Bariloche

Bri and I decided to ditch class and head for Patagonia and the Andes. We couldn’t leave Argentina without visiting Bariloche and the Lake District and our time is running short, so we made a game time decision and went for it. We got on our bus Wednesday afternoon, and 20 hours later, we arrived in Bariloche. The bus ride just got us even more excited for our adventure as flat boring deserts turned into huge snow capped mountains surrounded by the bluest water I’ve ever seen. Bariloche is a huge ski town during the winter and a lake sport town during the summer. We basically just went to look at the beauty, since ski season just ended and it was too cold to touch the water. Our hostel faced the lakes and mountains and had an excellent view of Bariloche. So even if we were just chilling, we were looking at huge mountains and a huge lake. The first day was beautiful and sunny. We took advantage and walked all over the place. We went down to the beach, walked through town, and enjoyed the sunshine. We had Mexican food for dinner!! Friday, we went on a catamaran to Isla Victoria in the middle of the lake. It was rainy and cold, but it was still absolutely beautiful. We were able to hike a little bit on the Island, and then the boat took us to a peninsula with a random rainforest (obviously not a tropical one). This little bosque is what inspired the animators of Bambi. The trees were all over the place and absolutely beautiful. They have like 500 names for these trees, and I can’t even remember one. But, you can see them in my pics, http://community.webshots.com/user/becrach.We spent the night hanging out in the hostel after we cooked a wonderful steak and veggie meal ($5 pesos a person). We met some Americans and chatted it up until the hostel nazi kicked us out of the common room at 2am and we had to go to bed. No biggie though, we were pooped! Saturday, we had planned on taking a gondola up to Cerro Otto and hiking around but because of the wind and rain, it was closed. So we did two things we definitely know how to do --- SHOP and eat CHOCOLATE!!! Bariloche is famous for their chocolate, and we spent Saturday finding out whyJ. We had to leave beautiful Bariloche Saturday evening, and now we’re back in BA.

Now, I have to pretend like I’m actually in school and write 2 10 page papers in Spanish about who the heck knows. I have a couple weeks to work on those, but let’s be honest, I have the option of going to Mar del Plata this weekend (the beach) or working on my papers…

… I guess you’ll have to keep reading to find out what I choose. Until next time,

Besos y abrazos!!

PS... you can already donate to Relay for Life to our Green Chupacabras team!!

more of my life in Buenos Aires...

So, I guess it’s been awhile… Since Spring Break, the girlies took me out for my bday, I celebrated Día de la Madre with my host mom and her sons, watched a Project Runway marathon with Bri, went shopping, spoke some Spanish (haha), had a Bible study, went to Tierra Santa (the Holy Land), went to Uruguay, and went to a fashion show.

To highlight a few things, we went dancing for my bday and I was “kidnapped” by the worst kidnappers ever! Ha- they tried. But it was a great bday, filled with good company and DANCING!! Who could ask for more??

Día de la Madre (Mother’s Day) was cute. I did a little treasure hunt for Haydee which she enjoyed, and then it was great to spend the day with her and her family. She wasn’t expecting anything for mother’s day and her son’s surprised her with lunch and she pulled out all her fine china. She was really happy to be with her family and it was great to see her so happy.

One of my friend’s here, Bri, and I started to do a mini-Bible study, which is great! It’s keeping us in touch with God since it’s difficult to find our niche in a Spanish speaking country. The churches are nice and everything, but it's hard to really learn anything when it takes so long to translate what they're saying.

Oh wow Tierra Santa! It’s a holy theme park here designed to tell the story of the Bible. It’s figurines and statues set up throughout the park with some shows of moving figurines. There was a GIANT Jesus – the size of a goal post on a football field and the Creation show was the last thing we saw. There was a sexy live belly dancer which I didn’t understand at all. The only thing I liked about the park was that at each Bible story, they posted a few words describing the story and the Bible verse it referred to. This way, we could know for sure what was going on. Besides that, it was funny in an odd way, but it mostly upset me how much it was just like a crappy Disneyland.

