Wednesday, May 29, 2013

Arequipa to Sacred Valley

We woke up at 4:30 to be ready for our taxi at 5:30.  We had a smooth flight to Cusco, and out pick-up was waiting there with a "Sra. Williams" sign.  We were starving and thirsty by the time we got to The Sacred Valley Retreat and B&B.  The owner would be another hour before he arrived (It was about 11:30).  One of the staff showed us to our room and where the filtered water was.  In an hour the owner was here and we inquired about lunch.  A few cups of tea, biscotti, and a grand tour of the small retreat later, and he told us one of the staff would make lunch for us.

At 2:30 we sat down for a lunch of fresh salad from the garden, bread, giant corn, olives, cheese, and a purple corn lemonade-style drink.  It was all very good.  Nearly all of the ingredients are from the garden on the property, and we were in the mood for some fresh veggies.  We sat with Fernando, the staff member that prepared it, and Martina, the one who showed us to our room.

Fernando is learning English, so we talked a little bit back and forth about this and that, trying to understand eachother.  For the most part it was a quiet lunch.

Afterwards Ryan and I hiked up the mountain behind the retreat for an hour or so before coming back down and stopping in the tiny town for 2 cokes and a muffin.  I made Ryan hide the empty coke bottles in his backpack because I didn't want the all-organic natural staff to see them.

On our way in we saw a family of pigs (A mom and at least 7 piglets) being ushered along the road by a local woman.

We talked on the balcony with the owners friend who has been staying here 3 weeks.  He is some sort of therapeutic pain-eraser.  He demonstrated by trying to lengthen Ryan's spine by adjusting his posture.  The jury is still out.

Time for pity-corner.  I have a huge bug bite on my right ankle, actually about 3 or 4 bites but only one is huge and swollen.  Why?!  Every where we go they find me.  I have been spraying every bed we've slept in with a preventative bed-bug deterrent so I don't think its bed bugs.  It's from Arequipa, but how or why I don't know.  Oh well... could be much worse.  Pity-party is over.

Here are a few more pics from the last several days:
Suriplaza, Putre

It was windy and cold

Awesome colors with the blue sky


The tire shaped grave it dug

filled in with rocks - again!

hopin' and a prayin' that it works!

It worked!  Ryan lays in the ditch that tried to eat our front tire

The back yard of out retreat in Sacred Valley, Peru


Burro's coming up the trail this afternoon

Sun starts to set

sunset over the mountains


Tuesday, May 28, 2013

Arica to Arequipa

From the international bus terminal in Arica, we got into a "colectivo".  Colectivos are txis that fill up with people to go across the border into Peru.  Enough of them were around with people saying "Tacna?  Tacna?" so we were able to get in the taxi of a woman in her 50s right away.

She took us with 3 Chileans over to another area of the parking lot and disappeared with our passports.  We would have been alarmed, but we read about how this all works and we knew she'd be back.  Sure enough 10 minutes later she was back with our passports and a printed immigration form.

We made the drive through the Chilean border, and then onto the Peruvian one.  It went pretty smoothly and she dropped us and the other 3 at the Tacna bus station.

From there we got a cab to the airport and waited for our flight to Arequipa.  We split a mediocre empanada from the airport cafe while we waited.

Around 4pm we arrived in Arequipa and taxi'd to our hostel "Amazing Home."  Our original hostel had emailed us a day before cancelling, so we hurried up and booked this one.  Its in a n old building, but the room is spacious and the shower hot, so we were satisfied.

We were starving since we'd barely eaten all day.  We stopped in the first juice shop we saw and ordered 2 mango juices.  The guy had us take a seat and ran out the door.  He returned a few minutes later with a bag of mangoes, and shortly after that we enjoyed some of the best juice ever.

The juice gave us enough energy to wander a while and find somewhere to eat for dinner.  We ended up eating at "Istanbul." We ordered pita sandwiches, kafta for me and falafel for Ryan.  We walked a little more after that, got some ice cream, can back and hit the sheets.

This morning we woke up early and Ryan did some exercises in the room.  We had banana pancakes in the breakfast area, which we were pretty good.  We walked to Starbucks for coffee afterwards.  I didn't even feel guilty for getting Starbucks in South America...I needed coffee that wasn't instant.

We sat on a bench in the Plaza de Armas for a while and watched the pigeons fly around the fountain.  We stopped back at the hostel to drop off our coats because it was getting warm, and then headed to tour a 16th century monastery.

The Santa Catalina Monastery was really pretty and really large.  The walls were painted bright blues and oranges, and it was interesting to see the old cells and chapels throughout the property.  We walked around for about an hour before heading off to find some lunch.

