday (Dec 30th) and had a few big nights of partying in Buenos Aires. We have found the best selection of stylish bars, shops, and restaurants in a section of town called Palermo Viejo. For New Year´s Eve, we went to a Cuban restaurant/club call Rey Castro. There, we had a wonderful dinner of the most tender pork or steak you could imagine and unlimited drinks as well as good latin dance music for about $25 US!

I guess this brings me to one of my big takeaways thus far. As an avid carnivore, Buenos Aires is a culinary heaven for me. The steaks are huge, perfectly cooked, and typically cost about $7 US. Although I definitely feel a little gluttenous at times, at that price, I find it hard not to order steak au poivre at every meal!

Another big takeaway for me has been how European this place feels. I honestly didn´t have an idea before coming here that a city like this existed in the Americas. With its countless outdoor cafes and quaint boutiques, BA´s atmosphere rivals, or even surpasses, New York or Paris. I have also been impressed by how safe I feel here on the streets. I see far more beggars on a daily basis out in San Francisco than I ever see here.

Ok, I am out of time now...We are heading to Punta De L Este (sp?) tonight so I´ll try to write another update soon. Until then, I am off to eat another steak

Steve

So yes, we made our way to the park station where they have nice little men in cute green uniforms who help you plan your trek. Of course at this point I start freaking about the hiking, the camping, the food, the water, the terrain, the weather, my sleeping bag, etc. etc. So I commandeer the park guard jefe and make him stand in from of the map and walk me step by step through every trail, bungalow, water stop, and potential disaster as I am disaster-prone. He kindly obliged and spent the next 45 minutes assuring me that all would be fine. He then called us a transfer, which we thought very sweet until we were asked to pay $50 for said transfer and ended up in some nice lake resort restaurant where we waited to take a one way boat ride out to our first glacier- yet another C-note.
The water though, was incredible, it is this crazy color blue, aqua, crayon hue that just looks so clean and crisp and you find yourself thinking is this what water is supposed to look like? what is it that i am drinking out of those stupid spring water plastic bottles? I want me some aqua toned glacier water next time. You later find out that the color is a result of minerals at the bottom of the lake which can be toxic if too much is consumed.

We took a dingy little boat to a larger tugger and headed out to this glacier. I have to be honest, pre-ride I was not all that interested in a big chunk of ice, but when you get there is just unimaginable. It´s huge and frozen and cold and you just keep saying to anyone around you, "holy shit. that´s huge and frozen and cold. wow, do you see the size. i mean that´s all ice. it´s just so big and tall."

The hour long trip ended and the boat crew literally dumped us off on the other bank, and said adios.

We had decided to do the 4 to 5-day W trek (thanks be to god) instead of the 8 day Circuit route. All in about 50K of pretty mild terrain. And so with 5 maps in hand (just in case we lost four) we set out into the wild only to stop 5 minutes later at a little refugio 100 meters away.

The trail is sprinkled with these cabins that serve as meal stops, bathrooms, showers, and for those less outdoorsy than this crew (which, let´s be honest with me in the group is not that hard), a nice bunk bed to sleep in. We had made the executive decision to use the bathing and food facilities at the refugios, but tent it outside under the stars at night. We quickly found that instead of night sky of stars we got a night sky of mosquitos. anyway. We decided to stop for some food and drink, but found that all the kitchen had left was tuna sandwiches and hot chocolate. So we filled up, read a bit, and delayed the embark. And as we were sitting there reading The Tipping Point (Shane), The Celestine Prophesy (James), and Snow Crash (Arielle), in walked Mitch Grossman a classmate of Shane and mine, his wife and brother. We had heard they would be tango trekking around the same time, and had hoped we would meet up. Holas all around! travel talk trades, and then sadly, we were finally off on the trail.

So yes, at 5:00 pm, we began our Day 1 trek- which i know sounds a bit ridiculous, but when the sun doesn´t set until 12:00 at night- it´s all good, and those of us who like to sleep until 11:00am the weather/sun setting times allow you to not only wallow the morning away but also get a full day-o-trekkin in.

We followed the trail for about 3 hours, and then found ourselves at the gorgeous lake with a shore smattered with tents and uber-refugio. We dropped our packs and headed straight for the cafeteria that was 20 minutes from closing and had ourselves a terrible meal of pork medallions, mashed potatoes, and some sliced cucumbers for a whopping $90. And all of a sudden it hit us that the this whole camping/refugio eating situation was going to be a huge money suck.

Little packets of nescafe and hot water were running us $3.00. So we grumbled our way through dinner, went outside, set up tent, and proceeded to pass out around 1:00 am just as the sky darkened.

Allright there Muchachos!

Its been a good few days since our last posting. We are still in Patagonia and are scheduled to take off to BA this evening at 6 so we thought we would take the opportunity and give you an update on what´s been happening.

We originally scheduled to pick up a vehicle from the airport following our arrival in El Calafate but due to a few mix ups we missed the guy with the rental car. I won't go into the painful details right now but after searching the town we found another rental agency that was able to provide us with a tiny white chariot so that we could go to the Torres Del Paine national park in Chile and start our hike.