We went to Colonia, Urugay this last weekend with IES. 75 American students boarded a boat and set off across the Río de la Plata. It was a short relaxing trip. We ate fattening Chivito: a huge pile starting with French fries on the bottom, followed by lomo (a cut of beef), then cheese, then fried egg, we drank yummy drinks, and we lied on the beach. Oh how I miss the beach…

Today, Amanda and I went to a cool fashion show sponsored by some hair dying product. It was so funny and cool. The models would come out in these ridiculous outfits and the announcers would talk about Silkey hair dying products. Some of the clothes were super cute and we kind of wished there were free give aways, but a lot of it was suitable for a Barbie/Wonder Woman.

And we’re getting ready for another trip…

Spring Break #2 of 2006!!

Saturday, September 30, 2006

Last night, we stayed in Buenos Aires to go to Teatro Colon to see Swan Lake. We could have left on Thursday night, but decided to stick around to see the ballet. Teatro Colon will be closing soon, so we had to take advantage of the opportunity. It was a beautiful ballet, and worth missing a couple days of vacation. Mark, Sean, Danielle and I got on the bus at 4pm and are now on our way to Salta to begin our Spring Break adventure.

Sunday, October 1, 2006

Today, we arrived in Salta at around noon. We were bombarded by hostel people at the bus station and decided to hop into the tiniest excuse for some type of mini mini mini van I’ve ever seen. We got to our hostel, Salta Backpacker’s, checked in and went out to lunch and the local artisan’s market. It was a relaxed day, walking around Salta – beautiful sunny and warm! Later, we sat and had café in the main plaza and then sat through the evening mass at the huge cathedral – Iglesia Catedral. While it was a little difficult to understand the Spanish with the echo of the microphone through the huge church, it was a beautiful mass. After that, we just went out to cheap pizza and beer and went to bed.

Monday, October 2, 2006

5:30 am wake up! Yeah we’re hardcore travelers. We got on a bus to Humahuaca, a small town in Jujuy – 5 hour bus ride. It’s a tiny old indigenous pueblo surrounded by multicolored mountains – Andes. We had a lovely day, walking around, perusing all the tourist traps and taking lots of pictures. We ate lunch at some cheap place that was $5 pesos for a 3 course meal. I love Argentina! And nothing short of a dog laying on the restaurant floor. I wouldn’t expect anything less. We went back to Salta (another 5 hour bus ride), got ready for tomorrow and went to bed.

Tuesday, October 3, 2006

Another early rising for another early bus. Today, we went checked out of our hostel and headed south to Cafayate, another small pueblo. Again, we were attacked by people when we got off the bus, but we put our faith in a cute tiny lady, named Ema Inti. She and I assume her family and friends run the only tourist office in Cafayate and their own hostel. She kindly led us to the hostel where we could drop our bags and then explained to us all the ways we could spend our day. We ran into about 10 other people from IES too (no one here ever wants to run into more Americans, but I guess that’s an impossible wish). We originally had planned to go to Quilmes, ancient Indian ruins, but after hearing all the other things we could do, we decided on the Quebrada tour. A quebrada is a canyon / gorge, and here in Cafayate we were able to trek through 6 different areas of the canyon. It’s similar to the Grand Canyon (for reference) but completely different. We climbed up and down all around these beautiful colorful formations and of course took tons of pictures. We went into this one that was just a giant enclosed circle; they called it some type of theater. When we walked in, this man started playing a flute. We all just stood in silence watching him and listening to the beautiful music inside this well amplified “theater.” He then put down his flute, and picked up his guitar and started singing. We had a mini concert inside of a quebrada! Who could ask for anything better. I had been in kind of a bad mood on and off the whole trip before this, but after hiking through some of God’s beautiful creation and clearing my head, I was all better. The last stop was la Garganta del Diablo. Basically a little kid’s climbing dream come true. There were hundreds of rocks to climb on that kept going up and up. Lots of fun! The bus ride back to the hostel, we were serenaded again by the guitarist/flutist. We had tamales for dinner, said goodbye to Sean and Mark as they would be heading onward to their next adventure at Iguazú, and we went to bed in the Balcon International.