We got to the restaurant just as they were opening and the owner asked us to give him 15 minutes.  What else to do but get more juice from our favorite spot?  We sucked down 2 mango juices and headed back to the restaurant for lunch.

Lunch was a bed of sliced potatoes with vegetable and beef topping.  It was delicious and really hit the spot.  It was a mix of sweet potatoes and regular, but each had purple skin.

We wandered a bit more before heading back to the Plaza to meet Joe.  Joe (remember Joe, Ryan's dental school buddy, with us for a while in Panama?) is also in Arequipa for a but before heading to Cuzco to do some volunteer dentistry for a few weeks.

We met with him and went to see a museum about a frozen 500 year old body of a child that was sacrificed to the god's by the Incan people.  The tour consisted of an introductory movie about the archeological expedition to the top of various mountains to uncover these bodies.

A guide took us around to see all the artifacts and at the end we saw the frozen body through a glass freezer.  Pretty weird stuff.

Afterwards we went to a cafe and had some tea and churros until it was time for dinner.

We ate at Mixtos, a restaurant not far from our hostel.  I had a stuffed pepper with potato, and Ryan had a mashed potato tower with shrimp (similar to a dish in our south american cookbook!) Lots of potato today!  Joe had a burger that looked really good.

We said goodbye and he headed off to the bus station for his bus to Cuzco, and we headed in to get ready for tomorrow mornings journey to Sacred Valley.  Goodnight!

(Pictures still to come...)

Monday, May 27, 2013

Putre, Chile

When our bus dropped us off in Arica we got a taxi to the airport to pick up our rental truck.  We reserved it through Hertz a few days before.  The Hertz website said the office was open from 7am on.  We got there at 8am.  Do you think there was a representative smiling and ready to give us our truck?  You're catching on.  Hertz will be hearing from me.

I asked another staff member at the airport what time they open. "Nine or nine-thirty".  Hmm.  Ok.  Ryan and I went upstairs and overpaid for an instant coffee while we waited.  We came back down around 9.

The lady from the parking voucher stand was kind enough to call the number posted at the desk for us since we had no phone.  "They're coming" was all I gathered.  We got a map from the Europcar rental lady, and waited around.  Three guys came up to get their car, and called that number again.  20 minutes.  It was after 10.

Finally the guy shows up and we get the truck.  We forgo the damage insurance, since our credit card covers it.  He gives us a better map and shows us to our Toyota Helix (or is it Helux...Hilux?) It's stick shift.  Since Ryan hadn't driven stick since he was a teen in his grandparent's VW, we took a few laps around the parking lot.  He took to it quickly and we were off, headed to Putre, about 2.5 hours northwest.

The road was long and took us through huge sand dunes and mountains.  When we arrived we checked in to Terracelodge, and I was happy to see a clean, attractive room with a hot shower.  We got some lunch (soup and chicken and rice) and walked a small trail a few kilometers from town.

We weren't very hungry at dinner since we'd had a late lunch.  We went to a restaurant on the square and ordered too much food than we wanted.  It was good though, a veggie pizza for me and fish for Ryan.

The next morning we had breakfast at the lodge and headed out to see Chungara Lake, a high altitude lake overlooked by a huge volcano.  We stopped at the rangers station and they gave us a neat sticker of the park.  I used their bathroom, that they had just finished hosing out.  I had to use 2 of my rationed napkins just to dry off the seat!

We walked a short trail near the water, and drove out to some other lakes around the volcano while we waited for the clouds to clear (Ryan was dying to get a shot of the whole thing uncovered).  We ate our lunch of empanadas and chocolate in the back of the truck just over the hill from a heard of llamas.

When we finished eating the clouds had moved and we went back to get more pictures of the Volcano.  Success!

With the rest of the afternoon we explored the dirt roads in Lauca National Park and a Vicuna Reserve (Vicna look like short haired llamas mixed with baby giraffes).  I even tried my hand at starting the truck, with Ryan coaching me.  it worked, and I drove a good 30 feet!

We took a long road to an old decrepit town with a crumbling church,  Ryan said he was waiting for zombies to come walking out of the old buildings.  It was creepy.  An old broken down swing set, with chains dangling, a see-saw with the wood broken in half.  And not a soul in sight.  We didn't see one other human the entire afternoon driving around the park.

The best part of that town is that it is right next to an active Volcano - you can see sulfuric steam and gas  rising out of a vent on top.  It was really neat.  We worked our way back to Putre and saw a beautiful rainbow shooting straight out of a snow covered mountain.

