Magical Land of Bolivia

From the moment we crossed into the Bolivian border in our overnight bus, everything became magically more beautiful. Paraguay dry Chaco became Bolivia´s lush forests. The three of us were just so happy.

Then… border crossing. Imagine a gross, fat guy calling Nicole ¨nena¨ (baby) over and over again, getting sick pleasure out of screwing with the only two Americans on the bus (while the rest of the world gets to get into Bolivia for free, American pay $135 each!). Somehow , however, between changing from guaranis to bolivianos to dollars from this sketchy guy, we came up $50 short. We were about to be sent back to Paraguay (nooooo!!!!!). Luckily, there were some amazingly nice Swedish and Spanish travelers who completely bailed us out. We can´t wait to pass on the good karma!

So we return to our bus, complete with visa, Nicole grossed out, but so happy to be officially in! We continued to be glued to our windows, enjoying the views and the nice Bolivian people. We saw pigeon eggs being sold! Soon we arrived in Santa Cruz, a wonderful little city filled with many interesting characters. On our first night, the three of us completely splurged on a little café facing the town´s buzzing plaza—a wonderful restaurant that became our home—complete with drinks, delicious meals and dessert. It was about $8 each!!!! We just pretty much kept saying ï love bolvia!!!¨´ over and over. We then strolled down ´´ice cream street´´ a calle happening with familes and six ice cream shops!!! So much fun!! The whole town was alive. The next day we went back to the little café to plan out Bolivia, after eating a delicious lunch at a delightfully cheap local restaurant. The day just flew by!! There is just so much to do in Bolivia. To keep us extra entertained, right outside our window was a crazy indigenous girl, who pretty much just stared at Sarah for three hours after when caught her taking a picture. The thing was, she was crazy! She smiled at everyone, waving her bare breasts around. She finally left, only after coming next to the window and staring at Sarah a bit more. There was also map guy, who enthusiastically showed us old pictures of South America for two days, in hopes we would buy one. We loved him. After sitting and eating, we went and sat and ate at two other places, got ice cream, then sat and drank some tea at other place. We were so happy.

The following day, we returned to Café 24, had some yummy omelets (with our now favorite green special sauce). We planned some more, and in the afternoon took a 4 hour taxi ride to the gorgeous town of Samaipata, with the nicest taxi driver in the world, Bladamir (!!!). We had a made a reservation at apparently sketchy hostel and town, so he drove all over finding us what can only be described as paraiso…. Posadas del Sol. For a little less than $9 a night, we get our own house, complete with kitchen, a magical garden overlooking the Bolivian highlands, the best breakfast in Bolivia, and a super cool owner from… Texas!!! The breakfast includes burritos!!! And no lie, some of the best salsa that has ever touched Nicole´s lips. The following day, the town had a delightful misty rain all day, so the three of us set out on a nice walk with our rain jackets, oohing at the town´s awesomeness, and making a best friend with the friendliest stray dog, Blad. He followed us all the way up in our mini-hike, but then was barked away by some mean dogs when we entered an herbal garden/store wonderland. We then ventured to the local market to get some fruits and veggies from the somewhat sad looking indigenous women, and went to our home to cook some delicious stew. The next sunny day, we all woke up at 7am, pumped. We ate again, the worlds best breakfast, and set off for out 20 km hike to the top of a mountain to visit pre Incan ruins!! Stacen believes alien landing fields, of course. The hike was hard, all uphill, but worth it. The ruins were very cool, and the view breath taking. We returned around 6pm, sun-burnt tired, and feeling so accomplished. Amazingly, we found out that Stacen had been invited to a medical school interview in NYC !!!!! He will be heading back to US in a few weeks!! After the excitement, we finished our stew, played some cards, and went off to a very deep sleep. Soon we leave for the magical Salar de Uyuni…