Wednesday, October 4, 2006

Danielle and I got to sleep in! Woohoo! (until 8:30am). We walked around Cafayate, bought some sandwiches to go and hailed a cab that would take us to the Indian ruins at Quilmes. It was about an hour drive there, an hour to fart around at Quilmes, and an hour drive back. When we got there, this guy gave us a mini tour of a museum of old artifacts, giving us some background information. The Quilmes Indians were there around the same time that the Incas were. They’re small city is left completely intact to show where and how people of the time lived. The Quilmes Indians were influenced by the Incas and with the advanced technology of the Incas, were able to have irrigation. But before Incan interference, they used to put water out in the open, knowing that it would evaporate and over time turn into rain. We wandered through the ancient ruins telling stories of how there were probably Quilmes children who snuck out at night just the same as kids today, and imaging little babies taking their first steps on these rocks and dirt. We imagined how many people had walked this same path over hundreds of years.

After Quilmes, we went to Tucuman to catch a bus to Mendoza. We had a 2am hot chocolate while waiting for our last leg of our journey to Mendoza.

Thursday, October 5, 2006

We arrived in Mendoza at around 4pm. We met some more hostel people and put our lived in their hands. We got on board this crazy beat up jeep and were taking to the Casa del Sol. We relaxed a little, used the internet, took showers, and decided to go out to dinner. Just as we were leaving, Christian invited us to an asado. Of course, we would never pass up meat and wine so we agreed. The told us to be back at around 10, so we went shopping at Mendoza’s daily artisan’s fair and walked around Mendoza a tiny bit. Then it was time for the asado!! Probably one of the best I’ve had in Argentina so far. The company was great, the food was amazing, and the music was great! The family that runs the hostel has 7 siblings, so 4 of them and the father were at the asado and some of their friends. Then there were these two beautiful Israeli boys just fresh out of the Israeli army, and Danielle and me. Spanish, English, and Hebrew went around the table as did the meat. After dinner, we were invited to go out on the town with now 4 Israeli boys and Raul (the oldest brother), and of course we would not pass that up. We went to the “bar/club street” and settled on some random bar, where we just sat around and drank beer and listened to the Israeli army stories. Dude, I’m so over Latin lovers!

Friday, October 6, 2006

We really slept in today – until 11! Then we got lunch, the worst I’ve had (a super pancho). And then we went PARAGLIDING!. Raul (the dad), Raul Jr., Christian, and Jorge took 2 of the Israeli guys, Danielle, and I paragliding. They drove us in the crazy jeep up to a mountain in Mendoza and took turns taking us down the mountain with the “parapente.” It was a beautiful view of the Andes and Mendoza, very slow and relaxing. There was not a lot of wind so it didn’t last very long, but it was a good experience for sure! Since we had worked up such an appetite, we went to the store and bought fresh pasta, sauce, hamburger meat, and bread. I kind of ruined the pasta, but it still tasted good. We invited Raul Jr. to eat with us and he got up from the table while we were eating. A minute later, I heard his voice from behind me tell me to close my eyes. When I opened my eyes, there was a package in front of me that said “panaderia” on it (bakery). He made me open it and it was a beautiful chocolate cake with whip cream and strawberries. Mmmm… he put a little tea light candle on it, and he and Danielle sang “Que les cumpla feliz” to me. We ate cake and then at midnight, they sang to me again.

Saturday, October 7, 2006

My Bday! Raul Jr. joined us for a day of biking and wine tasting. We biked around Mendoza and this huge park and then we later got on a bus to Maipu the country’s biggest wine place. We went to South America’s biggest wine museum, toured, and tasted a few wines. After that, we went back to the hostel and finished our left over pasta. Raul Jr. gave me a bracelet for good luck and then walked us to the bus. We bought an extremely cheap bottle of champagne for the bus ride, $4.75 pesos ($1.50 USD), to celebrate my birthday and we watched a weird movie on the bus and fell asleep. All in all a good bday.

Sunday, October 8, 2006

Back in BA. Reality hits. My wallet was stolen – we think while we were sleeping on the bus. What a wonderful spring break and my happy mood was so easily destroyed. I know it’s not that big of a deal, everything is replaceable but I can never understand why a vacation can’t be 100% flawless. (at least for me). I spent the day trying to get online, eating, and sleeping. And now we're going out to dinner with Bri’s parents.