Patagonia, Buenos Aires

I am currently in Buenos Aires, Argentina. It has been a busy past couple of weeks. I only spent about a week in Chile since I was in a time crunch to meet my parents in Buenos Aires. In Chile I stayed in Santiago for a couple of days and then took a three day trip to visit Viña del Mar and Valparaiso, Chile. They are coastal towns with houses built all down the mountains leading into the sea. Valparaiso was a bit run down, but had a lot of charm whereas Viña was much more well kept, but a bit cold feeling. I was in fact suffering from a bit of a cold while in Chile, most likely due to the bitterly cold temperatures in the Andes on the way there.

Arriving finally in Buenos Aires, I was blow away with how pretty the city was. I have to say that it is the most developed city I have seen in all of Latin America. Along with my parents we walked through almost every corner of the city noticing that every part seems to have a different architectural inspiration. We stayed at a very nice hotel in Recoleta, certainly much different from what I have been used to for the past 2.5 years. I had compiled a list of restaruants from people who had been here previously and we hit most of them. The steaks here are unparallel to anything I have ever had before, out of the last 10 days, I think I have had about 10 steaks. We did some of the touristy things like go to a Tango show. It was a dinner and show with about 2 hours of tango dancing, five different acts displaying the history of tango. Another interesting event was going to a Professional fúbol (soccer) game, Argentina vs. Paraguay. The game ended at 1 - 1, which was a bit anticlimactic, but still incredible. Argentinians are serious about their soccer and upon entering the arena you worry that you may be crushed to dealth.

I would have to say that the highlight of Argentina thusfar was going to Patagonia. We stayed in a place called Madryn which is located on the east coast of Argentina. There is a protected wildlife reserve called the Valdez Penninsula which we spent two days circumnavigating. Among elephant seals, sea lions and other land critters we were lucky enough to see Southern Right Whales and a Killer Whale tearing apart whatever it had just killed. The right whales were amazing, they were enormous and came within feet of our glorified raft. The killer whales were from more of a distance, but equally spectacular. Killer whales were out of season, so it was rare to see them at all. I was suprised that the eastern coast of Patagonia is a flat semi desert. The weather held out for us, in fact for the most part I have been lucky with weather. I am on the last leg of the journey, only two more weeks until I am back in the States. Until next time.

Uyuni Salt Flats

I am currently in Santiago, Chile via Uyuni, Bolivia. I had an opportunity to take a 3 day jeep trek through the salt flats of Bolivia as well as the San Pedro de Atacama desert in Chile. Day one began in the early afternoon. The crew contained a driver, cook and 6 tourists including myself. Two of the people I was with I had been traveling with since Lima, Peru for the past 2 weeks, so I knew it was going to be a good time. We headed to the salt flats and I was blown away by how huge it was. It is apparently 12,ooo sq km in size and all solid white salt, it is the remains of an ancient salt lake. Without sun glasses it was a blinding experience, fortunately I was well equipped. The most interesting thing is that there is no point of reference in terms of distance, so it is a fun place to take pictures, people in the distance just look like small people. There was a town which processed the salt, albeit very rudimentary, as well as all the buildings are made out of salt blocks. Now I love salt, but I think this was a bit overkill. Cruising through the flats we blew a tire and swerved a bit before coming to a stop. The following day was mainly driving, blew a second tire. We passed by several lagoons which has several species of flamingoes, I clearly could not tell them apart, I think it is just a farce. An interesting part of the day was seeing strange rock formations in the middle of the desert. The wind and sand eat away at the bottoms of boulders moreso than the tops, leaving rocks looking like trees and mushrooms. That night was fairly painful. We spent the night at about 4600 meters or 13800 feet. The temperature dipped well below freezing to about 12 degrees F. I had on a shirt, fleece, coat, gloves, hat, 2 prs pants, 2 prs socks, sleeping bag, and two fleece covers and I was still freezing my ass off. The next morning we went to see geysers and thermal baths in the middle of the desert, I decided that I was not interested in stripping down and swimming as ice crunched under my feet, I will leave that for people who are completely insane. We finished the third day seeing a green and red lagoon, due to the type of algae and then got dropped off at the Chilean boarder. The ride into Chile was certainly noteworthy as well, we decended about 2000 meters (6000 feet) in about 40 minutes. The road was unnecessarily steep and had emergency runoffs every 500 feet in case someones brakes gave way. All in all it was a worthwhile trip. Well until next time.

