Colonia, Uruguay

To get a small glimpse of Argentina´s smaller neighbour we spent a day in Colonia, Uruguay. Thea ferry ride from BA across the sediment rich river separating the two countries was gorgeous in the morning sun. We wandered the 18th century streets of the small town and then bombed around the area on a motor scooter. Uruguay is very popular for Argenitian tourists, exspecially in the summer for the beaches and the infrastructure is very built up.

Against our usual practice, we picked a restaurant with a tout. This was no ordinary tout! He attracted our attention when we first arrived with his incredibly loud call for "paste est el mama" or "paste like your mama" and his very strange large foam hat, like that of a drunk american at a football game. When we returned his button covered waiters vest was wandering around with his store sign balanced on his head before he disappeared and returned with a yet another outrageous hat. Turns out he has a collection sent to him from around the world of hundreds of bizarre hats including a hard-hat with beers cans and tubes! All class. Anyway, how could one resist. Turns our the food was great and he was an incredible host. See mis-labelled picture in link to right (Strange Argentine)! His mannerisms were strangly similar to my boss at PRTM, Todd B... Until next time!

Buenos Aires and Tango

Hola chicos! We liked being addressed as "chicos" in Argentina . It is a slang greeting used by Argentinos like "buddies" but seems more endearing when you have no contect! We used hotel points to spend six luxury nights at the Sheratons of BA. During that time we explored the city and Tango night life while eating our way through several large herd animals and enjoying our first ethnic meals (Japanese and Maroccan) in a month.

To find the real Tango in BA we asked our waitress one night who promptly called her father to find out where the happening Tuesday night "milongo" or open tango dance party was happening. We went and experienced real Argentinos tango ritual which is much like a high school dance with better dancing and music! Girls and boys separate, picking partners by eye contact. Then we took some lessons ourselves and went to a touristy tango show to get the full tango tour. I, the non-dancer, actually enjoyed the lesson learning three simple steps. heroic effort for me.

We loved BA overall except the endless Argentinian smoking!

Hiking in Patagonia

Patagonia April 2006 - We travelled down to Torres del Paine national park in Chile for 6 days and 5 nights of back-country camping. Our first night we camped OVER the Grey Glacier. The eerie sounds of ice falls reverberated all night. The ice flow was spectacular deep blue and a rainbow followed us for almost a day. The remaining days were equally amazing with mountains, ice and interested flora. Wind and rain were very persistent, thank god for GoreTex.

After this we moved on the Argentina side for hiking in Fitz Roy national park and spending some city time int he small, but touristy Patagonian towns of El Calafate and Chalten. Anna was excited to touch her fourth, and final, Andean species of llama (llama, alpaca, vicuna and quanico).

Planning Complete and We Are Mobile

We have completed planning the Great Escape and our rough itinerary follows:

Chile, Argentine and Brazil - Apr to May
Canoing Spanish River - May to June
United Kingdom - June to Jun
Tanzania, Uganda, Kenya - Jun to Jul
South Africa, Namibia - Jul to Aug
Sweden and Norway - Aug to Sep
Japan -Sep to Sep
Hong Kong and China - Sep to Oct
Vietnam and Cambodia - Oct to Nov
Scott Returns to Work - Nov

Adventure logs to come...

Chile - May 2006

We started in Santiago on April 4 with a fancy Sheraton hotel with great pool and girly drinks. We enjoyed a few days of museums and decompression before heading south to our primary objective, Patagonia.

We stopped for a week in Pucon, in the beatiful Lakes District of Chile. Climbed a volcano and tobagganed down, zip-lined across a river and hiked in a great remote wilderness in very nasty weather. Thank gopd for 3-ply Gortex. I now truly believe the hype of this fabric!

After the severe weather test we were all ready for a 6day, 5 night hike in Torres del Paine in southern Patagonia. Great back-country trip through mountains and over glaciers.

Checkc out some of our pictures at: www.flickr.com/photos/84102990@N00/

Ciao!