Reflections on arrivals....and departures

Hola again armchair travellers!

Hard to beleive I arrived here in South America a year ago today. What an interesting time it has been--I have not reviewed my initial blog in a long time where I laid out what my plans for the year were going to be, but do know that other than arriving in Buenos Aires and heading to Ecuador to begin volunteer work, everything else has changed. Funny how life happens that way :)

Speaking of departures, I sit here now in Puerto Natales uploading some pictures from my hiking here in Patagonia while waiting to board the ferry to Puerto Montt, which has been delayed by a day for departure. It is a cute little seaside town, and I am considering going to Puntas Arenas tomorrow for a few hours, but really with long term travelling you realize how many places that are near each other sometimes look all the same. I went to Torres del Paine yesterday, and although it was lovely, it was covered in clouds and honestly after some of the hiking I have done in el Chalten and seeing Fitz Roy and the Perito Moreno glacier, it wasn´t as spectacular as I was expecting it to be...but again, that comes from seeing a lot of incredible things this past year.

In just a couple of weeks I head back to the states--I am already dreaming of a New York pizza and some wickedly strong coffee. Guess I will also have to deal with getting a job, but am not going to think of that just yet.

So last week I went and did 2 days of back to back 8 hour hikes to see the Fitz Roy secotr of the Andes in el Chalten, and also did a day tour to do ice trekking on the Perito Moreno glacier in Argentina. That was a whole lot of fun and we ended the day with scotch on ice and alfahores--the living doesn´t get much better than this!

I am looking forward to the ferry trip next, spending a week hiking and kayaking in Bariloche and then heading back to Buenos Aires for a last chance to eat as much cheap good beef as I can and consume large quantaties of Argentinean wine for pennies before heading back. And I guess I will have to deal with the impending loss of attention from Latin American men. As irritating as they can sometimes be, I will give them credit for not having any issues regarding, and even expecting, rejection. And they are very cute--hhmm, should be a number of them on a 3 day cruise that I can torture for a while :)

Ah well, as this trip wraps up, I am finding myself spending a lot of time thinking of my life before it and what options are going to be open to me after it, and enjoying contemplating change. This year I have had a departure from a life that no longer suited me, and an arrival into the unknown, where everything is an opportunity, you simply need to choose to look at it that way.

Saludos amigos--thanks for joining me on this journey and I will post again before I leave this fine continent and coming soon will post a best of wrap up, so look out for it--There are so many great things to be thankful for!

http://s176.photobucket.com/albums/w190/sweidmann/Patagonia/?albumview=slideshow

In a land without pigs

So it turns out that the Buenos Aires shag haircut is not totally restricted to the city of the same name. I know this because at this moment, yours truly is sitting here sporting one. I am in El Calafate now, after spending several lovely days in Ushuia and one not so lovely day in a number of busses from that town to this one.

It being Semana Santa and all, and with my failure to need heed the lesson of this week from last year, I have been hanging out in Calafte for 2 days now because I did not book my glacier trekking tour early enough to actually get on one this week.

Desperately in need of a haircut since I was wearing an unintentional shaggy do, I went for a cut this morning. They offered a straight cut and of course I foolishly asked the age old stupid question of what would be best for my hair, where they did some kind of zig zag motion. Now you people know I like to take chances sometimes and figured what the hell, it is just hair. I admit I have been a bit afraid to look in the mirror since I left that place spying a good 6 inches of my expensive blonde hair on the floor, but if the look on the face of the woman here in the internet place is anything to go by, it is probably not great. Oh well, such as life, and hopefully there is still enough of it there to wear a ponytail!

Other things I have been up to since leaving BsAs include such things as seeing the penguinos in Ushuia, and taking a nice hike through Tierra del Fuego national park with some really nice folks I met there. I beleive I may have attained a singular ham-free day, and also became embroiled in yet another Argentine male soap opera. Really this not taking no (admittedly this is when one is inclined to be saying no)for an answer can be exhausting sometimes!

My obsession with the ham continues. Having 17 hours on a bus, you have plenty of time to contemplate such things as: Why is there no bacon? What is the origin of all this ham since there is not a single pig to be found in this country? What the heck are all the Isreali travellers doing if all the food is covered in ham and they don´t eat pork?

Manaña I am off to Chalten for a couple of days hiking in the Los Glaciers national park and then returning here to Calafate to do my trekking on the glacier! I am pretty psyched about that. After that I am off to Puerto Natales in Chile where I will check out the infamous Torres del Paine and then board the Navimag Ferry for 4 days of cruising through the Chilean ice fjords to Puerto Montt.

So I will work on finding an answer to these life changing questions and hopefully have something to report the next time I check in...hasta luego chicos and enjoy the couple of photos here:

http://s176.photobucket.com/albums/w190/sweidmann/Ushuia/?albumview=slideshow

Hotter than the FDNY? That´s right, Argentine firefighters!

Although that is not them in the photo, that is us working our way across the landslide in Bolivia!

Hello and thanks for tuning in again armchair travellers! So here I am wrapping up my month of total glutony in Buenos Aires. My pants are noticibly tighter and my eyes are suffering a bit from sun that insists on waking me up at noon everyday.

It has been a good time and I can even admit to having made some advancements in learning a few of the 50 past tenses that the Spanish language insists on having. I have also done some fun museums here, been the the movies (! yes, not very exciting for you people who can do that any time you want to, but a big deal for me!), boogied with some Colombian cuties, and of course had many philosophical discussions about whether the $3 bottle of wine is really better than the $2 bottle.

Other than that I admit I haven´t done a damn thing. A lot of reading, a lot of cooking and eating, and even occasionally a bit of studying. Not a very interesting update for the blog I am afraid, but I so needed this time to just do mostly nothing and have a rest so I can do Patagonia right!

Speaking of Patagonia, I am off tomorrow morning at some hour that I was unaware actually existed on the clock to head to Ushuia, which is the southernmost city in the world. And with what has become my travelling modus operandi, I of course really don´t know what I am going to be doing there. I understand I can do some kayaking in the Tierra del Fuego national park, and there is also supposed to be some amazing prison museum as apparently the town was a penal colony at one time. Also, the penguins should make thier debut this trip down in these parts, so I am really excited about that--although I understand they smell something awful!

And long overdue and included here are pictures of the WMDR! I don´t really have time to label them or even sort through them, so am putting the whole thing up and you can just run the slide show. Also included are pictures of what the ride looks like when the weather is cooperating! See if you can find me in some of those pics--sometimes the hair shows. :)

Our pictures are the ones you start seeing of the really shitty weather...the good weather pics are first.

Other pictures I have been on to in recent weeks are pictures of signs. You all will probably mostly not find them interesting, but since things like pedestrians having the right of way are a total and complete rarity here, I thought was interesting to take a photo of the only pedestrian crossing sign I think I have seen all year. Also here are the pics from Carnaval in Oruro--everything is just kind of thrown together.

Wow--must say in looking at the best of WMDR pictures, it is clear I must return to Bolivia and do this ride again in good weather! Good thing that visa is good for 5 years.....

http://s176.photobucket.com/albums/w190/sweidmann/Worlds%20Most%20Dangerous%20Road/?albumview=slideshow

http://s176.photobucket.com/albums/w190/sweidmann/Carnaval%20y%20mas%20Argentina/?albumview=slideshow