Coolest Glacier Ever

3/23/10: El Calafate, Argentina

I use a lot of superlatives when I write my blog posts. I think this is mainly because my memory is so short that at the time I’m actually typing out the post, what we did that day really was “the best thing ever” or “the most brilliant idea I’ve ever had.” But I suppose if you pressed me to really think about it, I’d tell you that I might be slightly…exaggerating.

But not today. Granted I haven’t seen that many glaciers before in my life, but when we went to see the Perito Moreno Glacier, my mind was totally and completely blown. BLOWN. It is the coolest thing we’ve seen so far on our trip.

Meet Perito Moreno, glacier extraordinaire.

The picture above was from our very first view of the glacier from the viewing platforms. It’s hard to tell, but the glacier itself is over 150 feet high. We just watched it in awe for about an hour, walking around the platforms to see it from different angles. Every now and then we’d hear a huge crash and look out to see a piece of ice fall (I think the term they use is calve) off the front of the glacier and into the water. I was surprised by how big some of the splashes sounded relative to the size of the chunks of ice that made the splash – but then I remembered that the glacier was over 15 stories high and it all made more sense.

If this had been our only experience with the glacier, I don’t think I would have come away with the same impression (you know, coolest thing I’ve ever seen), but luckily this was just the beginning. Perito and I would eventually be on a first-name basis.

We decided to do the Big Ice trek which, at 650 pesos (~170 USD) was a really big splurge for us. But it was totally worth it.

Getting our crampons on.

Don’t crampons sound like something that belongs in your medicine cabinet and not on your feet? It’s a strange word.

Kevin takes a sip of very clean glacier water.

Blue, blue, blue.

Walking on the glacier was amazing. The sheer size of the thing was completely mind-boggling, and the colors – I have never seen so many shades of blue before. There were creeks and rivers and 50-foot holes and giant chasms filled with the bluest water you could possibly imagine. The pictures really don’t even come close. It was beautiful.

Glacier meets sky.

Pretty good spot for lunch.

Color accent blue. Kevin is looking down at a waterfall in the middle of the glacier.

Tiny lego people. Humongous glacier.

One of the smoother sections.

A jaggedier section.

Kevin – he jumps.

After our trek was over (about three hours on the ice and two hours hiking to the glacier and back), we took the boat back to our bus. I had a shot of (free) whisky, which was the first time I’ve ever had whisky. And probably the last time.

Double fisting the whisky with a thing of raisins.

View from the boat.

The trek was amazing. I know I’ve used the word amazing already, but it really was just…amazing. Coolest thing EVER. Really.

_____________________________________________

Ohio Picture: Most perfect Os we’ve had so far on this trip.

_____________________________________________

Picture of the Day: The wind was so strong the water in this waterfall went upwards.

Read Full Post »

Patagonian Potpourri

3/22/10

[Editor's Note: I now see Zhou wrote a similar post yesterday. Sorry to throw useless tidbits at you two days in a row. Hope you enjoy!]

We hadn’t done laundry since the south island of New Zealand. We hadn’t talked to our parents since the north island. We hadn’t written a blog in six days. (The beans are all over the floor! We don’t write every day, we just pretend to.) Today we sat in our hostel and changed all that. And while all our clothes are in the dryer, there are a few things I’d like to get off my chest.

My shoes stink. It’s to the point that I don’t think they can be sanitary to put on anymore. There must be some virus or athlete’s foot or something lurking down in them to make them smell that bad. But every day I lace them up and hope people don’t notice. And every time we arrive at a new hostel, I scan the place for some Febreze. So far no luck – I’ll just keep marching on.

Foreign mannequins are far too real. I’ve noticed this ever since Southeast Asia, but haven’t been able to work it into a blog post. I can’t count the times that Zhou has jumped and I have flinched because a creepy man has been staring at us from a store window. Now that I think of it, maybe there aren’t any mannequins outside the US…

The second hardest time of the year for traveling is over. The first is Christmas. That day should be spent with family. Yesterday though, the first weekend of March Madness ended. Thank goodness. We did manage to listen to the Vandy game on radio (no more will be spoken of this game) and I luckily caught Ohio State’s second round game on CBS’s March Madness on Demand. But missing all 46 other games was like missing a hypothetical free coney day at Skyline Chili. While I have your attention though, one of my brackets is killing it right now and is in line to win my brother’s office pool. By the time you read this it will have gone down the toilet like my brackets do every year, so I thought I’d throw that out there while I still can.

I’m allergic to bees. This is another thing that I’ve been holding inside me, waiting for my chance to announce it to the public. Apparently I’ve never been stung by one before, because when we were surfing in Byron Bay one got me on the arm, halfway between my wrist and elbow. (How it got me I have no idea, since I spent 90% of my time drowning under water.) The entire right forearm swelled to the size of Ken Griffey Jr’s head on The Simpsons. I spent the next three days looking like a professional arm wrestler with no regard for his weaker arm.

We had another Small World moment today. While cooking dinner we met a girl who grew up five minutes from where we got married in New Jersey, but has spent the last three years of her life working in Ohio.