The Black Hole of Paraguay

Our final day in El Calafate was awesome!! We talked to the woman who ran the hostel and asked her if there was ANYTHING else to do in town except see the glacier (which we had already done), and shop for souvenirs. She told us about a desert hike tothe top of a nearby butte. We excitedly set off, figuring that her directions (¨just follow the river¨) would be sufficient enough to find the trail. However, Latin America got the better of us, and we wound up hopelessly lost scrambling up hills of rubbish strewn dirt and scrubbrush. We emerged out of the canyon into a barrio (for those of you who don´t speak Spanish, a barrio is a poor neighborhood), and so we changed our minds and began checking out the real-estate. Stacen had a very difficult time understanding why everything was so spread out. Each house (a one or two room shack) was set on about an acre of land each. However, since everyone was poor, no one could afford sprinklers, and it was so dry, so it was just an acre of dirt, rocks, and lots of trash. We continued walking through the barrio, talking about urban planning. And Lo and behold, we emerged an hour later to find not only the river once again, but a trail! We set off with fresh spirits, following the canyon up. We passed a dead dog covered in flies, and covered in blood, and tried to figure out how it had died. We eventually climbed down, over, and up, and began a 90 ascent through the desert on something like a 45 degree slope. We startled a jackrabbit (Nicole ooooooed) before making it to the top, where we ate lunch with a beautiful view of the desert, town, glaciated lake, and the andes. We then made our way back down, and only once almost stepped off a cliff. That night, the hostel had 6 jews staying there, and we relished them with our limited vocabulary as they shared their shnitzel with us, while we made our amazing stew that we had made. Later, we helped the night manager with some common english frases and told him about the importance of a website for the hostel.
The next day we walked to a ¨bird sanctuary¨ near the lake, which actually did have some flamingoes and cool geese. However, it was so windy that it was difficult to enjoy the beauty, so we retreated back to the town, finished our soup, and caught a taxi to the airport. The plane left late (good latin american style) but we arrived in Buenos Aires in plenty of time to buy Toblerone at the duty-free shop (it´s actually more like a mall). Going through customs was and interesting experience. Stacen was frisked and when they felt the Toblerone...we weren´t sure if we wound make it on our second flight. But they were easy-going, and we made it to Asuncion, Paraguay. We passed through customs to find out that both our bags had been ¨searched¨ by Aerolineas Argentinas, and Stacen´s brand new pocketknife and his prized headband had been stolen, and a strap on Nicole´s backbacp had been broken!! Stacen was pissed. They then went to the ATM where they took out 1 MILLION Guaranies! (about $200). We caught a taxi and got our first glimpse of the Latin America we had been expecting. It was poor. Looked pretty sketchy and dangerous (it was midnight), and needless to say it was a comfort to arrive safe and sound in the only hostel in Paraguay. There was a cat there and Stacen was happy. Nicole felt isolated, since she was the only girl there.
The next day, we ate our breakfast provided to us (the pre-toasted bread tasted like what we can only imagine a sponge would taste like. We left to walk around Asuncion, the capital, determined that we would have an amazing time, although everyone we had talked to had told us there was nothing to do in Paraguay. We walked the streets, and a couple of hours later, we had to admit defeat. There really was nothing to do. We settled on buying a pirated copy of Alice and Wonderland for 2 dollars, and got really excited about our bum day. We went to the grocery store, stocked up on some food, got back to the hostel...and there were 7 british guys watching soccer. Our spirits not dampened, we went to lunch at a ¨pay by the kilo¨ buffet, came back, and they were still watching soccer. They actually watched it all night long, and we flailed around trying to find a way to keep ourselves occupied. We tried to play cards, but there was this dude in a wheelchair who only spoke german who wheeled up to us as if to have a conversation, but really just felt like staring at us. He was strange, and our bed was right next to his in the dorm. We ended up just going to sleep out of boredom.
The next day at breakfast Stacen met a girl who obviously did not speak spanish. We discovered that she was a canadian chick backpacking by herself! We invited her to have breakfast with us, and found out that she had been volunteering in Buenos Aires for 5 weeks and making her way to Bolivia. We talked for a couple of hours and then parted, struggling for the seconds day to have fun in Paraguay. This time was a little better. We got a new cell phone (ours broke!), and walked around, bought bread from a man with a bread basket on his head walked around the presidencial palance and legislative offices (all surrounded by very sketching looking barrios). A little boy actually told us not to go into a certain part because if we walked any farther they would rob us. We made it back, met up with our new friend Sarah, and attempted to watch Alice and Wonderland again, just to discover that the quality was so bad we couldn´t even watch it! Instead, we planned to spend the next day together, and watched the Inglorious Basterds.
