Are you bored yet?

[CG on a ridge near a waterfall in El Bolson.]

[Cajon de Azul outside El Bolson-- a deep river canyon.  The photographs do not do it justice.]

[One of the three pedestrian "bridges" we crossed on our way to and from Cajon de Azul.]

[Underneath Cabeza del Indio, a rock formation outside of El Bolson which is supposed to look like the profile of an "indian"-- the guidebook admits this just looks like a "toothless hippie."  Thankfully, we only paid AR$4 (USD$1) for admission.  Plus, the place was LOADED with ripe blackberries.  It felt like a fair trade to me.]

[Dinner at Otto Tipp Brewery.  Beer sampler and 4 egg pizza.  Yeah.  There are 4 fried eggs on that pizza.  Welcome to Argentina.]

[Mountains outside of Bariloche]

[The biggest and snowiest peak is Tronador]

[Two dingbats on our tour of the cave at Lion Mountain.  It was called Lion Mountain because it used to be full of pumas.]

[Crawling through a passage in the cave.  I'm getting pretty nervous....]

[Hmmm.  Do I really want to squeeze myself through that?]

[Bingo!  Inside the second chamber of the cave.  No.  It's not snowing.  Those are dust particles.]

[Phewf.  I survived the cave (and the others on the tour).  Another view from Lion Mountain.]

More pictures

[Beach rocks on Valdez Peninsula]

[The view of the glacial lake, Lago Argentino, around El Calafate]

[Perito Moreno glacier from a distance]

[View from the perfect campsite at Lago Roca]

[Self timer while completing my travel log at Lago Roca campsite.  Not intended to be a still life but nonetheless looks considerably more posed than I intended.  Probably one of the best moments of my trip.]

[Perito Moreno glacier from half-way up Cerro Crystale.]

[The entrance to the beautiful village of El Chalten.  Little did we know that this was the clearest view of Fitz Roy (tallest peak in the background) we would get during our three days there.]

[Holy glacial landscape!  Hiking our first day in El Chalten.  On the way to Laguna de los Torres]





[Self timer lakeside]

[Equally beautiful scenery the next day on the way to Tres Lagos outside of El Chalten.]

[Back in the desert.  The beautiful canyon at Cueva de Las Manos.]



[7,000 year old cave paintings.  There are hands of all sizes and in many colors and, as you can see, at all heights on the rock.  Dating of the paint shows that this artistic or spiritual traditions continued for thousands of years.]



[The only six fingered hand]

[More of the beautiful canyon.]

[The second petrified forest.]

[More trees turned to stone.]

[Beer sampler at the microbrewery in El Bolson.  Yum!]

Extra, extra! Read all about it....

That's right, folks.  I am back in Boston.  And now that I can post to my heart's delight, please enjoy some pictures from my adventures (more to come in the days ahead).


[Most beaches on the eastern coast of Argentina weren't sandy...]



[CG swings beachward at Punta Bermeja]



[Sea lions on Peninsula Valdez-- noisier and smellier than I ever thought they'd be]

[Penguins!  Peninsula Valdez]

[Lots of penguins!]











[Me at the dinosaur museum in Trelew.... probably the very moment when someone was breaking into the car and stealing all of my stuff.  Ignorance is bliss, I guess.]

[More penguins at Dos Bahias]

[We had to step over the penguins on the "human walkway."]

[The first petrified forest.  The mountain in the distance is an old volcano called Madre e Hijo-- mother and child]

[Camping on a high mesa outside the petrified forest]

[Guanacos, Patagonian camels, outside of the petrified forest]



[The coast near Puerto San Julian.  Magellan is thought to have arrived here in the 1540s.]



[Parque Nacional Monte Leon-- where penguins hide under walkways]

More to come....

Blame it on Karen.....

Please excuse the silence.  I have been having a grand old time with my buddy Karen.  We've known each other since 1992, and apparently we still haven't run out of things to talk about.  I just put her on the airport shuttle.  I have plans to dine with Graciela and friends in a couple of hours, so I thought I'd finish up some travel stories.

It's hard to believe that it was week and a day ago that CG and found overselves on the last day before having to return the rental car in Buenos Aires.  We woke up in the town of San Luis-- about 200,000 people and so unlike previous cities.  We could tell we were returning from the southern part of the country (which is mostly rural and desert or mountains) to the argicultural and industrial north.