We got the car and headed out on the road to adventure that evening. The Chile/Argentina border is about 280km south of El Calafate and after three hours of driving through some desolate desert like terrain we arrived at the border crossing on the Argentine side marked by several squat buildings and a metal chain hanging across the dirt road that led into Chile. As we went into the largest of the guard buildings to go through the formality of the border crossing it became apparent that the building also appeared to double as a mess hall for the guards stationed there. Arielle noticed a ping-pong table in an adjacent recreational room and started joking with the guards about Shanes skills - which I can attest to as I got schooled by him on a table back in the hostel at Mendoza. Did I forget to mention that in the previous blog?
(I just want to note for the record how lucky myself and Shane are to have someone like Arielle traveling with us. She has a great grasp of the Spanish language and a really engaging personality that has managed to get us in to the most interesting and out of the most difficult of circumstances. Mad props to Arielle!)

Anyway, to our surprise one of the younger guards decided to call Shane out and challenged to a ping-pong dual.

With the honor of two mighty nations at stake, the two men faced off over the minature net. Paddles blurred and the ping pong ball was belted back and forth as tensions rose and Argentina pulled ahead winning the fist game. Shane and the guard switched sides and once again they took up challenge. A valliant attempt by Shane to bring the scores level fialed as the strain of our previous travels and a long car drive became evident. Still, we were all laughing when we left the station in high spirts promising a rematch with the guards on our way out of the park.

We pushed on and, after passing the Chilean side (no ping-pong here!)and grabbing a bite to eat at the local cafe, we caught our first glimpses of the majestic mountain scenery of the Torres Del Paine park.

A further 20km down the road and we passed the entry to the park just as the sun finaly dipped below the mountains and the sky became this crazy electric blue.

After a few more stops in the park we finally made it to our first camping spot. We pitched the tent and flopped into the sleeping bags.

When we awoke the next day the mountains that greated us seemed impossibly tall, scarping the grey skies and pulling the mist and rain in a shroud around their peaks. Not good news, it was looking like definite rain showers in the forecast for the next 24 hours. We were ready to kick some trail hikking ass though, and no small amount of rain was going to dampen our spirits!

Arielle - over to you...

We got in at around 7pm to El Calafate and the sun was still high in the sky. The Andes are about 60 to 70 miles away but you can see them from where we are and they form a spectacular backdrop to the high plains desert scenery that lies further to the east. We are aiming on picking up the rental car tomorrow morning and then heading for Torres Del Paines ,which is a portion of the Andes on the Chilean side of the border, to start a four to five day hike through this region. I am really excited as we will be camping outside during that time and, if the postcard images are to be trusted, the views will be spectacular. Speaking of postcards - I have written you all one and I just have to find some stamps now.

I guess I should catch you up on our trip to date, so we arrived in Mendoza in the early morning of 15th and spent the first day touring around the town. The city is medium to large (I think it is Argentina's 8th largest) and has an older, more charming center with less impressive residential 'burbs that make up the bulk of the place. We spent most of our time in the center which incorporates a couple of large plaza/parks and a series of tree lined avenues that give the place a real Euro feel. The trees are so important to the city that they have channels (a couple of feet deep) that provide water to the trees and allows them to survive the hot, dry summers. Where the channels are not covered by grills they also form potential death trap to any drunken foreigners who are stumbling around at night. Luckily no one from this party fell foul of the dreaded ditches!

The first night out we had a great meal in a little restaurant recommended in one of our guide books (can't remember which one it was though) and headed out to see if we could get into the local bar scene. We had some plans to hit up a bar around midnight where there was going to be a local electronic music festival but when we got there it was some sort of live performance thing that none of us felt up to struggling through. We later found out that it was a transvestite comedy troupe and that the 'nose-bleed techno' show started at 3am - if only we had waited... still, instead of the club we headed for the Hilton where we a had a quick cocktail, crashed a wedding party and gambled the night away in the adjacent casino - Shell , you would have been proud of my blackjack skills as I doubled my initial 60 peso bet and walked away with enough cash to fund at least part of our subsequent wine tasting trip.

So- Mendoza, being the wine capital of this part of the world, we would have been remiss in our duty as foreign cultural emissaries if we did not spend at least one day supping on the nectar of the grape form these lands. To that end we hired a local guy with a minivan to drive us to the some of the best vineyard and caves around the city. We managed to bag two wineries, enjoying tastings, getting some wine making history, learning abut the processes to boot. Our driver, Nicolas then suggested we check out a little place that had been opened up just the previous year where a couple of families have joined together to produce fine chocolates, jams, preserves, and who distill there own liquors. When we got to their casa we were not disappointed in what we found! These artisans have generated a library of flavor spirits and fortified wines that, when you read the labels, set your mouth watering in anticipation; you have your standard lemon, orange, grapefruits spirits as well as home made vodka, whisky, gin, and chocolate liquors. Throw into this mix some of the best Port, and a wicked chocolate banana based liquor and you know that we were having fun with the tasting (and we tasted every single one!). The best was saved for last, however, and when the owner/genius gave us a taste of a type of fortified wine made with apples and Cinnamon our taste buds went on overload! The gent told us the recipe is the same as when his grandfather was making the stuff back in the day and that, to his knowledge, no-one else in the region was making the stuff. So secret is this nectar of the gods that it is not even available on the local market. We brought three bottles! and then another six bottles of various other fav flavors.

The next day we had to deal with the headache of some good boozing and also the problems of shipping our booty back home. Still I think we have it worked out as it is sitting in storage in BA as we speak.

Man I am beat, its 1am and I need to hit the hay and get ready for our fist day of travel to the national park where we will make our trek into the Andes!