On day 3 of Paraguay, the true fun really began. We caught a bus to the bus station, where we managed to catch another bus to Aregua, an hour outside of the city and on the cover of the Paraguay tourism magazine. The buses in Paraguay are 40 year old Mercedes. Are ridiculously dirty, jolty, and full of very friendly Paraguayans. We finally arrived in Aregua and discovered something about Paraguay. It is a time warp. And they need urban planners. The city was a sprawl that did not need to exist. We started walking around and hit up a couple of art galleries, then got lunch (things became really cheap in Pâraguay). Then we walked the main street, which seels pottery. Quickly discovering that we did not want any pottery, Sarah came up with the genious idea to buy a pot and smash it. We bought the pot (for $1), chased a mother chicken and her 4 chicks down the road, fed a parrot some crackers, and then walked 30 minuites tothe edge of town (why was it so big??) and had an amazing pot smashing session. We chugged some water, and then talked about how the day was over and blah blah. It was then that we realized that only 2 hours had gone by, and it was only 1 in the afternoon. We had toget away from that town, and caught a bouncing bus all the way back to Asuncion, barely managing to escape without bruised tailbones. We spent the evenin planning the rest of our time in Paraguay, and how we were going to take a cargo ship up with the Rio Paraguay to visit the Pantanal, which has over 30 million crocodiles!!! Unfortunately, we discovered that due to the lack of Pâraguay´s infrastructure, there was really no way of touring the area without a trained guide and a TON of dinero. We made our way to the bus station, and passed a dude who yelled out ¨bus to Bolivia¨to us. We all kind of turned and looked at each other, and decided to GET OUT OF PARAGUAY while we could. On a whim, we bought a ticket to Filadelfia, in the Chaco, a deserty savannah in the western 2/3 of Paraguay. Giddly, we boarded the bus with 10 minutes to spare, and were wired, knowing that we were on our way out of Paraguay. 6 hours later, at 5 in the morning, we were deposited on the edge of Filadelfia, with no reservations, or anywhere to go, and we were hungry. We could not figure out why such a small town was soooooo spread out. It took 20 minutes to walk to the center of town. We went to Hotel Florida, a beautiful place with a pool and a restaurant. After eating breakfast, we went out to buy Stacen some pants (in his rush he had forgotten to pack them in Asuncion!). We took out some money, walked the main street, bought our tickets to Santa Cruz, Bolivia for 8 that night, and got back to the hotel, thinking that we had about 3 hours to kill. We discovered that it was still 11 in the morning! We spent the entire afternoon playing rummi, sitting around, swimming in the pool, showering in their pool showers, and pretty much mooching. The strangest thing about Filadelfia was that it was a Mennonite colony, and everyone there spoke german or the native dialect of the indigenous people, guarani. We spoke spanish better than most of them! We actually had a woman ask us if we spoke german, and when we said no, she walked away and didn´t even try spanish! It was such a weird place!
We caught the bus, which 90 minutes later dropped us off in another ¨town¨ to await our connecting bus at 2 am. This place was out of a horror movie. It was very poorly lit. It was not a town. It was 1 abandoned building, a closed up gas station, a shack, and a couple of dirt roads. Music was coming out of the surrounding darkness, and people appeared on the streets out of no where. The customs building that we were to wait in was actually HALF a shack that looked like it had been in the process of remodelling for years. The guy that met us told us to wait on the porch, and gave us a bed with no mattress to sleep on. But here´s the thing. The bugs were everywhere. Crunchy beetles. They got in everything. We could not sit anywhere because the bugs would get on us. Honestly, they were everywhere. The road moved with them. Wild dogs barked at us and wild looking people watched the gringos as we paced back and forth. We held running commentaries on how awesome Hannibal Lector was, had a total freak out with the bugs, and Nicole actually fell asleep on the mattressless bed. Stacen and Sarah encouraged a few passing giant toads to eat all the bugs but none listened. In the end, we had gone crazy, and realized that if we had a volleyball we would have named it Wilson and started talking to it. The bus arrived slightly early, and we got on, forever escaping the clutches of the gaping black hole that is Paraguay........

