Merry Christmas!

The boat ride almost sucked. For the first three days the weather was terrible - cold, rainy, windy - everbody stayed inside and too themselves; it was boring. The third day was especially terrible when we traversed a bit of the ocean - I got a bit sea sick and had to stay in bed all night. But the fourth day was wonderful; sunny and beautiful. Everyone was outside drinking and we got to see some whales (not as impressive as you would think).

I´m now in Bariloche. I´m continually suprised at how huge and naturally beautiful this country is. Anyway, nearly everyone I met in BA seems to be here and we are all going to the beach...so Merry Christmas all...

Oh yea the pics: The top is obviously the boat. The second down is the Perito Moreno glacier - the only advancing glacier in Patagonia. The last two are from Torres Del Paine (Chilé).

arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrg

I just waited like five minutes for this stupid internet page to load. Things move slow in Patagonia - I just got off a bus that traveled about 5 miles an hour down an unpaved road dodging emus and alpacas and sheep and shit. Alpacas are pretty rad. They are like the deer of patagonia and look like ton-tons from Star Wars. I bet you couldn´t ride them though. The last week has been a blur - it´s been all bus rides, mountains and glaciers. I´ve got some great pics but certainly don´t have the patience to load them on this computer. A few days ago I hiked in the Torres del Paine national park. It was pretty brutal - like hauling furniture in a five up in the LES all day. A bit more picturesque and rewarding though (wait, I didn´t get paid). Regardless, I´ve been having a blast and seen come cool things that I could have never imagined. Later tonight, I´m getting on a boat that travels from Puerto Natales to Puerto Montt (Chilé). It should be a fun. It´s gonna take four days and is a bit expensive but I think it´s worth it; I don´t really want to take a bus all the way up. After the boat ride I´m gonna blast over to Bariloche (Argentina, 4th time crossing the border) for Christmas and meet up with some cats I met in BA, then I´m will make my way up to Bolivia. I can´t wait, I love Chilé and Argentina but they are too European. I´ve been to Europe, it´s great, but I came here for some excitement - third world excitment! Who knows what that means, but heard some great stories about Bolivia usually involving dynamite or drinking some unknown alcohol and shitting ones brains out. Yea! Can´t wait.

Pics of Ushuaia and Puerto Natales

The top three are in Ushaia and the bottom pic is Puerto Natales (Chilé) where I currently reside. It took 15 hours on a bus to get here - my first of many long bus rides. I slept most of the way due to the fact that I was up until 3 at a club that a Jamaican/Argentinian told me to go to. It was free - and very funny too. It was like an 80´s dance party but they were serious. Ushaia was one of the stranges places I´ve been. It was small, dirty and for some reason reminded me of Duluth. Cool to visit but you couldn´t pay me a million dollars to live there. The sun set around 10:30 and rose about 4 awaking the roosters and thus me. Puerto Natales is strange too - small town, weird people, strange life and lots of tourists. And stray dogs, they´re everywhere.

There`s no beach in Buenos Aires

Sorry, but their isn`t. At least not one anyone would swim at. I actually did go down to the ocean one day and it was one of the saddest things I`ve ever seen. Trash everywhere and the water is rust brown. Anyway....I`m in Ushuaia now. I`m not sure why I`m here to be honest. Ushuaia is the furthest south city in the world and a big hub for people going to Antarctica. I`d love to go but I cannot justify spending $3,500 just to step on to the continent. Don`t get me wrong, Ushuaia is quite beautiful and in a great, unique setting but I was getting used to the summer and party atmosphere in BA. There are some cool things to do here; I´ve seen some penguins and done some cool hiking but I now have one hell of a long way to go to get to Columbia. I`m off to Puerto Natales (Chile) tomorrow then to El Calafate (Argentina) a few days later to see a big ass glacier and if everything works out I`ll be back in Chile a week from today taking a four day boat ride up though the coast. Internet will likely be spotty but I`ll try my best.