Guest blogger: Ryan

After following a seemingly endless number of trucks we arrived back in town.  We went to a local hole in the wall for dinner and got two "menu completos".  First came a huge bowl of quinoa soup with veggies and chicken.  The soup was so big that we thought the whole meal was the soup (and would have been satisfied)...wrong.  We quickly got a plate of noodles and another huge piece of chicken covered in some kind of delicious sauce.  For dessert we received a small bowl filled with a pink jello like substance.  It was pretty good.  We walked back home and went to bed.

Steph Blogging:

We enjoyed our breakfast again the next morning before heading off to explore the other side of mountains.  We first grabbed some empanadas, peanuts, and bananas to bring with us.  Suriplaza was our first stop.  It is a beautiful group of bright orange mountains, dusted with snow, and that day set perfectly against a royal blue sky.  We ate our lunch in the truck facing the mountains.

We decided to take a few more dirt roads over to another "must see" star on our map.  A few wrong turns had us dead end into more ghost towns.  Finally we found the road (either the map is labeled and the actual raod isn't, or the road has a sign but there is nothing on the map) and headed over.

About half way there we came up fast on a spot of the dirt road in which an old dried up stream had washed away a small ditch into the road.  Ryan hit the brakes so that the front of the truck didn't get damaged, but in doing so effectively wedged us in.  Impulsively he floored it to try to get us out of the spot, and by the time we got out to assess the situation, the rear driver's tire was in a 12 inch hole it had dug itself.

So now we have the front passenger tire wedged into the ditch/stream bed, and the back driver's side tire in its own neat little tire shaped hole.  I immediately regretted eating my entire empanada at lunch.  The hairy part was that we hadn't seen a soul since about 9 am on any of these roads, and now it was 1pm.

We ended up getting the jack out, jacking up the back tire as far as it would go, and filling the hole with small and medium stones, rocks, and gravel we could gather.  Ryan started her up again and I stood back and watched.

When he turned off the car, there was a clear black stripe of baldness forming on the tire, and all of the rocks we had gathered had been flung all over the road behind us.  And still, there the truck sat.

We would go through this a few more times.  Kissing the tread on the tire goodbye, filling and refilling the hole, trying to dig away the ditch that was holding the front tire, and so on.

I'm reading The Neverending Story, and there is a character in it called a "Luck Dragon."  Maybe I was getting delirious, but I was hoping that a luck dragon would come help us.

Finally we dug and dug at the back tire, wedged some large rocks in as far as possible and as flat as possible, trying to give the tire an unobstructed way out.  We dug and dug with our hands and parts of the jack to clear the front tire as much as possible.

I stood back and Ryan started her up again.  And moved!  Forward!  A lot!  I was jumping up and down yelling and Ryan had a huge smile on his face.  We made it!

The whole ordeal probably lasted an hour and a half.  We still didn't see a soul until we got back in to Putre, at least a 35 to 40 minute drive away.  Ryan of course was still up for seeing that other landmark, but I had had enough and just wanted to get back to civilization and out of that damn truck.  I had actually thought the axle was broken for a while when it was sitting there, it looked weird to me and the other rear tire didnt spin at all for the longest time.

I'm proud of us.  We didn't panic (outwardly) or loose our heads.  We didn't get short with each other even though we were both frustrated and getting nervous the longer it was stuck. We pulled it off together and got ourselves the heck out of there.

We went back to the same restaurant for dinner.  Again we ordered the menu completo and got too much food.  A huge bowl of cazuela de vicuno followed by a plate of beef with a fried egg on it and a large portion of rice.  Dessert was a banana drizzled in honey - very good!

We showered and got to bed when we got back to our room.  Ryan mildly skinned up a finger from all the digging and filling, and we were both tired.

The next morning we left before breakfast, taking very bland cheese sandwiches prepared by the owner with us, and returned the car.  We tried to fill the car at the gas station at the ariport, only to find out it was a jet fuel station and not for cars.  We had to drive 20 minutes out of our way into town to find a gas station.  Thats one thing America's got going...you never have to search too long for a gas station.

We dropped the car, got a cab to the bus station, hopped into a taxi bound for the Peruvian border.

to be continued...
The Volcano neat Lake Chungara

Is this a toyota ad or what?


Learning to drive stick

The old church belltower

more pictures to come soon!

Saturday, May 25, 2013

Boliva part 2 - salt flat tour continued

We woke up around 6 the next morning and had breakfast at 7am in the same religiously adorned room that we dined in last night.  This was the plainest breakfast of the trip.  Bread (stale, but I could see why if we've been driving around with it for days) and spreads with hot nesquik-style chocolate.