Kangaroo in the spotlight, the stolen snuggle, and a surprise twist

Our 1 hour flight was scenic and turbulence-free—Stacen HATES turbulence! Needless to say, everyone was much happier to have taken the flight than the bus, which wound through the Andes for 18 grueling hours to travel the same distance. The El Calafate airport is the smallest airport possible. It has 1 gate. It´s also in the middle of the desert. After a 20 minute taxi ride we were finally in town, which is more touristy than the Outer Banks. EVERY store seems to be selling stupid, over-priced tourist trap kind of stuff. The taxi driver was hilarious. He kept trying to sell us his services for the next day, even though renting a car would have been cheaper. When we got to the hostel, he offered us a couple of rooms in his house, for a more expensive price, and seemed genuinely surprised and confused when we turned him down. We got into the hostel and soon realized that it was run by 4 girls who had no idea what they were doing. Lots of sinks were leaky, we weren´t allowed to cook in their kitchen or use their washing machine (a first), and we had a curfew! The plus-side is that everything was very clean, smelled nice, very well-decorated, and when we left, they gave us a parting gift of lavender poupori.
After getting into town, Stacen and Tomer found another Casino. Spurred by the success of Montevideo, they got bold and attempted to play roulette, promptly losing 50 pesos ($12.50) in about 5 minutes. They retreated to the slots, where about 10 minutes later Stacen hit the jackpot! He and Tomer jumped up and down shrieking like little girls as the numbers tallied up to $129 pesos ($32)!!!
We rented a Fiat (which Tomer refused to drive and which Stacen and too willingly took control of), and drove the next morning to the town´s claim to fame—the Perito Moreno Glacier. We had to drive through the desert to get to it, which seemed like an oxymoron, but it was worth it. One of the last advancing glaciers in the world, it was something like 300 square kilometers in size. It fed a huge lake, and created ice bergs every time part of it splintered off. Stacen displayed some uncharacteristic patience, and he was able to get some awesome pictures! That evening we got back and walked around the town, when the 2 lovebirds decided to go out to a romantic dinner at a little bar. They had an amazing time in El Calafate. Sidenote, translations down here are horrendous. We had a menú with a dish called “Esperanza Patagonia” which means something to the effect of “Patagonian hope”, but due to some inter-language word similarities was translated as “Patagonic wait”.
The 4 of us caught the bus early on the next morning, and made the 3 hour trip around the lake to El Chalten, nestled snugly in El Parque Nacional de los Glaciares, the backpacking capital of Argentina. The town of 500 exists solely as an outpost for backpackers stumbling in from the trail to get trekking gear and supplies. We discovered that it is very well organized and were really impressed! We were all set to go out hiking…and then the wind began. We`re talking winds that exceeded 40 mph. On top of that it started to sprinkle, so we decided to bum around the hostel all day, and purchase some supplies to go on a 4 day hike through the backcountry.
We were so excited. We had visions of backpacking glory!! But, we soon realized…. Patagonia is cold. Very cold. And sadly, although it is mind-blowing gorgeous, we had sadly missed the true time to come and spend all the time in the great outdoors (really end of December, January, and February). So the two of us realized it was time to move north to the warmth so we could truly enjoy the outdoors. We also realized that our time with Tomer and Ziv had come to end, with us heading to Bolivia, Peru, and Colombia, while they headed slowly up Argentina. The next day we said goodbye to our traveling partners, and we headed off to our first ¨real¨ hike.
El Chalten is famous for all of its trails and camping possibilities, as well as the epic Fitz Roy mountain. It is a wonderful environment because everyone there is a true nature lover, dirty, and looking for a hike. And for 25 wonderful kilometers, the two of us finally got the great nature we had been dreaming of. We hiked, we climbed, we crossed rivers. We drank glacial water. We scaled a mountain. And then… Fitz Roy. And a glacier. And the most beautiful clear blue glacial lagoon. The sun came out, warming our cold, sweaty bodies. The feeling of accomplishment to finish and climb was the biggest high. On the way back to the town, we saw a woodpecker pecking wood!! We heard horses ney!! So of course, we went out to eat in celebration: pasta, penguin wine (which came out a ceramic penguin from its beak… kinda picture a vampire penguin) and a brownie.
We headed back to our wonderful hostel, filed with ideas on what to do next. The previous night we had talked for about three hours to a super cool Aussie we shared a room with, and decided to make Colombia a priority. Also, we learned about kangaroos, wallabies, and crocodiles!!! Apparently, kangaroos (who can jump over 6 feet) are so plentiful, they are just like deer. So…. instead of ¨deer in the headlights´´ it´s ¨kangaroo in the spotlight´´!!!!! Anyway, we decided to buy a 7:30am bus back to El Calafate to figure out what do to next.
We arrived at 11am, having no idea what to do- we had completely underestimated the hugeness of Argentina. So in a rush of adventure, we wandered around the town with our backpacks, going to internet cafes, the bus station, and to eat. We felt so free! So, after a pizza, we decided to go to Bolivia. Bussing Argentina would take over a week (each leg 25 hours plus), and we would be rushing like crazy. We went to check rates and now are…. Going to PARAGUAY!!! Hee hee we are just so awesomely going with the flow. We both decided that we were ready for something different. As amazing as Argentina is, we wanted to be pushed out of our comfort zones. For the next two nights, we had not even booked a hostel, and spent about an hour finding the perfect little rundown place, where we finally had a private room that would let us snuggle to our hearts content.
So for now, we are off… adventuring, with no idea what awaits us in Paraguay…

