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!!