We headed out to the Valle de las Rocas.  It is a bouldering heaven.  Ryan was drooling by the time the jeep stopped to let us out, and I barely grabbed a pic of him before he was off climbing up and down all of the unique, craggy, seemingly infinite boulders.  It really was a place unlike any other.  Romer had to honk the horn to get everyone to put their cameras away, climb down off the rocks and get back in the car.

Next we headed over to some altiplanic lakes.  First we had to either cross a stream or brave a mud pit.  Romer chose the stream and the water was up to the bottom of Ryan's door when we got stuck.  It was the first time we saw Romer smile.  We were stuck a good five minutes before a conference with the other driver (who looked about 18), much lurching and shifting, and some rocking back and forth by the passengers got us loose.

The altiplanic lakes were some of the coolest things ever.  I posted the photos in my previous post.  Imagine a large snowy mountain, colorful lake, and pink flamingoes dunking their heads in and out.  Beautiful!  We had lunch near one of these lakes (while seagulls circled above us).  Lunch was pounded chicken (possibly fried), rice, oranges, veggies, and coke.  It was again really tasty!

We spend some time at nearby lakes.  And headed over to Arbol de Piedra, a sort of balancing rock thats large at the top and small at the bottom and took a few pictures.  We then headed to Laguna Colorada.

Laguna Colorada is a pinkish red lake with still more flamingos.  It also had a lot of borax in it we learned.  It was really neat to see the red water, which gets its color from algae.

We headed to our "shelter" after the lake.  I say shelter because that is the word that the woman at the office chose to describe it.  She said Its a basic shelter with no heat. (I dont think we've had heat at all on this trip.)  This scared me and as the tour progressed I had the shelter in my mind as a tarp attached to a tin roof with cots inside and an outhouse a quarter mile away.

Happy to announce - not the case!  The "shelter" was actually "quite nice" as the brits put it. We had a shared room of 6 beds, real beds, clean looking with 10 lbs of blankets on top.  The bathrooms were acceptable, and we had a nice hot meal of soup and spaghetti in a dining area.

Ryan and I rented sleeping bags for this night because we'd heard it would be bitter cold.  I actually think we probably could have done without them, as we were plenty warm.

We got up early again and Ryan got some excellent pictures of the stars above our dear shelter.  Some of the coolest night sky pics I've seen (see previous post).

We had cold pancakes for breakfast made the night before with jams and spreads.  Not bad.  We were off to go back to the border which we'd originally crossed.  The tour normally ends at a closer border but it was closed due to snow.

We froze our butts off from 5:30, when we left, until at least 9:30, well after the sun came up.  We arrived to the border at 10, were we had some ham and cheese sandwiches.  We said adios to Romer, and hopped on a mini bus back to San Pedro.  We had to pay 15 Bolivianos to get out of Bolivia, strangely.  The minibus stopped for a while after this and our driver got out and argued/stood around with a few other men for a good ten minutes before getting back in like nothing happened.  The Chilean border checked our bags and we headed out on the 4 hour  drive back to the hostel.  Beautiful scenery the whole way.

We grabbed dinner in town, showered, and went straight to bed.

We didn't do much the next day.  Slept in a little, roamed around town, had laundry done, changed money.  I read in the square while Ryan ran for about 25 minutes.

By 8pm we were at the bus station ready to board our night bus for Arica.  The bus ride was uneventful, we slept just ok in our "cama" seats, as there were no premium ones on this bus.
Ryan deadlifting in the train graveyard

rock valley




More flamingos!

red water in laguna colorada

trying to get warm in the "shelter"

an active volcano with white steam escaping

Thursday, May 23, 2013

Bolivia, Salar de Uyuni

We woke up around 4:15 am in order to be picked up at 5 from our hostel in San Pedro for our tour.  At 4:55 we were sitting in the lobby with out bags.  We sitting there at 5...5:15...5:30...and 6 am!  I was convinced they had somehow forgotten us or changed plans without notifying us. We decided to go back to bed and just go into the main office when they open in the morning.  Still clothed, we get back in bed.  You guessed it, in runs the driver at 6:10.  I hear a few "Disculpe"'s and a "vamos!" and were we on the bus and ready headed out.  I learned later that several road closures and far away pick-ups made him very late.

We took the only 2 seats left on this minibus and unfortunately they weren't together.  We dozed off a while I think, and woke in time to see some beautiful scenery with the sunrise  along the way to the border.

