last weary backpacking leg

We are headed back to Uruguay! After Mendoza we headed up to Salta in norhtwest Argentina and did a day trip to a little town called Humahuaca which is 60 miles from the Bolivian border. We were at 10,000 feet and eating llama and trying coca leaves like natives. P.S. the coca leaves weren´t that great, but the llama was tasty! We were only there for one day and then we headed to Córdoba to check out all of the Jesuit churches. We have never felt more religious than going to 6 different churches in 4 hours! Oh so holy... Anyways, we are headed out this after noon to Montevideo and guess what! We A)got a great deal on the trip and B) we have the top front two seats on the bus, which means that we will have a driver seat view of the trip! I´m excited, but it may be chilly so we´ll bundle up. Oh and they´re CAMA seats.

Pictures to come and 10,000 of them!!

Wine, Chocolates and Olives, Oh My!

Just wanted to give you all a little update on where we are right now. As you know, we have been in Mendoza for the last two days wine tasting and are now trying to figure out if we want to go to Salta or Cordoba next. Either would be fine, but let me tell you the best part of the last two days. We rented bikes and went wine tasting!!! We camped out at a little spot outside of town and walked 10K to find the street with all the bodegas (wineries), the campground was a little farther out than we first thought, but it turned out fine in the end, the policia picked us up and took us to the bike place. We did winetastings at four different wineries and even went to an olive oil plantation where we found that the making of olive oil is ridiculously simple. The best part is we did the whole circut with out falling off our bikes. This morning we went to a chocolate factory were everything is hand made and we bought Absinthe. Little Green Fairy, here we come! We will let you know where we ended up in a day or two. Ciao!

Moving On

So we have been in Bariloche for two days. Bariloche is home to the seven lakes. Our hostel, Pudu, is on the top of a hill which over looks one of them, Lago Nahuel Huapi. On our first day here we hiked (without packs this time) up to Campanario. The hike is only 45min. when you get to the top it over looks the most spectacular view. We sat, had a beer, took pictures and made it back down. Then we went on a bamboo trail that lead to Lago Escondido. After a 6 hour day of hiking we ended the day with some pizza, beer and a movie at the hostel, not to bad.

Today we walked to the bus stop that went to Villa Coihues and while waiting we met a guy from Canada who was going on the same hike, so the three of us decided to do it togethter. We walked off the bus and met up with our tour guides (three local dogs) that walked us to the waterfall. Then all six of us walked to Catedral (4 hour hike). We then left the dogs and went back to Bariloche for beer and chocolate...

Bariloche has been really great to us. We have met some really friendly people and if you are ever here you must stay at Pudu Hostel, the owners ROCK and they have a bar with some local beer that is really good! Tomorrow we will be on our way to Mendoza! Where we will have some WINE!!! We can´t wait!

today

we arrived in Calafate this afternoon and needed a drink so we went to a little bar and enjoyed a little somethin! We will be here until tomorrow night and then we are off to Bariloche. Hey did you know that they have flamingos here! Well they do and we are going to walk the lake tomorrow so we can take a picture of some for you. Well we love you all and hope all is well! Talk to you soon.

Downhill is just as bad as uphill....

