Wine Country

Night bus from Santiago to Mendoza = terrible idea. Generally, I like to take night buses because you can sleep while covering a lot of distance. The buses in Chile and Argentina are fantastic too! When I spoil myself, I get a cama seat, which is almost fully reclining. On this bus, however, I had a semi-cama (semi-reclining) seat; it's comfortable enough. Everything started off well.... they gave us blankets, pillows, and even a midnight snack - never had these amenities before! Unfortunately, we had a border crossing that we reached at 2am. This was Terrible. 2.5 hours of getting your Chilean exit stamp, your Argentinian entrance stamp, and then your hand luggage and stowed luggage manually searched. Border crossings have been a nuisance... but you usually get off at one border for 20-40 minutes to get your exit stamp, drive another 10-30 minutes to the other border, then wait 20-40 to get your entry stamp. So it's never taken so long before. I'd also never done it at night before, and certainly not at 2am. Not so fun. Probably only got about five hours of sleep that night and now I definitely have a cold. I also missed Aconcagua, the highest point in South America. I had great advice about where to sit and when to look on the drive from Santiago to Mendoza to see it (thanks Eli!)..... but by the time we finished with the border crossing, I was too exhausted to stay awake. (It was also too dark to see lol)

I arrived at the hostel around 7:30am, well before check-in, but my room was ready so I got to settle in. Hostel Empedrado in Mendoza = awesome. I had a two-bed "dorm" room that cost about $19. This hostel had free wi-fi, free laundry, a free 15 minute international call, crepes and DIY eggs at breakfast. Fantastic! (For breakfast, most hostels have free toast, tea, and coffee... sometimes you get cereal. And that's it.) I didn't have much time that morning though because my friends were there and wanting to leave on a morning bus to nearby Maipu, for wine tasting.

15 of us got on a 45 minute bus to Maipu. We rented bikes and the second we were all paid up, it started pouring rain. Mr. Hugo (bike-shop ower) gave us all a glass of wine as we waited out the rain. Next stop: the only place where you get free wine - most vineyards cost between 15 and 25 pesos ($4-$6) to taste. Next, we went to a really amazing place that made almost everything you could want: whiskey, absinthe, liquors, jams, olive oils, chocolate, etc. I'd never had a shot of absinthe before... it's pretty gross! They made the most amazing jalapeno salsa though - I bought three jars :) After a long bike ride, we ended up at the Termus vineyard. 10 of us split 5 bottles of really good wine... I had my wine with a really amazing steak that only cost about $10. I also had the best Malbec ever(!) but the bottle cost about $100 and I couldn't bring myself to buy it. Next time maybe? We even went to a beer garden later that day - delicious stout :) It took a while to get home and some girls got lost on their way, but we eventually made it back for an all-you-can-meat asado/all-you-can-drink wine night at the hostel. Such good food! It's six of us left from the Antarctica trip and this was our last night all together. On and off, we had a month together, and it's been a lot of fun :)

So wine tasting and the asado made for a really fun day, but I have deduced that even when boozing, biking isn't that fun. One girl fell into a ditch... (she fell two more times that day...) another girl just fell off her bike in the middle of the street. (Dangerous, but that was funny because she kind of just laid down and surrendered.) Everyone was okay minus some cuts and scrapes. I didn't fall or anything, but I ended up with my normal biking bruises...

Mendoza itself and the surrounding vineyards, I have to say, weren't so impressive. I think Sonoma and the Russian River Valley of California are incredibly beautiful and this was just eh. Lots of smog and trucks passing through so that that magic of biking through vineyards was essentially lost. I walked around the city of Mendoza for four hours, giving it its proper chance, and nothing I saw was particularly memorable. Definitely glad I went to see it, and will probably always remember my wine-tasting experience there, but I maybe don't have to come back here.