The Chilean border took a while.  We were in like not really moving for a good 20 minutes and then things picked up.  After everyone was through we drove about 200 meters to a concrete slab with a bouy-looking sign that said Chile on one side and Bolivia on the other.
Bolivia sign near border

At this spot many other buses were meeting jeeps (land rovers actually) to drop off passengers for tours.  Breakfast was spread onto the cement (ham, cheese, jelly, bread, instant coffee or tea, hot water).  We ate and dragged our packs over to Romer, our driver, and the jeep.  There were two to choose from and I selected the one that at least 2 confirmed english speakers were standing at.

Romero put our large packs on the top of the jeep and wrapped them in plastic.  We piled in and headed out to the town of San Juan.  We learned that the 2 english speakers I'd spotted were 19-year-old girls from England.  We stopped at a railroad track with a large mountain nearby for lunch.

near our lunch spot

Lunch was pretty good. We had cucumbers, tomatoes, avocado, rice with carrots, bananas, and tuna.  As soon as I drank the coke my hands started to tingle.  I think the carbonation in the pop combined with the carbonic anhydrase inhibitor we're taking for the altitude caused the tingling.  It wasnt unpleasant, just noticeable.

After lunch we headed into the town of San Juan.  A very very small town where we stayed at a Salt Hotel (I use "Hotel" loosely).  The entire building was made of salt.  Salt blocks for the walls, with a salt slurry kind of mortar, salt tables, chairs, bed frames.  Loose salt made up the floor.  Ryan said he could taste it in the air.  

We walked around the town some and saw some alpaca roaming around.  We saw a dust cyclone form and disappear from a distance which looked really cool.  We also walked up the hill in the back of the hotel to see sound mountain views from the back.  The whole area must have been an ocean millions of years ago.  The rocks were clearly ancient coral.  You could see the shapes of the coral and imagine it underwater water with fish swimming throughout the holes in the rocks.

Afternoon tea was taken in the common room on the salt tables. We showered just before dinner and we were ready for bed soon after.  It was pretty freezing in our salty room.  We double layered all of our clothing and brought our down jackets right into bed with us.  Ryan was very chivalrous in letting me have the more comfortable of the twin beds.  I took a melatonin to try to help me sleep, but still ended up sleeping poorly overall.

We woke up at 4 am a bit before the others and had time to view a beautiful view of a dark starry sky which we enjoyed to some funky music blarring from one of the jeeps.  Soon the headlights were on and we were happy that we'd gotten up early to see the stars.
We drove out to the Salar to see the sunrise.  It was absolutely freezing but really cool to see.  The salt looked like ice and snow, and as the sun rose it made neat shadows all around.
After sunrise we headed to an island in the middle of the salt flat.  It was covered in cacti and really neat-looking coral/rock formations.  We ate breakfast here (bread with spreads, tea, coffee) and used the bathroom after hiking around a bit.  We also about a small wooden flute keychain that I plan to turn into a magnet.
After breakfast before the others had come back to the jeep I showed Romer some of my Daddy Yankee songs on my ipod, and played snipets to see if he knew them.  Most he knew.  I did this because he had been playing a lot of Daddy Yankee songs in the jeep from his mp3 player.  I thought this was the end of the music exchange.  Then, as we are pulling away, he hands back the AUX cord for me to plug in my ipod!  I played the songs I'd showed him and sat there excited and embarassed as my tunes played for the whole group.  He turned it up at one point and that moment made it worth frittering my ipod battery with no charge in sight. 
Soon we were in the middle of the Salar with nothing but salt all around us.  Everyone started trying to take those famous perspective shots.  We paired up with the english gals and tried to help eachother set up and take the pictures.  It's harder than it looks.  We came away with a few neat ones.
We stopped at another salt hotel on the actual flats, thank God we didn't stay there.  I paid 5 Bolivianos to attempt to pee in their revolting bano.  It was so bad that Ryan took a picture of one of the toilets.

We went on to a small town right on the edge of the flats that had some souvenirs and a few old broken down cars parked around.  We ate a nice lunch here inside yet another salt hotel.  This one had slightly better facilities.  Lunch was roasted chicken, pasta, green apples, and some veggies with coke.  I've had intermittent tingling in my hands ever since that first day, I think the coke started it all. 

We went on to the town of Uyuni (where our driver lives) and visited a "Train cemetery".  We took a bunch of pictures around all of the old rusty train cars before heading into the main part of town.

We were dropped and Romer told us he was going home, meet back in two hours.  This is a long period of time if you've ever been to Uyuni.  It's really small with hardly anything to see.  We roamed around a bit, got some tea at a cafe that advertised wifi on a dign out front.  Of course I barely got a signal and attempted to e-mail our parents.  It just kept saying "sending..." and I had no idea if the email was actually going through.  I tried to send my mom a facebook message.  It looked like it worked, but I wasnt sure as it also took forever to send.