The land of fire...and mud

After two flights from Buenos Aires, we began our descent to some of the most breath-taking views we could imagine. We were completely corny, screaming ¨Look! Look! Look!¨ at every beautiful thing we saw. Tierra del Fuego is as magical as one can imagine: snowy mountains, vast forests, lakes, the ocean, penguins all come together. And the two of us cannot feel luckier to have made it to the southernmost city in the world: Ushuaia.
From the beautiful airport, we zipped to our hostel in an incredibly cheap taxi ride ($1). At first, our hostel looked nice, nothing special. Then, the four of us were shown to our ¨room.¨ A beautiful, spanking new APARTMENT! Ziv actually cried with tears of joy. For the same price as all the other hostels, this amazing place gave us a private apartment, with a full kitchen, bathroom and two private bedrooms for an entire week. Already pumped, we decided to rent a car for the week to be able to fully explore this amazing magical land filled with hikes and treks. We went crazy at the supermarket, since we would actually be able to cook real food!! (we eventually would end up going to the supermarket everyday because… why not?!! Foood!!). That night, we ate some yummy stew (because mama Nicole loves stew!) and salad and played Nicole´s favorite childhood game: Continental!!! Stacen, Ziv and Tomer have all been successfully addicted. Imagine two Israelis screaming ¨Quiero puedo!!!!¨ in random messed ways. Awesome.
The next day we set out for a five hour cruise to see penguins (!!), sea lions (!!), and random birds in the wild Antarctic waters. We stood outside in the cold winds, just looking at the amazing icescapes and waters. Then, we got to the island: just feet away from us were wild penguins and sea lions!!! Real ones!!!! The penguins were just plain old cute, but the sea lions were intense. They pretty much just sit there, fight with each other, push themselves off the rocks, get back on the rocks and start the whole thing over again. Our boat then went to a second island filled with hundreds more penguins. Again, surreal is the only way we can describe it. On the way back, we met a couple of guys travelling who told us about a cool glacier to hike up in the afternoon.
The glacier was tiny, but the hike was perfect. Hard and steep, we both felt like we had finally started to do what we set out to. Nature. Beauty. The whole thing. Getting to the top was an achievement. Nicole got so hot she took of her pants and just wore her leggings—then lost her pants!!!! Figures! Only she could lose her black pants in daylight on a trail with nothing but gray rocks.
We hiked around the beautiful Tierra del Fuego National Park the next day, nestled right on the border between Chile and Argentina. The animals there are so used to us nature-lover tourists that there were two wild foxes just chillin´ near the entrance! We walked for several hours around the crystal clear waters filled with thousands of molluscs, and the best rocks to skip that Stacen could ask for. By the afternoon, the day had cleared up, and we got a ride back to our car, but decided to sit and look at the beautiful waters for a while before heading out. This is when Stacen—for almost an hour—showed off his mad skills at skipping rocks. Fulfilling probably his wildest dreams, his impressive skills got so much attention from the tourists that large group of Spaniards stopped to watch him, take pictures and clap.