Creepy Pics

The top pic is a really weird pic from the roof of our hostel. The building was built by a really rich Argentinian who modeled every floor off a different chapter of Dantes Inferno. The second 2 are pics from a real cool cemetary. Word......

10 days on

So it's been 10 days in Buenos Aires and I'm still not sure what I've done. Everybody in this city (including my hostel) parties non stop. It's one of the few cities when bars are empty at 2am and you get called a pussy for going home at 5. For gods sake, I missed my spanish classes for a hanukkah party (if that makes any sense). I have, though, met some really great people and will likely have travel partners for the rest of my trip - or at least Argentina.

The hostel I'm staying at is about two blocks from congress (the building you can see from my balcony). Because of this, I'm treated to daily protests when I go to the supermarket in the morning. And today, the new president - who also happens to be Argentina's first female president - was sworn in at congress. Our street was secured and no cars were allowed for 24 hours prior to the event. The even itself was pretty stale but I got some pretty good shots of the presidentail motorcade going down our street.

I'm off to Ushuaia tomorrow. I'm ready to leave Buenos Aires but certainly not the weather. It's been in the 80's all week and beautiful. It's appears that it will be pretty cold in Ushuaia (relatively for those in the Northern Hemisphere), around 50 and windy. From Ushuaia I'll head up through patagonia and I hope to make it to Bolivia by the end of January but who knows if it will actually happen. I'll post some more pics when I get a chance.

Da Le Boca

Ah, I tried to post this after the football match but got tied up. This city is just too crazy...

The Fútbol match was off the hook. We had to arrive 3 hours early to avoid any trouble. The oppsing fans had already arrived and were already singing songs and stomping around. On the way in we saw riot police and cops on horses everywhere near the stadium. Our guide informed us that we had to sit under the bleachers further back because the opposing fans would spit, throw trash and piss on us (they were directly above us). Once the stadium filled up, shit got wild. They start singing songs, jumping up and down - basically going crazy. I´ve got some great video of this and will upload it when I figure it out. La Boca (the home team) dominated the first half but failed to score. The opposing fans spit and threw trash on the people below us. They shrugged it off like nothing was happeing. I saw this guy leaning on the fence watching the game with a massive loogie hanging from his elbo, apparently too into the game to wipe it off. The opposing team (I forgot the name) ended up taking over the game but the spirit of La Boca fans never wained - they sang louder. In the end La Boca lost. We were not let out of the stadium until the opposing fans had left so we waited around for about an hour. Durring this time we got to watch people throwing shit and figting the police, cool but kinda scary.

The bottom two pics are from the game the top one is the view from my room.

I´ll try and write some more later as I´ve done a lot since the game. But now, I must nap, my head hurts from spanish class.

Buenos Aires

Buenos Aires is fuckin´ rad. It´s big, ugly, smelly and rough like New York, but definetly has a disinct European feel to it. I didn´t get a chance to do much yesterday as I was exausted but I did see some cool shit. The subway nearest me still runs on what appears to be cars from the turn of the century (the last one). The cars are made of all wood and you have to manually pull open the doors to get out. In fact you can pull open the door whenever you please - even when it is moving - and the train moves regardless if someone is still stuck in the door trying to get in. It´s really hot here and it was quite a shock coming from New York. My hostel is the best hostel I´ve stayed at in the world. I´m on the sixth floor, I have a sweet balcony in my room that has a sick view of the city. There is also a roof bar and the people here are really cool. And everything is cheap. Yea. A little disorganised on the first post but whatever, I´m sweating my balls of. Today, I´m going to a soccer game. It´s the last game of the season, La Boca the poor team from BA is playing who have been explained to me as the Argentinian equivilant of the Yankees. I´m rooting for La Boca. I hope their isn´t a riot. Apparently we are paying the mob for our safety or whatever. It sounds fuckin nuts.