We continued to roam for a while as my bladder slowly filled.  We passed a guy who was selling rings on the street.  Upon closer inspection, the rings were actually pounded from coins.  Ryan chose a Bolivian coin as his new wedding band.  It's really neat, and I can't imagine a cooler ring.

Romer came back and I asked him if there was a bano near by.  He said no and pointed to "Banos Publicos" across the street.  Taking into consideration that we were downwind of public toilets a block or so away and lived to tell the tale, I passed.

Uyuni is a very dirty town.  It's sad because it could be much nicer, but there is just garbage everywhere.  I've heard Bolivia is the poorest country in South America, I don't think they are investing in promoting cleaning up small towns like this. 

We headed onward and just when I was about to burst we pulled into another microtown called San Cristobal.  I made a bee-line for the banos and I'm pleased to report that San Cristobal has some decent facilities.

We drove on to our lodging for the evening.  Yay!  Another private room!  We settled in to our room (after walking past a window ledge with half an alpaca leg sitting on it - a little disturbing).  Soon our tea was ready in an upstairs dining room.  We drank some tea with the others in our party.  We had nothing else to do so we just sat there until dinner.

Dinner was a bed of french fries covered in a slurry of veggies, hot dog pieces, possible more llama meat, and some hard boiled eggs.  It was pretty good actually!  We ad it with bread and some canned strawberries for dessert. 

After dinner we tucked ourselves in for the night and slept til about 7 am. 

to be continued....


sunrise on the flats

playing with perspective

beautiful mountains



arbol de piedra

laguna colorada

note the lone flamingo

with our english friends

ryans night pics



Friday, May 17, 2013

San Pedro de Atacama

This morning we had a pretty good breakfast at the hostel before renting bikes for the day. 

Now it's time for a little honesty. I'm not a bike rider. I've never really been comfortable on a bike. Sure ill go on a flat bike trail in a park and have a mildly fun time. But my butt was still sore from the wine tour bike, and at the wine tour bike my butt was still sore from Pucón. My back gets tired, I'm always banging my shins and hips on the pedals and handle bars, and people always seem to be breezing past me, no matter what gear I am in or how hard I pedal. Don't engage me if I am attempting to go uphill, because you may get barked at. 

But I digress. We began the long slow uphill climb to see some beautiful rock formation and landscapes. The pictures don't do it justice. 

It started raining soon after we got back to town. We turned in our bikes early because the whole town turned in to a muddy mess. We grabbed lunch, bought bus tickets for next week, checked in for our salt flat tour, and each bought an alpaca scarf for the cold salt flats. 

We cooked dinner in the hostel; our usual quinoa and lentils with veggies, and watches some of a Jim Carey movie on the tv in the kitchen. 

Ready for bed soon :) no firm plans for tomorrow, weather is too bad for morning tours. Go figure - rainy day in the desert!
Ryan enjoying the landscape
Muddy San Pedro
Ryan's new hat



Thursday, May 16, 2013

Mendoza to San Pedro de Atacama

Our empanada class was pretty popular.  Ourselves, the couple from Alaska, the french guy and several other attended.  A spanish-speaking woman in a chef hat with a younger girl translating told us all about the ingredients and steps to make beef and onion empanadas. Ryan and one other guy made theirs vegetarian.  After the demonstation we sat down at tables and used some ready made dough to fill and fold our own.

We sat at a table with a french couple on a 6 month tour of South America.  They were really nice.  The empanadas were put in the oven and served back to us.  We enjoyed them while chatting with our tablemates and drinking malbec wine.

Ryan and I had made some quinoa and veggies just before the class, so we got that out of the fridge and shared it with the others in the class.  It turned out to me really social and a fun atmosphere.

We went to bed close to midnight, and woke up early for breakfast this morning.  A cab had us at the airport in plenty of time for our flight to San Pedro.  I breezed through security in Mendoza and then went through customs, which was a tiny booth about 10 feet from security.  I rounded the corned and waited for Ryan.  And I waited.  I peeked my head around and thought maybe he was having trouble understanding the customs official, but couldn't really see much.  An English speaking woman "Security is making him check the massager."  Yep, they didnt like the look of his rolling massager that he uses on his legs.  A few minutes pass and Ryan comes through.  He explained to them that it was for massage purposes by saying "masaje" and doing the motion, but they weren't having it, looks too much like a weapon I guess.

We read a little and enjoyed the view over the mountains before landing in Santiago to get our connection.  Ryan picked up his bag and brought it on the place without issue from SCL to Calama airport.  The view from the plane was really amazing.  Lots of snowcapped mountains, aand seeing them slowly turn pink as we went North was really cool.