Way back in Comodoro Rivadavia (the place I replaced most of my clothes with school boy uniforms), we took a rock to the windshield from a passing truck.  The ensuing crack grew and grew during our trip.  We knew we would have to pay the car rental agency to replace it but we figured we would wait until the end of the trip to work out the details.  Here are the highly entertaining (insert sarcasm here) steps involved in trying to get a windshield fixed in Argentina:

1.) Find the automobile club and ask if they know any places that replace windshields. 
2.) Automobile club employee thinks this is beyond his call of duty but reluctantly divulges name of car windshield replacement shop.
3.) Car windshield replacement shop is located but there is no parking nearby.  Park a half a block away.  Enter shop.  Ask about windshield repair (not possible) and replacement.  They want to see the car.  The car is too far away for them to walk and look at.
4.) Replacement shop insinuates that the rental agency will make us pay too much money if they bring it back to them.  They also think we might have paid insurance for windshield replacement.  They give us a quote but recommend that we call the rental agency.
5.) Find call center and try to call rental agency.  Rental agency doesn't pick up.  I pay US$2 while I "wait for an operator to assist me."
6.) Car rental agency tells us it will cost US$280 plus the time the car is out of service to fix.  The replacement shop quoted us US$190.
7.) Return to replacement shop.  They cannot replace the windshield before 7 pm.  We have to be in Buenos Aires (450 miles away) before nightfall.  The replacement shop owner tells us we're screwed.  I realize that I actually do know some slang in Castellano.  Good for me.
8.) CG and I hit the road, dreading the interaction with the rental agency upon return.

The long, straight trip back to Buenos Aires was without incident.  We split the driving down the middle and managed on about a tank of gas.  It's amazing how little fuel we used when we weren't on dirt roads and driving straight up the sides of mountains.  As we approached Buenos Aires, the roads turned into multi-lane highways, the air got hazy and the drivers got crazy.  This is what the Lonely Planet says about driving in Buenos Aires:  "Anyone considering driving in BA should know that most local drivers are reckless, aggressive and even willfully dangerous.  They ignore speed limits, road signs, lines, and traffic signals.  They'll tailgate mercilessly and honk even before signals turn green.  Buses are a nightmare to reckon with, potholes are everywhere, traffic is a pain and parking can be a bitch.  Pedestrians seem to beg to be run over at times."  I drove.  It made me feel like I was back in Boston.

My very sweet brother gifted us a night at the Buenos Aires Hilton because I couldn't get into my apartment until Saturday morning.  Our arrival at the five star Hilton was deserving of an academy award.  The outside of our car was covered in 3 inches of red, thick mud.  The inside was filled with wood for campfires (collected from dead trees at the side of roads), semi-rotten foods in decrepit cardboard boxes, and unwashed clothes from 5 weeks on the road.  Something inside the car smelled funny and despite trying several times to locate the offending item, I could not.  In retrospect, the smell might have been me!

We parked at the curb outside the hotel.  No bellhop or valet approached the car.  I worried that they might deny us entry into the hotel.  The lobby was full of folks in black tie.  As the song goes "Two of these kids are not like the others...."  CG stayed in the car and I approached the check in desk with trepidation.  But, in the end, they welcomed us like any other customers (nevermind that they pinched their noses as we walked by).  We apologized profusely and left the car with a very confused valet.  The luxury of the place was amazing after 5 weeks in the car.  Welcome back to Buenos Aires!!

Saturday was a rush to return the rental car before 2 pm.  We managed to get into my apartment, empty the car (yuck), find a place to unload a backseat full of campfire wood, get the car cleaned inside and out, and negotiate with the car rental agency over the cracked windshield.  The rental place replaced the windshield and charged us only slightly more than the shop in San Luis.  It was a good deal.

So, after 30 days and 10858 kms (6786 miles), I was back on my two feet in Buenos Aires and ready for Karen's arrival!

Where was I??