O

Peru, Machu Picchu, Lake Titicaca

I am currently in La Paz, Bolivia. It has been a very eventful last week and a half since my last post. Well I spent a couple of day in Lima, I have to admit that I was not all that impressed by the city. I made my way to Cuzco, Peru which is home to all the famous ruins of the Incas. For three days I visited various ruins ending in the pinnacle of seeing Machu Picchu. Even with all the hype, it stands up to impress. I did some serious mountain hiking as well, climbing a 700 meter mountain and a 650 meter one the following day. Both of these mountains surrounded Machu Picchu which gave a great birdseye view of the ruins. This was one of my major things to do on this trip, like Christmas as a kid, it passes too quickly. The next trip was to visit Lake Titicaca, the largest lake in South America. On the Peruvian side is Puno. The most interesting thing about Puno are the people who live on floating islands. They are made out of boyant reeds, in fact everything that is on the island is made of reeds, such as the houses, boats, watch towers ground etc. It was certainly unique.

Making my way into Bolivia was an experience. In my travel book it says that entrance visas are free, well this changed 4 months ago and is now 135 dollars, among having a list of things to complete before you enter. I had to bribe the official to overlook my unpreparedness. Our president strikes again in pissing off yet another country, so it´s citizens have to pay for it. In fact U.S. citizens are the only country that have to pay anything to enter Bolivia. I have to say that when I was told this I was embarrassed, we are really not held in very good reguards around the world.

In Bolivia I began in a town called Copacabana which has majestic views of lake Titicaca. I did run into problems originally since the town does not have ATMs. I was down to my last 2 dollars in cash when I was able to have a bank give me an advance on a debit card, I was seriously concerned that I would be in deep doodoo on that one, but disaster averted. All is well and I have been pretty healthy. Until next time

Ecudor and Peruvian Boarder

I am currently in Lima, Peru. I spent about a week in Ecuador checking out the city of Quito as well as the southern central part. While in Quito I met up with some friends, one of which was from Quito, who knew the city much better than I. One of the highlights was going to the ¨midad del mundo¨ which is the equator. Apparently a few years ago, due to GPS they realized that they had been about 200 meters off in what they had thought to be the equator. They had built a park and a monument marking the ¨line¨, but in fact it is not correct. Well we went to the current ¨real¨ line and saw all the spectacular occurrences that come with it. You can balance an egg on a nail; they show you how water drains on the line, as well as north and south of the line. I am not sure if it was a trick, but sure enough it does go down in different directions. It was a wonderful tourist trap. I spent the next few days heading south on my route to Peru. A couple of towns really I thought were pretty. Alausí is a town where a train leaves to trudge down the Nariz de Diablo ¨devil´s nose¨. It is a series of switchbacks along a cliffs edge that are quite terrifying. From Alausí I headed to Cuenca. This was a really pretty city, smaller than Quito, but certainly more charming. Crossing the boarder to Peru was a bit nerve racking. There is a bit of a racket with fake money being changed. The fake money changers work with some of the corrupt police in that they will change your money and then a police officer will ask to see the money you changed, tell you its fake and take it from you, god forbid they go directly to the source of the fake money. Well knowing this I only change money at banks. I was stopped by an officer and told he wanted to search my bag for fake money, to which I replied that if he wanted to search me we had to go to the police station so there would be more witnesses, he promptly sent me on my way. Once in Peru I took a 21 hour bus ride to Lima. Sitting anywhere for 21 hours really tests your sanity, not to mention the man pushing 350 pounds sitting next to me. It was an amazing ride though through the desert of western Peru. I had expected peru to be much more lush, but the entire west coast is a baren desert. It is beautiful how the desert ends right into the pacific ocean. Well until next time.

Cartagena, Colombia

Against most advice I decided to go to the most dangerous country in South America, Colombia. After spending a few days here, I am not sure how it has such a poor reputation. I have been spending the last few days in Cartagena, Colombia, which is on the Northeastern coast of Colombia. It is country steeped in history and it is considered Colombia´s historical gem. Pablo Ecobar threatened to level it in 1989 with 500 tons of dynamite, for retaliation of the government clamping down on his drug trade. I was able to spend two days just walking up and down the streets of the old city, every turn was a postcard. The whole city is surrounded by a solid stone wall to keep out pirates back in the 16th and 17th century. Joined by the shipmates I had from Panama we scoured the city. During the days walking around and in the nights sitting out in the squares drinking rum and watching street performers. One square in which we frequented was originally the square where slaves were bought and sold, I kind of felt bad laughing and drinking there.