The following day was bumming around, eating more stew, playing cards, and drinking wine. We actually took a four hour nap! After that, we set out on a goal to go out! Previously in the day, however, Stacen and Tomer had returned, giggling, from the supermarket, laden with beer and cookies. Needless to say, everyone fell asleep, woke up, took showers, and we actually made it to an Irish pub where we all attempted to stay awake for about 45 minutes before finally giving up and just going back home to sleep!
The next day we started slow, drinking lots of green tea and marvelling at being so far south. We finally made it out of the apartment and headed up the road for Emerald Lake. The woman that we got the map from in the entrance gave us some pretty intricate details about how to get to the top, and we were a little confused at first, that is, until we hit the trail. Tierra del Fuego, in its entrance back into winter, was beginning to display some pretty ridiculous weather, including wind, clouds, cold, and rain. The ENTIRE trail was mud! We had to hop from stone to stone for miles all the way up. The bridge was out! We had to sort of scramble through the bushes and walk across the rubble. But it was breathtaking—we walked through the forest that we considered the home of all the elves in the world. We emerged out of the forest and onto the tundra, which during the summer of course is not frozen, but soft and springy, more comfy than a mattress! We had an amazing time plodding the rest of the way up, where we got to the lake, beautiful greenish-blue, and we witnessed a cloud come over the mountain and get sucked into the lake! Ziv by this time had stepped in one too many puddles and her feet were soaked…so of course we built a fire and ate lunch! It started raining but no one cared, we had a blast. The walk down was just as breathtaking, and we chilled the rest of the night.
The next day Stacen turned off the alarm and completely messed up the plans for the huge trek they were going to do that day. So it became another bum day, where we walked around town. They saw one of the giant cruise ships docking and loading up with passengers, and Nicole was struck with a wild idea. She ran up to the entrance to the boat and asked if they needed some extra help, and we would be willing to work just to get to go to Antarctica. Unfortunately, ships have regulations and we were declined.
Our last full day we had come up with an awesome trek to a glacier. We had a map, the car to get us there, and the drive. Unfortunately, the weather was not on our side, and it was cloudy windy rainy as we started off. Before arriving to the trail, Stacen took a wrong turn and a pack of 6 wild dogs actually attacked the car, and we literally could not go any further. It was so ridiculous and none of us could stop laughing! The hike was beautiful what we saw, but the ground was flooded and the bridge of course was out as well. We walked through a peat bog 5 feet deep, and Nicole stepped on ground that actually RIPPLED with every step. After attempting in vain to place logs over the river and get over for about 45 minutes, they noticed some other backpackers walk over a bridge about 100 yeards down the trail that they had not seen. They felt stupid. Finally making it over and scaling 2 more little rivers, Nicole was looking down when, the ridiculousness of it all, a branch hit her in her good eye, knocking her contact to the ground, never to be found again. So now Nicole was blind and we had to walk back. We finally made it, only slightly depressed that we had yet to complete a hike. That night we packed up and started making plans for our next destination…El Calafate!