As I write this, I'm on a bus from Mendoza to Salta, in the north of Argentina. 19 hour bus ride and I got myself a cama seat. So awesome. We just finished a game of bingo and I am full because they served us dinner last night, and breakfast and lunch today. (Sometimes they give you one meal for a 28 hour bus ride and that's it!) I'm trying to be good to myself because my body seems to be more stressed out than I'd like it to be... Sorry if it's TMI but I've missed a period from putting too much stress on my body, I'm not sleeping enough, I'm fighting a cold, my knee starts to hurt anytime I do any hiking, biking, or running, and I've developed little red bumps on my arms and torso that I'm pretty sure are from my first bed-bug attack :/ That said, my spirits are high and I've really been enjoying the last two month of travel. I know I should take it easy, but I can't just yet.... I'll be in Brazil in less than two weeks and that's when I plan to properly recover and rest :)

Powering Through Chile

It's a mad dash for carnaval and I've got no choice but to pick up the pace: MUST GET TO RIO BY MARCH 3RD!!!

Osorno: I left Barioche in the morning and had about five hours to spend in Osorno. At the suggestion of the bus terminal lady, I took an hour's bus ride from there to Lake Puyehoe - it was okay. I didn't know it at the time, but I had driven past it already on the bus from Bariloche. Oops! I did get that picture-postcard view of the Osorno Volcano so it was kind of worth it. (You can see this from Puerto Montt, a town I skipped.) Osorno itself was okay...pretty bustling... a little grungy ... a little dirty. The supposed sights to see weren't much to look at, but their main plaza has free wi-fi and since it was summer, live concerts in one of the main squares. :)

Pucon (Villarica): Arrived in Pucon that night around 11pm with Kelly and Megan. We had plans to hike the Villarica Volcano the next day... little did we know you had to prepare the day before to get fitted for clothes and gear. We were too late. They basically said it was impossible for us three to go but I asked if there was any way I could go because I already had my bus ticket out of Pucon to Santiago the next day. The hostel owner made a call and, though I had to be up at 6am, they were able to fit me in. Hostel Donde Egidio - super nice people there, not to mention a great hostel overall. After four hours of sleep, I woke up to get ready for climbing the volcano. 4.5 hours to the top, including a ride on a chairlift that supposedly cuts off an hour of hike time. With ice axes in hand, a group of about 16 people including myself climbed up the snowy, ashy volcano. Parts of it were terrible of course... super strong winds, ash in my eyes, and a neverending uphill trek... But the top was amazing! The colors! Volcanic rocks are also very cool. We were lucky because the smoke(?) from the volcano didn't blow at us from the top so we didn't have to breathe in those terrible fumes until the very top. You had a view into the volcano - no visible lava - and then a view of about five different lakes down below. When we started the trek, everything was blanketed in clouds but they cleared and it was just an incredible view. The best part, however, was the descent: We got to go sledding all the way down. SO FUN!! Sometimes you'd go so fast that you'd get a face full of snow..... or you'd end up sideways from banking a turn.. or you'd just crash into the person in front of you because you were butt-sledding faster than him or her. I've concluded that butt sledding is way more fun than any other snow sport :)

Back from Villarica into Pucon, I rushed around town to get a feel for Pucon. I liked it very much... it seems to be relaxed and quaint... full of really nice people. I also ate the biggest empanada I have seen so far .. about half the size of an 8.5 x 11 piece of paper... super good too!

Santiago: 9pm bus from Pucon to Santiago with a 7am arrival. I'm not sleeping enough and it's starting to take a toll on my body. With no time to spare however, I powered on. I saw all the major sights of Santiago in a day... After exploring by myself for a few hours, I met up with a group for a free tour. It kind of sucked because the girl was European (i.e. not Chilean) and didn't seem to know that much about the city. I Did meet some cool people who were willing to go to the soccer game with me that night: Universidad Catolico vs. Union Espanola. This turned out to be a bust because the website lied about the game's start time... and by the time three of us were in a cab on the way to the stadium, the game was over. Boo. On the upside, the money went to Pisco Sours, Beer, and Lomo a lo Pobre (steak with two fried eggs on top, onions and french fries) instead. Great night spent with new friends :) Santiago itself was an amazing city. It was the biggest city I'd been in for quite some time, but I loved it. I can do big cities... I feel like I can navigate them pretty easily. I really only had a small taste but I will definitely be back to Santiago some day.