We shared a transport to San Pedro from the airport with a German girl and a few others.  The drive was surreal.  We felt like we had landed in Afghanistan by the look of the landscape.  Total desert with sandy mountains and rocky flat areas.  The town itself is all dirt roads and adobe style mud-brown structures.

Our hostel, Campo Base is really clean and nice and we're glad with our choice.  We grabbed some dinner at a veggie restaurant down the road, and ice cream cones while we looked at souvenier shops.

It's shower time now, not sure yet what we will be getting into tomorrow.  Lots of tour options around here.


Wednesday, May 15, 2013

Last day in Mendoza

Our asado bbq dinner got us to bed late and full of mean last night.  There was so much food, chorizo, ribs, and all sorts of other cuts.  We ate with Will, a 23 year old from England, and Rudy, a 33 year old guy from France.  Actually, we were the only 4 to sign up for the dinner at the hostel.  We talked travel, healthcaare, exchange rates, and gun control.  All with our teeth slowly turning purple from the wine.

We woke up a little later this morning, and had our breakfast alone near the kitchen.  I love the dolce de leche crepes they serve.

We headed off to change some dollars to pesos and buy some mate tea servery.  We bought 2 mugs and 2 filtered straws, ended up using an atm for more pesos, and changing the rest of our dollars at the hostel.  Before coming back to change the dollars, we enjoyed a churro and a giant layered pastry with 2 coffees in the market.  

I swapped books in the book exchange and picked up "The Neverending Story."  I watched the movie as a kid and I think I will enjoy the book.

We set out again after Ryan spent some time looking into tours for a destination later this month.  We strolled around Mendoza's central park for a while before heading out to lunch.  We went to a vegetarian cafe to try to give our bodies a break from the meat storm which they have been enduring.  we had some veggie pizza and tacos with jasmine tea at Morelia.  Nice relaxing spot.  

We walked a little more to look for a magnet.  We like to have a magnet from each country.  All of the magnets were "ugly" (Ryan's words) so I ended up choosing a tiny mate pewter cup with a straw that I will glue a magnet to.  

After grabbing some veggies and fruit to prep with our quinoa and lentils we came back and are now listening to Rudy tell us about his paragliding tour today.  At 8pm we have a free empanada making class here at the hostel.  That should be pretty neat.  I'm disappointed that we will miss Thursday nights mate tea class.  We leave in the morning for San Pedro de Atacama.  We've really liked it here in Mendoza.  
Part of last night's dinner

Not sure how to rotate this - Ryan in the park

Mendoza's Central Park

Tuesday, May 14, 2013

Andes Vertical

This morning we had breakfast with a couple from Alaska, they are traveling for one year!  We chatted while we ate and waited for our guide from Andes Vertical to pick us up for pour monthin adventure.

Damien walked in and had the same face as Ryan's good friend Jaron, but with a full beard and long hair.  If it weren't for the company t shirt and french accent, I would have assumed he was lost and looking for his skateboard.  Damien was very friendly and we learned that this would be a private tour.  He helped us get our bags into the car and another staff member began our drive to the mountain. I thought Damien was preapring a sandwhich up there as I couldnt really see what he was doing from the back seat.  He handed the driver a leather bowl/cup with a metal curved straw and the guy stated drinking this steaming liquid.  Then he refilled it and handed it to me, saying it was like a bitter tea, a traditional drink.  The metal straw had a filter at the bottom and he said to drink until the liquid is gone and only the "powder" remains.  There was a layer of green tiny sticks and white pieces floatnig on it, and it was hot and tasted bitter.  After I finished it, as I was waiting to see pink elephants cross the street, I asked if I would be able to pass a dug test when we get home.  Yes, this is just a kind of tea, not a drug.  Phew!

He refilled it for Ryan, and we continued like this until I'd had 3 cups! Once we arrived at the mountain we were dropped off and Damien led the way to the first summitt.  It was about a 20 minute uphill hike, and gave us great mountain views.  After a few photos, we hiked higher to a second summit and had a great view of a large dam as well as the town of Cacheuta, where the hot springs are.

After that, we started down to our first rappell.  It was about 30 feet and the driver was at the bottom helping be the safety.  It was a little scary since it had been so long since I've rappelled, but it was fun and we quickly followed it with a second rappell of the same height.

The last rappell was largest at close to 140 feet.  The fun part was after we got down, we had some lunch and got ready to climb back up.  Ryan impressed the guys with his climbing skill, going up three routes with relative ease and no falls.  The commented a few times on how his "skill" is very goI went up one time and at one point poor Damien bascially had to haul my body up a good 7 feet until I found a foothold I could manage.  Oh well - I never said I was any good at climbing.   We got a photo at the end with the driver, we were all 3 in Patagonia Down Sweater jackets!  We took a photo with Damien as well.