Wait, wait!  Backwards for a minute:  CG reminded me that I forgot to tell the story of our run-in with the National Guard.  On the road between Malargue (which, by the way, was filled with an unnatural number of folks on bikes-- easily the bike capital of Argentina) and San Rafael, we passed through a checkpoint.  We've gone through dozens of check points in our journey.  We stopped a least 10 times heading south to be inspected for transport of meat and certain fruits and vegetables.  We knew that drill.  Once, we sat at the side of the checkpoint and quickly ate two red peppers so as not to waste them.  This, done with permission, amused the employees greatly.  We also passed through police check points and often were waved on once it was discovered we were foreign tourists.  Leaving Rio Gallegos, a police officer asked me where I was coming from.   Not understanding if he meant my home country or where I had driven from that day, I stumbled.  "Oh!" he said.  "You don't understand anything.  Just drive on through."  Hmph.  For once, I was annoyed not to be questioned by the police.  Another time, leaving the town of Los Antiguos near the Chilean border, the police officer wrote down my name and passport number.  That was the most intense scrutiny we had experienced.

Between Malargue and San Rafael, we were stopped by a National Guardsman.  He asked us our nationality and to see our car rental papers.  Then he asked me to pull over and open the trunk.  After opening the truck and inspecting our garbage bag (yuck!), he asked CG to step out and indicated that he would search the passenger compartment.  He then systematically removed all personal items from the side pockets, glove compartment and our bags and sniffed everything. 

It was all I could do to keep from laughing.  He picked the wrong folks to sniff-- everything we owned smelled of slightly turned perishable food, campfire, or old sweat.  Most amusing parts?  1.) CG had a tiny empty liquor bottle in the pocket of his rain jacket which he uses as a safety whistle-- blow hard across the top one of those things and you can make your car companion's ears ring for an hour!  Both CG and I looked at that, then looked at the guardsman's face and snickered silently.  And I wonder why Canadians have a reputation for being big drinkers....  2.) The guy found an Altoids container in my purse which was filled with.... yes, Altoids.  Sniff, sniff.  Smells like peppermint, looks like peppermint.  It must be... peppermint candies!!  How confusing for this guy.  In the end, he didn't smell anything that interested him and waved us on.  CG and I got in the car and laughed for several kilometers.  I'm thinking he'll consider it twice before sniffing around a car camper's vehicle again....

Back in the U.S.S.R.

Okay.  So it isn´t Soviet Russia.  It is Buenos Aires.  And I feel like this is home... kind of.

Since I last wrote, we spent an amazing afternoon at a dinosaur museum and palentological site.  The ride to the site was long, boring, dusty and BUMPY.  I could not imagine such a trip would be worthwhile.  Seriously.  I care almost nothing for dinosaurs but I loved this place.  It is an active excavation site where you can pay to dig amongst the dinosaur bones.  We decided not to dig, partly because we did not have a lot of time but also because I did not think I would be interested in it.  The site, museum, and excavation are surrounded by natural gas wells and nothing else.  The rock in this particular area is red, red, red.  I think I might still have some red dust on my shoes.  We took a guided one hour tour with Gastòn.  He knew his stuff.  I was entranced.  Dinosaurs are more interesting than I ever thought.  And the best part was that the entire tour was in Spanish.  I thought my comprehension was quite good until CG pointed out that most dinosaur words are Latin.... same in English as in Spanish.  Oh well.

After dinosaurs, we traveled on dirt roads to the lovely little town of Chos Malal.  We arrived late and it was cold.  I impressed on CG the need to stay in a hotel.  We ate goat at a tenedor libre (all you can eat buffet).  Yeah.  I ate a little goat... and I kind of liked it. 

The next day was rainy and gray.  I would have liked to sit in front of a crackling fire and read... but no such luck in a place like Chos Malal.  We endured and found the least helpful tourism office we have come across since arriving in Argentina.  The woman at the office basically discouraged us from traveling in the area.  Huh?  The roads are bad, she told us.  I might have snowed in the mountains, she warned us.  Finally CG suggested that we had already driven thousands of kilometers on bad dirt roads and that we could manage a little snow.  We pressed on into the mountains in search of hot springs.  We ascended and ascended, our little car worse for the wear.  We passed through some lovely little mountain villages-- so remote yet cheery.  We saw snaggletooths on the side of the road carrying their firewood on their backs.  It was kind of like I imagine the mountain villages in Nepal might be like.  The first set of hot springs included a rushing river of warmish water.  CG waited for the other tourists to leave and jumped in.  Out of fear for hypothermia, I stayed away.  Next to the steaming stream, we found a few geyers spraying into the air.  It was incredibly surreal.  We found hotter springs at another site higher up and cooked some hard boiled eggs inside of a little hole in the rocks-- 11 minutes until perfectly soft boiled.  And finally, we found some hot spring hot tubs where we relaxed before heading down the mountain and spending the night in a funny little village with a name I can't remember.  The day in the mountains amongst the strange "geothermal activity" was lonely and surreal and absolutely gorgeous.  I can't wait to show all of you the pictures.  (By the way, the "geothermal activity" stuff-- that's CG talking... not me.  I didn't know there was such a thing as geothermal activity until just recently.  Call me sheltered.)

