Foz do Iguazu and Back in the USA!

Foz do Iguazu, Brazil

                              Back home having collected a boat, 2 bikes, 2 ski bags, lots of empty food containers, + our backpacks and the roller... 

From whales to manatees to a snow covered yard full of deer tracks (and probably rhododendrons with no buds left...). From stormy seas to calm beautiful lakes in mid summer, but surrounded by snow covered volcanoes, to a nicely cleared driveway in a so far mild New England winter.
From foreign countries with many friendly people, to a party week with family and big dogs in Orlando, and finally home!
All within the span of a month.

The world is truly small, and despite the flight shaming and my eagerness to do what is best environmentally, I think it is very important we stay in touch with people everywhere. With family and friends, but I firmly believe also that the world benefits from people meeting new friends and experiencing life elsewhere - face to face. The scientists/engineers of the world would figure things out if only the old fashioned business types and politicians stayed out of their way.
We are fully aware of how lucky we are to have had this opportunity to again see new places.

Since we started making our dinners in Buenos Aires in mid October, our choices have been: stir fried veggies with tomato sauce, a couple of Thai type stir fries with curry paste & coconut milk, or more veggie stir fries with a Chilean spice mix called Merken. We should be well supplied with all the nutrients carrots, tomatoes, peppers, garlic, onion, ginger and potatoes offer. Craig will miss the potatoes of Patagonia - he says they were tastier than any we get here.
And anyone who goes grocery shopping with Craig should please remember not to squash his bread. I never knew this was so important - even the boring, sliced soft bread varieties we have on the shelves also at home should never act as protection for wine bottles!

                Manatees

How does this trip compare to Our Big Adventure? The language barrier was pretty constant in South America because I mastered mostly polite phrases. The last time, it was rare not to be able to use English.
Many of the people we could speak English with, had learned the language ‘on the job’ - we know people told us this in Ecuador last spring, and now at least in Peru, Chile and Uruguay.
This time we spent more time in poorer areas, we changed location more frequently, we scheduled 3 guided tours/treks in 4 months, compared to working around essentially 2 such over 10 months the last time. We have a good idea of what Uruguay looks like as a country, whereas the last time we focused on only a few places in each country. The biggest difference I think is that the last time the cultural variations were huge between the many areas we visited. This time my lack of language skills prevented us from experiencing the regional differences. But we got to see so many beautiful places, and it is nice to have a better idea of what the southern half of this hemisphere looks like!

The house is dusty, but if that is the price we pay, it’s a low one. 1.5 years ago we noted the world is big, and above I state it is small... it all depends on the context. We have many more places to visit, but for now we really hope we get visitors here at home!

The Lakes District in Chile

On the beach near Bahia Mansa mid summer!

The Osorno Volcano, from the Petrohue Falls

It’s time to come home! Small things now irritate me - like toilet paper holders that fall apart when you try to get paper off a full roll, a couple of lukewarm showers, dull knives, gas stoves I need to ask Craig to turn on because using the cigarette lighter sideways burns my thumb....

But that’s enough for the complaint section - the country side is simply gorgeous here in the Lakes District - a vast area. There is Valdivian Rain Forest with many trees we haven’t seen before, and have no idea what they are. Except we have now seen Monkey Puzzle Trees also in the wild - it is the national tree of Chile!

Link to Chile’s Lake District pic’s

Punta Arenas and Whales!

It’s New Year’s Day and we have gorgeous views flying north over tall Andean peaks. Glaciers with beautiful lines showing their movement presumably, snow so white it hurt my eyes in the sun - and interesting formations from wind, or maybe avalanches.. glacial lakes of various turquoise and blue colors. Icebergs, rivers... I doubt a human has touched every part of this vast area. This is by far the most beautiful flight we have ever been on.