Valparaiso: Valparaiso is about two hours away from Chile. It's a cool little town full of hills... so much so that there are 14 (maybe 15 or 16?) elevators throughout the city that bring the people to their homes. i think locals actually just walk, but the elevators have historic significance and I think they've even been declared a historic monument. The hilly part of town is completely different from the town below... the streets are windy, there's a bohemian feel, bright colored houses dot the landscape and it's just a cool place to be. Pablo Neruda's house - La sebastiana - in Valparaiso was cool too; it looked like a ship! I tried the local reineta and congrio fishes at a restaurant overlooking the ocean. Not sure what you guys think of this, but one woman in the tour group wasnt going to eat half her fish... so i asked what she was going to do with it - throw it away - and I asked to have it. No shame! I ordered the congrio and got to try the reineta as a result. :)

Vina del Mar: I don't really have too good a feel for Vina del Mar since I only had a couple hours there... When you first enter the town, you see a giant watch made of flowers. You drive by castles and palaces... and they even have a Moai from Easter Island. (I think, anyway, that they actually brought it from Easter Island.... there may have been a language comprehension issue on my part, however.) The beach, Playa Acapulco, was beautiful and it was really nice to have some time relaxing in the sun.

Valparaiso and Vina del Mar were a day trip from Santiago. Once back in town, I picked up my stuff from the hostel, took the subway to the bus station, and then was on my way back into Argentina. Mendoza here I come!

Bariloche (Bar-ee-ah-loh-chay)

Bariloche was very good to me. Rather, I decided to be good to myself for the days I spent here. For one, almost no hiking! At Cerro Campanario, you can hike up or take a chair lift to the top. I took the lift and had tea and an empanada while enjoying a panoramic view of Bariloche. At Cerro Otto, you can, again, hike up or take a cable car. I took the cable car. It was sunny the day I did Cerro Otto and the views were spectacular!

One morning, I took a colectivo to its last stop at Llao Llao (pronounced Zhao Zhao). I kind of went on a whim and didn't know exactly what to see or do there, but I ended up walking about 6 kms and saw a lake (Lago Escondido) and a bridge (Punta Romano). Cool. While in the forest, there was a kind of bamboo that covered the pathway, making it feel like a very magical-and even enchanted-place. Very cool. Back on the road, it was raining pretty hard and a ranger gave me a ride to the hotel where I could catch the next bus back into town.

My last day in Bariloche, I went chocolate shopping for two hours. TWO HOURS!! I visited 11 stores and bought something from 10 of them lol I don't kno what came over me!.. some crazy ideas about comparing chocolates perhaps. They had one store called Mamuschka - Russian themed and complete with matroshkas (the little doll statues that are stacked inside each other). For some reason, Bariloche had a lot of little Russian touches and several stores sold Russian trinkets.... I liked this very much.

Post chocolate-shopping, I had a massage. Awesome except for the fact that the woman stood there and watched while I undressed...(Incidentally, this happened in Thailand too.) Next, I was off to Parilla de Tony. Not including all-you-can-eat restaurants, this is the most meat I've ever had. The options for single portions are 400 grams or 800 grams... that's 14 ounces or 28 ounces of filet mignon. SO MUCH MEAT!!! I got the filet mignon pequeno (400 grams): You have a massive plate in front of you that you can use to snack on the bread and chimichurri sauce they give you.... then Tony himself comes out to serve the meat. He put one filet on my plate... it was BIG. But then he put ANOTHER one on my plate!

For any Ruth's Chris fans, this was bigger than the Ruth's Chris cut and there were TWO of them on my plate! I think it was way over 14 ounces and probably closer to 20 ounces. It was amazing!!! (This was, incidentally, my second time eating at Parilla de Tony - I went the first night with my friends and it was so mouthwateringly good that I went back [by myself!]).