On one of my walking days I came across barracaded streets and all kinds of army and military personel. I wandered over to where all the comotion was and stumbled into where Alvaro Uribe, the president of Colombia was walking out of one meeting to head to another. I was able to get within 3 feet of him and got a decent picture. I could not image me just wandering up to where George Bush was and have no one question me. It was just a random circumstance of right place right time. Tomorrow I am heading to Quito, Ecuador. Until next time.

Panama Canal and Sailing to Colombia

I left the last entry in Panama City, but I had not seen the Canal by that point. I spent a day at the Miraflor locks. I was fortunate enough to see a couple of cargo ships go through the locks. The sheer size of it all was humbling. The ships are 300 feet by 1050 feet and hold thousands of of truck size containers. I could go into the engineering of the locks, but I will refrain. What I would like to spend some time sharing is an amazing sailing trip I took from Panama City to Cartagena, Colombia. I left last thursday the 24th of July and did not arrive in Colombia until today the 31st of July. I was joined by 7 other tourists on a 40 foot sailboat called the Wind Surfer. Our captain, a 23 year old Colombian named Tilson. Our first leg was from Panama City to the San Blas Islands. These are islands off of the west coast of Panama and are not included on most maps. They are owned and controlled by the Kuna tribe and are much like the indian reserves of the US. They live in sugar cane cabanas and their only mode of transportation is a dugout canoe. The San Blas Islands are a collection of 375 islands which a single family can inhabit for 3 months and then they must switch islands. None of them are owned by foreigners, in fact foreigners are not allowed to even rent them. We spend four days there and spend the night on our sailboat. They were some of the most pristine beaches I have ever seen. One night we were treated by a Kuna family to a lobster and crab dinner which they had spent the whole day catching. It was a scene right out of survivor. I and my travel companions were eating by lantern in a sugarcane hut, breaking the shells with whatever hard object we could get our hands on. Well the difficult part of the journey was a 50 hour straight shot from San Blas Islands to Cartagena. Now just to place some emphasis, this is over two days of straight sailing, without stopping. Well we started of well, getting great time and enjoying ourselves. Then the wind died. We were stranded somewhere in the carribean sea, motionless. Fortunately our luck changed and we got moving again. There was a bit of a storm on our last leg with the boat rocking so profoundly that it was impossible to get any sleep, in fact a wave crashed into the side of our boat and my open window was turned into a water tunnel into my cabin. On a positive note I did get a chance to see several groups of dolphins and flying fish as well as some of the most beautiful sunrises and sunsets that I have seen in my life. Arriving in Cartagena, finally after 7 days of poor nights sleep as well as my only showers being swimming in the salt water, it was a godsend. It is such a beautiful city, the old town looks straight from a movie set. I will have more time in the next few days to see more of it. Until next time.

A man a plan a canal panama

Much has happened in the last week, I will try to keep it succinct though. Last time I had written I was in San Jose, Costa Rica. Well my next stop was Puerto Viejo de Talamanca. This is located on the south eastern corner of Costa Rica. According to the travel book it is "a laid back beach town where anything more than surfing or laying on the beach is considered overly ambitious." Once there I have to admit that I was dissapointed. The town had a seedy feel and my friend and I immediately thought we would leave the following day. On a whim we decided to walk down the solid coral, depressing beach in search of better pastures. To our amazement as we turned bend an immense expanse of beach with crashing waves opened before us. Immediately we did a 180 and decided to stay a couple of nights. We certainly took advantage of the beach as well as the waves, body surfing.
Next on the itinerary was Boca del Toro in Panama. This is located on the north eastern part of the country. Its an archipeligo (a chain of islands), each with it's own personality. We stayed on the main island which was called Isla Colon, mainly because it has the best night life and restaurants. We spent the first night enjoying the 50 cent beers and getting to know some of the other travelers. Yada Yada Yada, large headache the next day. Taking a water taxi we visited another island and spent the day laying around a beautiful, private beach. What I neglect to mention is that to get to this beach you have to take a 30 minute hike through mud upto your calves, the only way to make it is to go at it barefoot, which got quite slippery. I am not sure that many beaches would be worth it, and this was barely so.
Today I have just arrived in Panama City. We crossed the Panama canal to get to the bus station, I will be checking that out in more detail in the coming days. I will hopefully be able to get some pictures up here is a few days. Until next time.