We arrived in Punta Arenas Xmas Eve, and the main reason for going there was our excursion aboard a research ship, with the goal of seeing whales.
About 20 years ago local researchers found a channel in the Magellan Straits, where humpback whales return every year after their migration south. This is in a large archipelago off the Chilean coast, west of the southernmost tip of the Americas, Cape Froward (not a captain’s name, but synonyms include ‘obstinate, unmanageable, difficult’ - the winds are challenging rounding this point). I had read about the Francisco Coloane Marine Preserve almost a year ago, and kept talking about it...
These researchers formed a business (Whalesound), built a camp on an island, and help finance their research by taking us there. They have very nice and spacious dome tents, hot showers, and they feed you. We spent 3 days aboard the boat, and 2 nights on the island. We saw no other boats or tourists until we were heading back to Punta Arenas.

Link to Punta Arenas and Whales pictures!

Good Bye Argentina

Our southernmost point, on the Beagle Channel in the Tierra del Fuego National Park. El Fin del Mundo!

Am starting this note on the bus from Ushuaia, Argentina to Punta Arenas, Chile on Christmas Eve. We have been incredibly lucky with the weather also here in southernmost Patagonia - the sky is blue with little white clouds, and we have had sun since we arrived 2 days ago. The first day it rained some, while the sun shone, and the same happened briefly this morning. When it rains more, you just go to a different window and you see sun!
It’s early summer, and it has been warmer than the average yearly temperature of 10C (50F). But when not warmed by the sun, I needed my gloves and even wore my wool hat for awhile. Somewhere I read one should be prepared to experience the 4 seasons all in a day.. am not so sure it only pertained to hiking in the mountains here. The wind gusts are very impressive and I wouldn’t have wanted to be somewhere high and exposed.

Link to last few Bariloche, and then Ushuaia pic’s

Bariloche

It’s not only the mountains that make you feel small 

Refugio Lopez

It has become too challenging to transfer my pictures from the camera to the iPad. My link, below, includes the first 2-3 days. Craig is confident we can fix this problem at home, so for now I am guarding my old SD card with my life, and hope a new card will help.

The ‘beauty’ of bus travel - no prepaid reservations. We had booked a week at a little house here in Bariloche, in the Lake District of Argentina. Our week is turning into 2.5 weeks because we like it so much here. Instead of continuing to Chile by bus as planned, we’ll fly to southern Patagonia directly from here.

Bariloche is in the northern part of Patagonia, and spring had arrived in this part of the Andes. We were assured most of the snow on the hiking trails we would go on, would have melted, and that they were dealing with strong winds instead.
We rented a car, and driving into town from the airport, we were in awe of the beautiful landscape. Lots of colorful wildflowers lined the road, and Bariloche sits on the shore of Lake Nahuel Huapi [from a local language meaning the island of the jaguar (puma)]. The lake is in a National Park by the same name, and we are at an elevation of 770 m (2500’).

Link to Bariloche picture - incomplete

Uruguay 2

Huge parrots’ nests

We have spent 2 weeks in Uruguay, and think we have a fairly good idea of what the country looks like. Some of the inland country side reminded Craig of the Midwest. Except for the palms and the flat topped hills that look like volcanic craters, but are not. The weather has continued very pleasant - have had only one totally rainy day. I doubt I have heard thunder for hours on end before that day, though.

Link to Uruguay 2 pictures

Uruguay 1

A Coati - common in Uruguay

Uruguay 1

Montevideo is a much smaller city than Buenos Aires. But 1.8 million people live there, over half of the country’s population. There are fewer high rise buildings, the Old Town seems to have a combination of old and new. There is graffiti everywhere (not picture-worthy), they have tree lined streets, but somehow the parts of the city we saw seemed less well taken care of than Buenos Aires.
Our apartment in the Old Town was on the 7th floor of ‘Palacio Salvo’, which when it was finished in 1928, became the tallest building in S. America.

Link to Uruguay 1 pictures

An unscheduled return to Buenos Aires

At the Art Museum!

We had our third canceled flight, now an hour before heading to the airport. El Calafate is small enough that there isn’t daily service to the Puerto Madryn area, so we decided to come directly to Buenos Aires, our following stop anyway.
We are both cynical, and think the airline canceled due to a low number of bookings. Craig knows this happens at least at home. 2 days wasn’t enough time to visit Puerto Madryn - seems I shouldn’t have booked things ahead this time.. Had hoped to see whales for the first time, but guess we now need to book a whale watch at home instead.

link to pictures from our 2nd visit to Buenos Aires

Miscellaneous pictures & observations by Craig

 

We ate a few times at the same restaurant in Caraz. Each time this lady came in and went to each table trying to sell potatoes or wildflowers (actually begging). She's wearing the characteristic hat of the area.