I’m proud of my lack of employment. Speaking of work, or lack thereof, one of my favorite things on this trip is filling in the immigration cards when we enter each new country. Why? Because on the line where it says Occupation I always get to fill in “unemployed.” This may seem a bit egotistical (for lack of a better word), because there are millions of people out there looking for work who can’t find a job. And from that angle I do feel a bit bad about feeling good about it. But I also know that this is the only time until I retire that I have no financially-related responsibilities. Zhou and I worked hard and saved a lot for two years to pay for this trip, and I’m enjoying every non-working minute of it. However, this brings me to:

Holy crap! I have to find a job soon! With Zhou’s graduate picture coming more and more into focus, my post-trip life is getting more and more narrowed down. I’ve actually already started looking a little bit online for opportunities, but won’t dig into it more until we’re sure of where we’re going to end up. Still, for the first time on this trip I’m beginning to have those moments every now and then that our fantasy life is going to end soon and I’m going to have to make something of myself. And nobody wants me to make something of myself, right?
_____________________________________________

Picture of the Day: It was a day off so we didn’t take any pictures. You will just have to look at this old picture of Ushuaia.

Read Full Post »

Vignettes From South America

3/21/10: Puerto Natales, Chile to El Calafate, Argentina

Did you want to hear about our bus ride from Puerto Natales to El Calafate? The ride that we took at 7am after getting in bed at 1am the prior night before? How the bus was stifling hot and I arrived an 8 out of 10 on the grumpy mood scale? How I then demanded that we not leave the hostel for at least 24 hours so I could recuperate from the late nights/early mornings/lack of naps? You don’t want to hear about it, right? Ok then, let’s move on.

The cheek kiss
In Argentina and Chile, everybody does the cheek kiss as a greeting. Just one side though, not like those crazy Europeans and the triple “muah muah muah” (left, right, left again). But we’ve never had to use this greeting – I think because the locals think we have some contagious disease. But today I was introduced to Giro, who happened to be working the shift at the front desk when I needed to ask him a question. I had a question about laundry, but after we exchanged holas he very formally introduced himself and asked my name. Then he leaned over the desk that was in between us with his right cheek angled toward me. I was confused. Was there something on his face that I needed to wipe off? Was he looking for something that was slight in front of him, up high, and to the left? What was going on? About 1.3 seconds past the threshold of doing nothing that made it awkward, I realized that he was proffering me his cheek for the cheek kiss greeting. So I belatedly leaned in and kissed his right cheek (it was very smooth). It later occurred to me that most people don’t actually put their lips on the cheek when they do the cheek kiss, they kind of just bump cheeks and air kiss. Whoops.

Stray dogs
The stray dogs in El Calafate, where we arrived today, are extremely hospitable. We had to leave our hostel briefly to go to the grocery store, and when we left the store there was a friendly white mutt with floppy ears sitting outside waiting for us. He assessed us and our groceries (mmm, chicken!) and escorted us to the hostel door. I would have invited him in, but I don’t know what our hostel’s policy is on fleas.

Breakfast
Most Argentinian and Chilean hostels include breakfast in the price of your room, er, bed. At all of our Argentinian hostels thus far, breakfast has been: bread, more bread, butter, jam, dulce de leche, instant coffee and more bread. Usually self-serve. But at our last hostel in Puerto Natales, not only did they set the table with adorable red-flowered teacups and matching plates, BUT they also included the following: yogurt, cereal, bagel-like thing (just like a bagel but with no hole), small chocolate chip cookies (I don’t get it either, but I didn’t complain) and juice. Then they even did your dishes for you. I would have stayed there forever, but we had to move on.

Spanish, or lack thereof
I’m really proud of Kevin, who is really quite unembarrassed by saying things in Spanish, even if he has no clue how to actually say it or even what’s he’s saying. As for me? I’m perpetually worried that I sound awful and am saying things wrong. But we have learned a few extremely vital phrases, and they are:

“Cuanto cuesta?” How much is it?
“Para llevar.” To go, as in taking food to go. We’ve used this one a lot. It’s weird because in Argentina, the double “l” is pronounced “sh” instead of “y,” like it is in Chile. Why do they do this to us?
“Donde esta…?” Where is…? This is usually followed by
“Cajero automatica.” ATM.

And the biggest secret of all – they don’t say “adios” here. They say “ciao!”

CIAO!
_____________________________________________

Picture of the Day: I don’t think Kevin gave the rainbow we saw yesterday the proper spotlight, so here’s another picture of it.

Read Full Post »

Torres del Pain(e)

3/20/10: Puerto Natales, Chile

There are four things I can think of at the moment that push Zhou over the edge.

1. Waking up early
2. Things not going according to plan
3. Walking for hours and not getting anywhere
4. The wind

All four of these things occurred today – I don’t know how she made it.

This morning we caught the 7:30am bus to Torres del Paine National Park, one of the most popular hiking destinations in Chile. (Zhou would be quick to point out that this came one day after catching the 5am bus to Puerto Natales.) Most people do multi-day treks through the park, but we decided a single day trip would be enough for us since we’ve already accomplished everything imaginable during our Hall of Fame trekking career (see: Annapurna Circuit and Routeburn).