The next day was a long day in the car.  Neither of us were very happy about sitting in the car and watching the flat countryside whizz past us....especially after hot springs!  We arrived in the bustling metropolis of San Rafael.  We stayed in a dirty campground with incessant dog barking.  It was a low point. 

Thursday was a new day and a new attitude.  We toured Canyon del Atuel which locals compare to the Grand Canyon.  The Grand Canyon it was not.  But the scenery was gorgeous and CG got a chance to kayak some rapids.  He even "went swimming" (aka the kayak flipped and he had to bail on the ride) and came back all jazzed about the experience.  I read my Kindle and watched some funny Argentines in their natural habitat.... call it the zoo, I guess.  We drove on to San Luis that evening and were surprised by mountains of traffic.  In retrospect, this was good preparation for arriving back in Buenos Aires.

Okay.  CG is getting bored watching me type.  To be continued at the next internet cafe.....

Swans, Flamingos, and Caves. Oh my!!

Saturday night is a blur of sleeping indoors, a real mattress, and a hot shower.  AR$180 for a night in a hotel was worth every centavo.  I only wore one pair of socks to bed.

We left Bariloche and headed north on Sunday morning.  We stopped at Las Cavernas de Cerro Leones (the Caves of Lion Mountain) which are privately owned and can only be visited by guided tour.  First off, we were in a tour group with an Argentine couple who could only be described as.... limited.  Okay.  They were dumb.  And they asked a million dumb questions and felt free to comment at every juncture.  At one point, the man announced that he "didn't like Brazil or Brazilians."  What?  Does that have anything to do with the formation of caves underneath this old volcano?  Anyway, being in a tour group with this couple made me feel so much better about all of the horrible American tourists I have run into during this trip.  We, as a nation, are not alone.

The tour of the caves was fascinating.  We visited three or four caves.  One which was used as a cemetery and is 55 degrees year-round.  Another cave had some interesting cave paintings which are not very well preserved.  The final cave had a corridor about 2 feet by 2 feet into a deeper part of the cavern.  Many of you may know that I am claustrophobic.  CG did not know this... but soon found out.  At first I balked about entering the deeper cavern, but with some encouragement, CG's pen light, and the chance to be the last in line, I managed to squeeze my way through the corridor and join the group on the other side.  The inner cavern was beautiful-- the roof was formed by a series of graceful arches.  There was an underground spring with potable water towards the back.  When the dingbats stopped talking for a short period of time, the cave was silent and musky (silent, save for my deep breathing exercises!).

We traveled further north via the Ruta de Siete Lagos (Road of the Seven Lakes) which showcased beautiful little lakes and villages.  We saw one head-on accident and stopped to help (CG can fix cars).  We breezed through the gorgeous resort towns of Villa de Angostura, San Martin de Los Andes, and Junin de Los Andes.  We climbed into the mountains and drove amongst snow-capped peaks as the sun set.  The goal was to make it to Parque Nacional Laguna Blanca to camp for the night.  I was becoming increasingly panicked at the thought of camping in the snow, but the road descended into a flat desert and the temperatures advanced to a more reasonable range.  We arrived at Laguna Blanca after dark.  Using CG's memory of a primitive map at the visitor's center, we attempted to find the free camping.  We drove up and down an old ranching road without any success.  We interrupted a HUGE flock of sheep and its angry hearding dogs before turning around and finding a sandy spot on the side of the road to camp.  There wasn´t much wind.  I managed to sleep fairly comfortably with three layers on top, two layers, on the bottom, a hat, and two pairs of socks.  This morning we awoke to grey skies, rain, snow capped mountains around us and howling wind.  We ate breakfast at a windbreak near the lake.  CG checked out the residents of Laguna Lake (which is saline)-- black necked swans and pink flamingos.  We couldn't get out of there fast enough.

So, now we're in the bustling metropolis (not!) of Zapala, heading towards a dinosaur museum and then, fingers crossed, onto some thermal springs and R&R.

Until the next fast internet connection....