I´m still here...

but I´m living on a beautiful farm with very limited internet access.
Stay posted. The stories are already racking up. It´s going to be a landslide the next time I post.

Besos ciao mis queridos

Torres Del Paine, photo overload

All the Beautiful People...

live in Frutillar, Chile.

Last night, our bus drops us off on the side of the highway at an unmarked bus stop. Granted, we had been warned of this in advance, that we would need to take a local bus ("colectivo") to head into the center of town, but it was dark and rainy and...
well, never fear, there just happens to be a family waiting at this obscure bus stop. They hail a "colectivo" for us. Turns out colectivos aren´t buses but rather shared taxi cabs. We shared ours with a vacationing mom and her son and a kindly man who couldn´t believe Andrea was actually 23 years old. (-No me digas!!!-)
Parted ways down the road but not until they had passed on every granule of advice they could think to bestow us. Of course, the mom insisted we drop by her place the next day should we be in the area... the bottom room with the green window; it´s a lovely view of the lake, we´re told.

Then, our taxi driver tours the neighborhood for us to find the best, safest, yet most economical hostel... free of charge (-Dos extranjeras solas y jovenes, tienen que cuidarse!!-) Granted Frutillar is not that big so not such a feat but still quite the generous gesture.
We find a good secure hostel run by a good upstanding Chilean family; they aren´t trying to rip us off. Very well; ciao to our gallant cab driver.

To follow, the most delightful and jolly family running the hostel helps us to our room. (Private bath and HOT WATER!!! It´s the little things that make us happy these days...)

Dinner down the road at a quaint cafe, also family owned... we can watch the sweet señora in the back grilling our hamburgers, piling on the avocado, loading up our plates...
The couple thought we were from Bariloche, Argentina. -Do you speak english?- they ask us in earnest.
(Probably this was more directed at Andrea and not myself, but I´ll claim little victories wherever I can!)
We bid them fairwell, full with spicey (finally a country that loves its spice!) chilean burgers and homemade blueberry pie, but not before they offer us their hospitality... any help we need, anything we lack, they´re just down the road so if we come running, they´ll be there waiting.

Welcome to Chile. Indeed.

In the Meantime, An Invitation

So, I´ve been playing a sort of game with myself for the past week. My goal is to come up with chapter titles to catalog all the adventures Andrea and I have thus far survived. Some are more obscure than others I realize and sometimes I´ve come up with multiple titles only because I haven´t chosen my favorite yet. As such, this is an invitation to y´all who still faithfully read my silly little blog. If a title catches your eye and you want an explination, send me a message and I´ll tell you the story.

Once Upon a Time in Neverland
The Alegria in our Lives
Doomed to Our Destiny, or Along Came Perú
Of Lust and Longing in Lima (Pt. 1)
The Waca-fucking-china Verdict
Yes, STILL in Lima (Pt. 2)
Machu Picchu: To Be Inca or Too Incapaz
The Long Lost Lima, or Just 2 Pincha Gringas (Pt. 3)
3 Days, 2 Australians, and 1 Bomba Short of Happiness
The Calm Before the Storm: Tio Coco´s Apartment
In the Sunshine of Bobi Hilda´s Love
Never Fear, Liza´s Here
Charybdis at the End of the World, or Devil´s and Butterflies, or Le´heim! It´s Assado Time!
Cristian, Comida, Campo, Córdoba
Back in the BsAs
Oh My, Mendoza...
I. Dying for Tequila is Suicide, or I Died a Tequila Suicide
II. A Mountainous Mosaic: The Aconcagua
III. Que Venga Más Vino en Vida
IV. An Armada of Neon Angels
V. Just a Liter of Coke and Rum: Dreamers Renegade in the Plaza (ahem, just to clarify for the familial units that read this, it´s actually refering to two tattoo artists we met and not any sort of new found alcoholism...)
El Bolson: We Never Ate So Well Again, or Maté with Leo, A Man of Many Noises
Paine, The Many Shades of Blue
So I Didn´t Meet a Penguin
Welcome to Bizzaro World: How I Survived El Chalten
If Not For Humanity and Half a Cheese Sandwich

That´s all I have for now, but I´ll keep coming up with more as we keep jumping around.
Un beso ciao mis queridos.