So basically, Bariloche to me means incredibly beautiful landscapes, R&R, massage, chocolate, and meat. It doesn't really get better than this :)

Next stop: Crossing back into Chile to hit Osorno, Pucon, then Santiago!

More Patagonia

The day after the superbowl, I crossed back into Argentina to get to El Calafate. The town is pretty touristy and they know how to make everything easy for you. Before I left to have dinner with friends, I had my bus ticket to the Perito Moreno Glaciar the next day, my transport to and from El Chalten to see Cerro Torre and Fitz Roy the day after that, and then a bus ticket out of El Calafate to Bariloche the day after that. Easy. One complaint though: I was staying at a different hostel from everyone else - at I Keu Ken. It was a nice hostel but they advertised themselves as being four blocks from the bus station... it was, but four blocks uphill... not fun with bad knees and a backpack.

Perito Moreno: This is pretty much the only reason to visit El Calafate - it's in the Glaciar National Park. The Glaciar National Park is said to house the third largest ice field after Antarctica and Greenland. Even after Antarctica, turns out I'm not sick of glaciars. This one was especially cool because you could see it breaking apart every now and then. Huge chunks of glaciar would break off and fall into the water. It was incredible to see and so loud, like fireworks only they were exploding beneath you! My camera ran out of batteries so instead of taking pictures, I enjoyed the view and snacked on chocolate bon bons. :)

El Chalten: More hiking. My body is definitely mad at me now. I hiked for 9.5 hours to Laguna Torre and halfway to Cerro Fitz Roy (the two highest points). Cerro Torre and Fitz Roy are part of the Glaciar National Park too, only about 3 hours away from El Calafate. I have mixed feelings about El Chalten... I got an incredible day.... no clouds to obscure the beautiful view and great weather... sometimess the town goes 10 days without seeing the peaks! I was lucky and it was awesome!

(This next section is a big rant. Feel free to ignore and skip to the end.) El Chalten was beautiful that day, but I'm also pissed off at El Chalten and everyone I talked to about it. I had overly ambitious plans of doing both hikes.... Once I got to the park, I was discouraged from doing so and pretty much made to believe that this is impossible (little did they know the pace I kept in Torres del Paine!). So the ranger says not to do it. The RANGER! Okay, fine. I start in on another hike to Laguna Torre - this is amazing. Then there's another viewpoint an hour away - the Maestra. I am most pissed off about this because the view (an hour away up a rocky crappy hill) wasn't any better than from Laguna Torre! I even asked people if it was worth it and asked about what you could see ... nobody told me it was shit! So that's two hours of time wasted. (This becomes important later...) Around this time (3pm), I realize that my two-week old backpack has lost its bottom... comletely ripped at the seams with my stuff falling out. It looked like everything was still there.... but it was when I went to reapply sunblock that I found out that tht was missing. Oh coppertone! I've also lost my orange which I was really looking forward to eating! So I can already feel the sunburn on my shoulders and I happen to glance at the map to find out that Cerro Torre and Cerro Fitz Roy are CONNECTED. WHAT?! I assumed doing both hikes in a day is impossible because you have to go back and forth to the start point. Nobody told me! It's like a hologram... you just dont see it for the longest time, and then once you see it, it's all you can see. So all I could see on this map that was very confusing, is the route to Cerro Fitz Roy... that I now am probably too late to take. Heading back into town from Laguna Torre, I stop and ask a girl for some of her sunblock. Bad decision. She tells me she's taken this connection route from Fitz roy to Laguna Torre... that it took her about two hours.... and that it was the most beautiful part of the park she's seen. Crap. I can't miss that!! So I get to the sign and it says three hours to Poincerot (where the first Fitz Roy lookout is), then another two hours from there to town. It was 4pm. I had to be back in town for an 8pm bus. So what do I do? I go for it! I know, I know, stupid... but I was used to beating park estimates. But the sunblock girl did NOT tell me it was SUPER uphill and I had already killed my knees getting to the stupid Maestra. So I'm discouraged.. but I power on. Again, stupid, I know. Then I run into a guide who says its another two hours - I'd been trekking for about 40 minutes uphill... and that I can't make it back to town going that way by 8pm. He says if i hurry, I can try to see one of the lakes and then rush back to town... so I did that. Then went back all the way I came... basically trekking two hours out of the way, then another two hours to town. I made it with about 40 minutes to spare before my bus but the whole way back I was so mad!!! Would have taken me about two hours to get to Laguna Torre, then three hours to Poincerot, then another two back into town... It sucks that I hiked 9.5 hours and still wasn't able to do what I wanted to do in the first place! Why did the ranger discourage me?! Why did I take the stupid Maestra?! (Not only was it crap, but I would have had those two hours to do both treks!) Why didn't anyone tell me the Maestra was crap? Why didn't I know the treks were connected?! Why did I stop to talk to the one girl who'd tell me what I was missing? Why did I go for it?!!! GAH!!!! Basically, it was my fault for not knowing, and then trying to go for it anyway... but at the time, I was mad at everyone! It was also poor time management and that's just not something I'm used to.... therefore it makes me so incredibly angry! AHHH!!!! To top it all off, I almost missed my bus because it started pulling out of the station at 7:55pm. He let me on, and everything was fine, but goodness! Anything else, El Chalten?! Thanks for the sore knees, sunburnt skin, and bad tan lines! (Rant concluded)