Once we were all finished with the climbing we hiked a little way down and made a short drive to the hot springs.  We'd never been to hot springs before, so we're glad we were able to give them a go.  they range in temperatures, from quite hot to luke warm.  We sat in the hot one for a while, then a slightly cooler one before calling it a day.  I'll post pictures of our adventure once I have reliable adapters, internet, etc. Probably later in the week.

We are back at the hostel now, and ready for our asado tonight!


 summit 2
 ry guy
same jackets!










Monday, May 13, 2013

Mendoza Biking Wine Tour


Our wine tour started with a 15 minute drive with a driver and 2 Australian medical students. We arrived at the bike tour office, grabbed our bikes and helmets, and met Diego (our guide) and 3 flight attendants from Buenos Aires.  Diego said they were "stooges"...."you know, stooges, like on an airplane".  He meant stewards!

We rode for about 5 minutes toward our first stop when someone called Diego back to the end our single-file line.  One of the Australian girls recently lost a close friend from a bicycle accident, and her aunt is being put on trial for murder for running over a biker in South Africa.  Needless to say she had lots of mental issues with being on a bike.  The arranged for her to meet us at each winery by car, and we rode on.

We stopped at the entrance to a pretty winery with long rows of grape vines and mountains in the background.  We didnt end up going into this place, but Diego told us about watering the grapes and harvesting them by machine versus by man, and we noted that the "mulch" we were standing on was actually grapes (shriveled ones, skin, pieces of leaves, branches, etc.)

We took a few pics and rode on to the winery of Carmelo Patti - famous for his Malbec.  He showed us articles in wine rating books and even in the Washington Post praising his prized Malbec wines.  We tasted 3 of his wines and I really liked them all.  You can tell he was really proud of his wine and his work, he was very friendly and we were happy to get a photo with him.  He is considered a small winery because he produces only 50,000 bottles a year.


Next we rode on to a second winery, the name is escaping me.  This one was much larger and we were able to see huge vats and barrels in which the wine is aged.  We saw bottles being labeled and sealed.  The basement of this place was enormous and in it we tasted 3 wines.  A white, a malbec, and a blend.  This winery produces about 600,000 bottles a year.

We biked on to what would be our last winery.  This was a boutique winery that produced an even fewer number of bottles than the first one.  This would also be where we would have lunch.  Ryan and I each ordered the ribeye.

Wow!  A table set to perfection in a private room of the restaurant was ready just for our group.  Warm rolls were passed around and our plates were drizzled with high quality fine olive oil - oh the olive oil!  It was delicious. We each had 3 wine glasses at our setting and they were all filled rather generously for a "tasting".  We also each had a mini-empanada filled with tomato that was also very good.

I'd like to look back and see my face when they brought our plates out.  A HUGE ribeye with a large square of layered white potato, sweet potato, and squash, also a portion of mashed pumpkin and a small green salad.  A really large and delicious "lunch." The ribeye was excellently prepared and some of the best meat we've had; Ryan said it was right up there with (but not better than) his Dad's steaks.

The food was great and I did my best to eat it all, but sadly I had to leave a bit of meat behind.  I drank about 2/3 of the wine they gave us, added to the other 6 tastes we'd had earlier...well...lets just say we were ready for a nap.

How cruel to spoil folks with food and wine only to make them pedal for their dessert!  After a tour of the winery, we rode to Absinthe.  Absinthe is an artisan shop full of delectable chocolate and marmalades  sweet liquers, and the best olives we'd ever tasted.  We sampled and tasting many of the spreads (cafe, dulce de leche, coconut, chocolate  hazelnut and fruit ones).  There was also a salty spread table with olive and roasted pepper and garlic preparations.  Our favorite were the whole sweet green olives, and the coconut marmalade.

After the spreads we were asked to select 2 liquers which we'd like a shot of.  My first thought was "Ugh, no more alcohol!" but the penny pincher won out in my brain with the "you've already paid for it" line.  Ryan and I both had the chocolate banana shot, which was sweet and tasty, but strong.  We both passed on shot number 2.

It was about 6 pm when we rode back and caught a ride to our hostel.  We really enjoyed learning all about wine.  (Always store wine on its side to keep the wine in contact with the cork).  Also we are now in the market for a decanter.

We are still so stuffed from our huge 3pm feast that we are skipping dinner tonight.  We are just hanging out and uploading some pics.  Tomorrow our rappelling and climbing adventure starts in the morning!


with carmelo patti