AWOL

So I have been trying to put together a post on the glaciers and our ice trekking expedition. Unfortunately at the moment I´ve run into a smidge of bad luck on top of not being able to find a computer anywhere that will let me upload my photos... le sigh.

I promise to be back soon but for now I have to take care of business.
I miss y´all back home. (so much!)

Oh, and happy valentines day... all you non-couples and couples (i suppOSE ;) )
Spend it with good people and know I´m sending all y´all love love love.

El Bolson, photos (Hippie Paradise)

(This one is for Maggie. Her inspiration for my commission, hehe.)



El Bolson is hops capital of Patagonia... yummy!

A REALLY delicious Belgium waffle.

A view from my backyard. No, really, a view from my backyard.



Some kind of freaky sculpture dedicated to the crazy free-spirited hippies that founded this beautiful town. My gratitude to them. Remind me to tell you the story about the "energy mountain" one day when I have a better internet connection...

Mendoza

When I first glimpsed Mendoza, it was a hazy dawn and from the window of the bus the sierras (mountains featured above) appeared weightless floating mid air... all you could see were snow-capped peaks jutting into the sky. For a split second (mind you I´d hardly slept even an hour on the 13 hour overnight bus ride, so my mind´s perception might have been a bit skewed, who´s to say) I thought I was looking out onto the Hallelujah Mountains of Pandora.

Ok, maybe not Pandora but still. I fell hard into some kind of love-entanglement with this city/province. Perhaps I´ve just been seduced by the wine bodegas and unadulterated country side, but I was meant to live here in another life... or perhaps just later down the road in this one.

Potable water from the Aconcagua River. I´ve never tasted such delicious water in my life. It feeds from the snow melting off the Aconcagua Mountain and surrounding peaks as well.


Apparently this is supposed to resemble the figure of a pregnant mummy. There were lots of shapes to sight in the mountains (Frankenstein, a woman´s face, panthers...) apparently but this was the only one I could make out.

Puente del Inca, once a spa retreate with sulfuric hot springs but since abandoned after a devastating earthquake compromised its stability. Visitors are still allowed to view the ruins. I wish the colors had turned out a bit better in this photo... some of the most brilliantly putrid looking yellows and organges you could ever see.

Volcano Tupungato in the distance. Still active and rising every year due to the tectonic activity in the region.

Aconcagua National Park. Left just a sliver of my heart here I think...

The Aconcagua Mountain covered by clouds. After the Himalayan mountain range, this is the tallest mountain in the WORLD, yet it gets little to no acknowledgement I feel. 21 days trek to reach the highest peak if you are an experienced mountain climber.






Not only does Mendoza claim the tallest mountain in all of South America in the Andean mountain range but it´s also wine country. Over 1000 bodegas surrounding the city but only about 90 are open to public tours and tastings. Also of interest to note, Mendoza is quite essentially a desert not to mention subject to horrendous hail storms annually (which destroys about 15% the yearly crop). Irrigation has transformed this entire region (for the better wine lovers must concur) into a new terrain able to support hectres of vinyards. Pretty incredible.

Once upon a time when fermentation vats were constructed from brick and morter, they sealed the inside with beeswax. Modern day vats, however, are metallic and do not require this, of course.

Profile of a vinyard and an idea of what I meant by the Hallelujah Mountains... though not quite the same.


We drank ALL this wine... did we? Hmph. Wish we could have tasted it all at least.

Not something you see everyday lying around in the States.

Homemade liquer made by a local Mendocino family. (What a cool family business!!!)

Full moon rafting and bonfire dance party, our last night in Mendoza.



Poi dancer to entertain.
Plaza Independencia, town center.