Wallabies, wine, and wonder!

Our first view of Buenos Aires primarily consisted of two five story 1800s era Mississippi River paddle boat casinos. We got off in the port and instead of having the bags come around on a conveyor belt like at the airport, porters came out wit the bags yelling, “Who´s is this?” to the 400 waiting people. We soon discovered the great hidden wonder of Buenos Aires—the prices. A taxi across the city of 14 million cost $4.50. We were quite excited, and after getting to the hostel and meeting up with Tomer and Ziv, we hit the streets for some Buenos Aires nightlife! The nicest taxi driver in the world picked us up, and took us to the center of the action. Dozens of bars lined the streets and plazas, and it took about half an hour just to get a seat somewhere. We had an amazing time spending very little money. We went back to the hostel and marveled at it´s beauty. It was everything our Montevideo hostel could have been and we truly enjoyed spending the other three nights of our visit there.
The next morning, we discovered that breakfast consisted of 2 croissants and dulce de leche. For those of you who don´t know, dulce de leche (incorrectly translated as “milk jam” down here, is similar to Nutella but much sweeter. Needless to say, we both felt gross afterwards and desperately purged our bodies with yogurt and liters upon liters of water. The 4 of us went walking through the city and ended up in a gigantic tourist market where Nicole and I met lots of middle-aged American couples on vacation! We figured it was because Buenos Aires is exactly like Europe, and it really is—impossible to tell a difference from Spain. We walked through the market and Nicole bought many beautiful glass pieces of jewelry before breaking only one earring that night. We bought a liter of what we thought was fresh squeezed orange juice but realized that it was from concentrate a little too late...Stacen was thirsty, and naively trusting the street vendor about the health of his purchase, drank the liter in 15 minutes. Meanwhile, we all went to the most famous cemetery in Buenos Aires, the kind where the coffins are just placed in little tombs. Looking in to see the decaying coffins was only slightly creepy. There was however, a family of stray cats that basked in the sun which made Stacen feel better—that is, until his frail body began to feel the effects of the cheap OJ. Needless to say, he almost fainted and thought he was going to die. He drank water and felt better, and to celebrate, we all went to the zoo!
The Buenos Aires zoo is incredible. Complete with fountains, pigeons, and animals without fences, it was nothing short of a free for all. Pigeons were stealing food from emus, muskrats were stealing food from Galapagos tourtoises, and Stacen and Tomer took extreme pleasure in going up to a cow and feeding it the grass from the expertly manicured grounds. However, the most incredible thing was the wallabies. Hundreds of them hopping around as 3 year olds attempted to catch them. They roamed around just like the pigeons! Not too bad for $7. We headed back home and after stumbling upon a family of stray cats complete with 6 snuggling kittens, made a pit stop in the super market for supplies. Vegetables were 50 cents per pound, and we indulged in spending 8 dollars on 3 bottles of Mendoza wine! We spent an amazing night in the hostel.
The following morning we ate our OWN food for breakfast and were much happier for it. We walked through some beautiful plazas with some of those awesome huge trees, and ended up on Avenida Florida, the central shopping district of the city, no cars allowed. The street vendors spotted Stacen the American instantaneously, and attempted to sell him anything from carriage rides to tango classes. We walked for hours, stopping for a romantic lunch in a café where we spent a grand total of $15. We continued on, walked past the presidential palace, ironically called “The Pink House”, and shopped street vendors the rest of the day. We returned to the hostel to prepare for dinner—at the Hard Rock Café! Drastically over-priced, Nicole received a cold soy burger and says that it wasn´t worth it. Stacen, however, said that it was part of the traveling experience, but she is correct and we will never do it again. We went back to the hostel and hung out all night.
The next day, Nicole and I went to an internet café to do boring grad school, application stuff, when we made a discovery…Nicole has been accepted to the Yale School of Public Health! In pure happiness, Nicole practically was floating through the streets as we made our way to the waterfront, which took a lot longer than expected. After a 2 hour lunch we just turned around and walked back. That night after dinner, we taught Tomer and Ziv how to play Nicole´s favorite card game—continental. That consumed the rest of the night before we had to wake up the next morning and catch our taxi for the airport…After some mix-up as to where exactly the plane was leaving from, we boarded our small little plane and 5 hours later were in Ushuaia………