My last afternoon in El Calafate I spent buying sunblock, buying a new backpack, reinforcing the backpack with duct tape, and buying a new watch (my old one died recently...). I ended up with a kid's Winnie the Pooh watch because it was the only thing moderately affordable. :) 28 hour bus ride to San Carlos de Bariloche that actually wasn't bad because I was in a fancy (cama) seat that almost reclines into a full bed. Now I'm off to celebrate a friend's birthday... Happy 24th Birthday Kelly Toomey!

p.s. Mom tells me there was a 7.0 earthquake in Chile... I didn't feel it! I'm safe :)

Torres del Paine: Done!

Long. Grueling. Exhausting. Trekking 80+ miles on rough terrain with a 35lb pack, and in about six days, might be one of the most difficult things I've ever done.

Day 1: Bienvenidos a Paine

Laguna Amarga - Campamento Seron

Distance Covered: 10.25 miles; Total trekking time: 4.5 hours

11 of us took a 7:30am bus from Puerto Natales to Torres del Paine. Aftering paying a 15,000 peso entry fee, we were on our way. One of the guys in our group dubbed "Captain Football" (because he wanted to make it back in time for the superbowl) led us astray and we ended up taking the long way to our camp. Spirits were high though that first night, and bottles of whiskey and vodka were passed around, in the name of reducing pack weight. I sustained approximately 10 mosquito bites that night... three of which were in close proximity on my forehead so that when I woke up, I felt like I'd been socked in the face. Good times.

Day 2: Blood, Sweat, and Tears

Campamento Seron - Campamento Perros

Distance Covered: 17.40 miles; Total trekking time: 8.5 hours

Okay, the sweat is self explanatory but before we started trekking, a tent pole snapped, hit me in the face, and split my lip (blood). Anyone in Krav knows that physical trauma makes me cry (hence, tears). After that incident, it was hours of trekking with a full-fledged effort not to bite at my lip. From Campamento Seron, we did a lunch stop at Campamento Dickson with the possibility of staying the night there. But when we got there, the mosquitos were out in full force. Biggest mosquitos I'd ever seen and they weren't scared of 100% Deet. Saw a guy walking away with big red welts all over his back. Definitely not staying there. A group of us moved on to Campamento Perros, but in the end, only seven of us made it.

Day 3: The Pass

Campamento Perros - Campamento Los Guardas

Distance Covered: 11.18 miles; Total trekking time: 6.5 hours

The pass is supposed to be the most difficult part of the circuit. In all honesty, it wasn't that bad. But the 800 meter downhill got the best even of me and for the rest of the trip, my right knee would bug me after only a few hours of trekking. Two girls stayed behind to wait for the other four to catch up.

Day 4: My Body, Ow.