This is a typical shower head from Peru, with exposed wires and taped wire junctions. Yikes! There is a heating element in the shower head. The way it works is you turn on the water, next you throw a breaker to shower, then you adjust the water so it's hot. If the flow is too high, the water isn't warm. If the flow is too low, there's a low cutoff switch that turns off the heat. It's very difficult to adjust the right trickle flow such that you get hot water.

We took this taxi up to a trailhead near Caraz. The road was very rough and narrow with about 50 switchbacks. Americans think we need SUVs with four-wheel drive and ground clearance. The taxi was an ordinary Camry about 15 years old.

This is a trash pickup in Cusco. People leave their trash out in garbage bags and packs of dogs then tear up the bags for the food inside. Then the poor trash collectors have to gather that up and shovel it into the truck. Stray dogs are a plague here.

This is a deep fried bread and relish that is automatically served with meals in parts of Peru. It's like the chips and salsa with a Mexican meal - quite good.

This church in Arica, Chile is made entirely of iron. It was prefabricated in France, designed by Gustave Eiffel. Apparently he made many buildings like this for export to South America.

 These folks are celebrating the anniversary of The Battle of Andamos, a national holiday in Peru. The battle was a crushing naval defeat for Peru in their war with Chile in the latter part of the 19th century. This defeat set the stage for their loss of the entire war, which led to the loss of Peruvian territory to Chile. Why this should be a national holiday in Peru is beyond me.

This building was a lactarium, built in a public park in Buenos Aires in the early 20th century for the convenience of nursing mothers.

 An abandoned fishing boat in Puerto Natales.

A typical breakfast in Buenos Aires - Cafe de leche and semi-lunas

We went to an art museum outside Buenos Aires, housed in what had been a beautiful and elaborate athletic and social club built in 1912. It has some of the original bathroom fixtures.

 Many older buildings in Buenos Aires have these tall (10-12 ft) narrow entrance doors.

This fountain replicates one found in the 16th century painting by Hieronymus Bosch called The Garden of Earthly Delights.

Torres del Paine and Puerto Natales

It’s windy!

We have spent over a week in Chilean Patagonia and have seen no signs of the political unrest that continues at least in Santiago.

Puerto Natales is a small town, and tourism is probably the most important industry here. Our hostel is very basic, but totally nice - Craig is able to sleep well, we have warm showers, and a large & clean kitchen in which to make our own meals. The staff is very friendly, flexible and helpful - they offered us free storage for stuff when we left for the Torres del Paine National Park, and even lent us a lock for the locker. Coffee & tea are free throughout the day!
But using the laundromat across the street after returning from hiking, cost almost $20 for our 4.2 kg of clothes...

We can see the ocean from the hostel, and despite the town being sheltered by islands and peninsulas, there were white caps the 1.5 days we spent here before heading to the Park. Fortunately the rain let up the morning we walked to the bus which took us there.

Craig’s Monkey Puzzle Tree - as mentioned in The Ghost and Mrs. Muir

Link to TdP & Puerto Natales pictures

Buenos Aires and El Calafate

Halloween in El Calafate

Our apartment, on the 8th floor, in Palermo, a central and safe part of this huge city, has a washer! We don’t have to disinfect water! I have wolfed down our basic home made veggie stir fries (the first time we have cooked since leaving home). I also totally enjoy my quinoa with added seeds etc. for breakfast (couldn’t find oatmeal the first several days, despite Argentina exporting grains..). We have 2 floors, 1.5 baths, Craig has a couch to stretch out on, no noise from the neighbors, a large balcony - this is just what we wanted, and needed. And we have enjoyed our first bottles of wine since home - Malbec.

Link to Buenos Aires & El Calafate pictures