Ah, Torres Del Paine. A beutiful spot that is picturesque from every angle. We arrived at around 10am to find the sky clear and the wind gentle, perfect. We, being the intrepid explorers that we are, started our hike from the eastern section of the "W" at Lago Amarga with the goal of Base Camp Torres that was a simple 7 hours away, uphill. p.s. we bought nice sleeping bags in Puerto Natales, knowing that it would be colder in the park than in town which was already chilly. We made it to Torres tired and back/foot sore and decided that we would go to the lookout for the torres first thing in the morning. It was around five and we made our selves a little backpackers dinner of soup with bread, salami and cheese. Tired, but very proud of ourselves. As the sun set behind the mountains we crawled into our newly purchased bags, which are rated for 2º Celcius. Let us tell you about the FREE campsite, it had no lights (but we did have a flash light), the only running water (which was very good and cold water) was the strem and a lovely bathroom the didn´t flush! It was so out of a movie and we loved it! After jumping in the tent we anticipated the morning. What we didn´t anticipate was how FREAKIN COLD it would get that night. The ground was freazing our feet also freazing. We both got maybe four hours of sleep and that was in painfully short increments. Sounds pleasant right? Then around 3am the rain started and it got really cold, and damp. We finally woke up and made coffee while still rolled up in our bags and wondered what we got ourselves into. Finally we stepped out of our tent and look up to the torres to see nothing but clouds. We started up to the lookout which was one hour for camp to not be able to make it up because of the rain. It had washed the trail out. We were pretty bummed, we should have gone up the day before when it was clear. We started back down the trail on the way to the next campsite, 10 hours away, when we looked at each other and said enough. Our feet hurt, our backs and shoulders hurt we were cold and tired. It was time to go back and call it quits. We walked back to the starting point and caught a shuttle to the bus pick up. Along the way we over heard another trekker who had also started the W but could not finsh say that last night was the warmest that they had been through. The shuttle driver said that night it was -5º C down outside of the mountains. After hearing this we knew we made the right decision. We had come at the very end of the season and right before snows were to really start, and we were cold. He also stated that at this time of year only pro-trekkers do the W, which we are not! It´s all good. We have trail names now though! I´m "Ñandu" and Jay is "Guanaco" as in "You can do it, Ñandu!" and "Let´s go, Guanaco!" Cool, huh?

So we came, we camp but we only conquored one night...

this trip keeps getting BETTER

so we only have a second to write so let us tell you that yesterday was the most amazing Easter ever, we will fill you in later and our pictures are breathtaking! We are off to Chile in about 45min. We will be camping/hikking in Torres Del Plaine(google this place). We will be hikking the "W" which take about three to four day. Well we will talk to you soon, love ya

Happy Good Friday

Yesterday we took a long ride to Estancia Haberton. It was a lovely but super long! Today we walked round town, we made it to some local streets were we had some cheap lunch! Tomorrow we will be off to El Calafate(goggle it) at 5am. So on Easter Sunday we will be on Perito Moreno Glacier!!! Keep you posted and have a very Happy Easter!!

Ps. Pam save us Easter candy! We love you!

Not to bad for our first day....

So camping was a no go because it is way to cold and it´s closed until summer..haha... We are staying at a hostel and this morning we met a nice older man, Nico, and he took us to Martial Glacier (for 50 pesos). We took a ride half way up and walked the rest of the way up (it took us 4 hours, good work out). It was a 45º angle al the way up! We also were the only ones who went all the way up to the glacier!!! It was the most amazing view! Tomorrow we are off to Estancia Haberton with new hiking shoes for me! So stay tuned...

Traveling cheap can get expensive...

Alright. We are here in Buenos Aires and we have more news after being stumped for 20 minutes at how to type an @ sign so we could log in. I love traveling... This has been our trip so far: A long chilly bus trip here. A missed flight. A phone call to the airline letting them know we wanted to change flights. Them telling us it would cost us to change right now and that we should have told them earlier.(We tried, they didn't pick up their phones). A cab ride to the airport because city busses don't come all the way out here, and finally breakfast/lunch. Good Times! Alright. We'll talk to you all soon, or later if we miss something or get lost somewhere...

You´re going to love this...

So we haven´t left the bus station and we have already missed our flight tomorrow!!!! Just like us to do something like this so what are we going to do... get drunk... we will fill you in later...

Ushuaia? Doesn't that mean "Frozen foreigners"?

We are off to Ushuaia and our great Argentina road trip now. Ushuaia is the southernmost city in Argentina and except for a small naval port across the channel in Chile, is the southernmost city in the world. We were going try to take a boat down to Antarctica, we'll see. I'm stoked because it's around the same latitude as the middle of Canada so it should be chilly and we are going to camp! There will be no hostels for this group because we want to save as much money as we can. We really don't know what we are going to hit up on the way back so we aren't to sure of how long we'll be gone. We are think it will take about three to four weeks and this is all we have planned for now: A) Take a bus to Buenos Aires tonight. B) Fly down to Ushauia. C) Head North. There are a few places we want to see, like Torres del Paine in Chile, but after that there is no set plan. It's all fly by the seat of our pantalones. We are going to try and write every few days but no promises..... so if you don't hear from us in four week someone better start lookin.....