Campamento Los Guardas - Campamento Italiano

Distance Covered: 14.04 miles; Total trekking time: 8.25 hours

This was my hell day. The right side of my body seemed to be most tramautized by what I was doing to it. Growing blister on my right foot, right knee aching with every step, right quad muscle burning more than the left, and my right hip start hurting for good measure. I got used to beating trek estimates, but today I was really hurting and performing well above par. For the first hour, I walked by Glaciar Grey - incredibly beautiful. The next pass is from Refugio Grey to Refugio Paine Grande.

This too was beautiful... you have a view of the glaciar behind you, mountains and green forest surrounding you. Seeing these views, you remember why you're putting your body through all this. So getting to Paine Grande was a struggle but I rewarded myself by buying a sausage and a coke. (Luxury items that one does not pack on a 7-10 day trek). But Paine Grande to Campamento Italiano was hell. Everything hurt. I had hours ahead of me. I was alone. (We all walked at our own pace and that usually meant trekking hours by yourself and meeting up at the campsite later). All those dark "why the hell am I doing this" thoughts were in full force. I even started crying a couple times. Not good.

Day 5: And Then There Were Three

Campamento Italiano - Campamento Chileno

Distance Covered: 21.75 miles; Total trekking time: 10 hours

Only three of us made it to Campamento Italiano - team Zodiac Awesome. Originally, we had crazy plans of waking up at 5:30am and geting to a far away Campamento by nightfall, all in hopes of catching the gypsy train back to Puerto Natales the next day. (A group of travelers bought a bus, called it the Gypsy Train, and offered us a ride). But at 5:30am, it was pouring rain and that plan was scrapped. Still it was a long, long day. We went up past Campamento Britannico and back down to Campamento Italiano. From there to Refugio Los Cuernos. 6-7 hours more to go. I popped two advil because my legs were aching having already trekked 6.5 hours. Then I hoofed it. Determined to reach Campamento Chileno before nightfall I went as fast as I could up the stupid hill-ridden path. It was supposed to be a shortcut. Worst. Shortcut. Ever. But I made it in 3hrs 35 mins and had a beer to celebrate :)

Day 6: Finally, An Easy Day

Refugio Chileno - Campamento Torres

Distance Covered: 4 miles; Total Trekking Time: 1.5 hours

Only had to go --- kilometers today. Took about an hour. Nice. Not as nice: Thought I'd go the entire trip without having to dig a hole... but this short trek is the one that got the best of me. :/ Got to Campamento Torres, the base from which you can climb to the lookout point, the main attraction of Torres del Paine. The plan was to wait 4am and see it at sunrise, but we went up just in case. Clouds were partially covering the towers but it was good to see the super steep climb we had ahead of us (in the dark, at 4am).

Day 7: Why We Do This To Ourselves

Campamento Torres - Hotel Las Torres

Distance Covered: 6+ miles; Total Trekking Time: 4.5 hours

Two people from our original group joined us the night before so it would be five of us to make it up together. Awake at 4am to start the 45 minute climb straight up. Waiting for sunrise, I huddled in my sleeping bag while winds blasted us from every direction. (Winds at Torres del Paine reach up to 180km per hour. Crazy.)

The sky got lighter and lighter and then suddenly, there was a moment when the Torres were lit up, glowing almost red from the sunlight. It passed just as quickly as it came, but we got our perfect day. Supposedly, the Torres hadn't been cloud-free in a week but as we climbed up to them, you could see stars shining and when the sun was out, no clouds to obscure the view.

Really quite breathtaking. We all basked in our accomplishment, took pictures, and then started the long climb down. Torres del Paine circuit trek.... Done!

Took the bus back to Puerto Natales, had one of the best meals ever (lomo a lo pobre), made guacamole for Superbowl XLV, and watched Rodgers take us all the way there. Go Bears! (I mean, of course, Go Packers) :)

Body still hasn't quite recovered but I trust that it will. Moving on to El Calafate to see the Perito Moreno Glaciar and then more hiking in El Chalten on Cerro Fitz Roy.