Upon our arrival at the park, we paid the outrageous entrance fees (~$30 each) and followed the crowd onto the next bus to take us to the trailhead. Well, that’s what we thought. After another 45 minute bus ride we discovered that our trail began where we paid for the tickets – this spot was for those doing overnight hikes (read: everyone else on our bus). We found a friendly bilingual hiker who was able to explain our problem to the bus driver and we were told it would be best to do a two hour hike and then meet the bus again at 1pm when he made the loop back to the park entrance.

That’s when we discovered the wind. To put it in perspective: I’ve read somewhere that a sneeze travels upwards of 200 mph, so I worked up a big sneeze to race the strong gusts. I’m pretty sure the wind won. (Now that’s something to sneeze at!) On a more realistic note though, the wind actually did knock Zhou over once, and at one point while looking at a waterfall I heard a scream coming from behind me. “I’m going to die! I’m going to die! I’m going to be blown into the river and nobody will ever find my body!” I saw Zhou stumbling past me, so using my immense strength I grabbed her and pulled her to safety. Then I was nearly blown into the river myself.

Zhou getting blown down the path.

The wind has blown her scarf over her face...

… and down she goes!

On the plus side, her scarf acts as a arrow pointing travelers to the catamaran.

Eventually though, we did make it back to the start of our own trail. So at 2:15 (only four hours and fifteen minutes later than we wanted) we started walking. By this point we had already woken up early, completely screwed up our itinerary and been batted around by the wind. So when we realized that the new path we were on was not the hike at all, but rather another road to the hike, I thought Zhou would give up. It turns out we now needed to walk over nine miles round trip just to reach the start of our trail. Plus she was with a crazy husband who now thought that if we moved really quickly we could do the full 12-hour hike by 8pm. But to my surprise, she began motoring through this futile walk. She did eventually convince me that we wouldn’t make it as far as I wanted, but that didn’t stop her from completing over 15 miles of trekking today (given all the extra steps she has to take, that’s the equivalent of 25 miles for me).

If this trip has been about personal growth (which it has), I’ve been very impressed with how far Zhou has come when it comes to things she doesn’t like to do. Today was just one small example, but I felt it deserved mention in the blog. Plus, we got to see lots of good views… look!

_____________________________________________

Puzzles for Postcards

Rhyme Time! Solve all three of these completely unrelated rhymes.

The desk where a Pixar employee does his work
An ancient work of art made from small pieces of colored glass
A small song sung by a small Siamese pet
_____________________________________________

Picture of the Day: Can anyone tell me what exactly this look is?

Read Full Post »

An Open Letter…

3/19/10: Patagonia

…to the Muffin That Was Served to Me on Our Bus Ride From Ushuaia to Puerto Natales

Dear Muffin-That-Was-Served-to-Me-on-Our-Bus-Ride From Ushuaia to Puerto Natales,

When our bus driver – Argentine Mr. Rogers with a mustache, I had nicknamed him – handed you to me, I was slightly baffled. A muffin? For lunch? The lady who sold us our bus tickets had said lunch would be included on our ride, and since it was past noon I was expecting lunch – you know, a ham and cheese sandwich. But then you were given to me. You, a muffin. I held you in my hand and stared at you in a perplexed manner. You politely said nothing about my staring.

You were quite a small muffin, and I noticed that your little muffin top barely peeked over the edge of the muffin wrapper, as if the person who baked you had been a bit stingy when pouring the batter into the tin. You were plain yellow, almost looking a bit like cornbread, except with no bits of corn. No bits of anything, actually. Just a plain, small, yellow muffin. I wondered what you might taste like. I thought maybe I should save you for later, since we wouldn’t be getting into town until 10pm that night – and who knows if we would stop for dinner. I thought about how long a small muffin like you would be able to keep my stomach from growling and decided that it wouldn’t be that helpful to save you for later. Plus I was starving. All I had for breakfast that morning was a peach and half a bag of Lays potato chips. So I decided to eat you.

I unwrapped the wrapper carefully, so as to save any big crumbs from coming loose and falling into my lap. I pinched off a tiny piece in between my thumb and forefinger and noticed that you had quite a dense consistency – not springy or fluffy like I would have preferred, but in these situations you can’t be too choosy. I put that tiny piece into my mouth and chewed it slowly. You were quite dry and vague-tasting, and yes, very dense. There was no particular flavor that I could actually discern. You weren’t a blueberry muffin or a cornbread muffin or a chocolate chip muffin. No, you were just a plain yellow muffin.

I continued to pull off pieces of you and slowly eat you, with bottled water to help wash down the bites. Even though you weren’t the best tasting muffin in the world, I found myself quite forlorn when I looked down and realized I had finished eating all of you and all that was left in my lap was a small white wrapper and a smattering of little yellow crumbs. Argentine Mr. Rogers with the mustache came by shortly after to collect you wrapper, and I sadly gave it to him, knowing that I would never see you again.

Oh muffin, you were not delicious! Not at all. But I had to eat something. So I ate you.

Sincerely,
Zhou
_____________________________________________

Picture of the Day: Are we in Antarctica or Ushuaia? This sign is confusing me!

Read Full Post »