Uruguay: Lo Bonito, lo Feo, y Un Pescado

After our long bus ride to Uruguay, we set out on a hour long walk to our hostel to give our legs a chance to move around. Our hostel was THE perfect crappy hostel! Located in the beautiful Plaza Independencia across from the Presidential Office, it was complete with peeling walls, leaking roofs, people sleeping until 4pm, broken bathrooms, and a bar.
After dropping off our stuff, we set out to walk the streets of Montevideo, only to discover that on Sundays the city is COMPLETELY dead. No shops are open and everyone pretty much stays in their house sipping their mate and roasting up some parrilla (BBQ). Luckily, we met a nice couple that taught us all about mate (the national drink), and we bought a gourd and yerba. You cannot imagine how surreal it is that everyone in this city walks around sipping their mate. You see people in business suits holding these wonderfully traditional gourds filled with steaming hot water and tea leaves. We calculated that about 1 out of 5 people walking down the street will be drinking it!
We ventured around the Rambla, a path filled with bikers, runners and walkers that goes along all of Montevideo´s beaches. Sadly, we mostly found brown contaminated waters filled with dead fish. On our way back to our hostel, we decided to explore the beautiful and luxurious Radisson hotel, where all the foreign dignitaries stay. We explored the top floors, spas, pool, workout room and... CASINO! Nicole gambled for the first time, winning $170 pesos!!!!!! (about $8.50!!!). It was quite the rush!!! Tomer and Ziv arrived around 9pm, and from there we chilled, ate and went out to check out some night life in the local bar.
The next day we woke up to a busling city, blue skies, and smiles. We walked through Ciudad Vieja (old city), walking through markets, crumbling builidngs, and the famous Mercado del Puerto (Port market), where we ate meat, plus meat plus meat (our vegetarian tummies are still recovering :) ). The four of us continued to walk through the city, made a delicious Israeli salad, and again hit up the casino!!!! We did end up loosing 10 pesos :(.... about 50 cents.
The following morning we left for three amazing days in a tiny beach town called Punta Del Diablo. It has beautiful small beach houses everywhere, shacks, fishermen, and only dirt roads. PERFECT. Our hostel was a little haven for us, with incredibly nice and friendly owners, Argentinians, and other foreigners. That night, we taught out Israeli friends the wonderful card game of Kings.
The true adventure, however, took place the next day. Tomer and Stacen, only talking in caveman voice (quote) ¨We men catch fish, feed women. Spread seed and flourish¨ So the men rented some fishing poles, and the four of set out to the windiest beach imaginable. The sand swept across the beach, cutting our legs-- still, we continued. After two hours of choppy waters, tangled fishing lines, sand in our eyes, cuts from our legs from rocks (Nicole), spirits were down. Then... Tomer yelled: a fish. And goodness was it a FISH!!!!! Over 3 feet long, weighing 20 pounds!!!!! We were all shocked. We had no idea what do!! The cooler and the bucket we had brought simply were not big enough!! so we carried the poor dying fish, running toward the village to get huge bags of ice.
(As a sidenote, we both did have a bit of trouble watching this big, beautiful creature gasping for breath. We truly tried to be as respecful as posible that his life would feed us.)
We got some ice, dumped it in, and the men victoriously carried their beast back to the hostel. They began washing it, gutting in, seasoning it. Stacen built a big, powerful fire. The men felt like MEN.
Then as the hours passed, our fish began to burn, crumble, yet remain raw. Tomer and Stacen got sadder and sadder, Ziv and Nicole got hungrier and hungier. In the end, the beautiful fish lay in the trash, and we dined on rice and salad.
The fish truly got the last laugh.

The next day was truly all about relaxing. We read, sat, and walked around the cool sand dunes and beaches around town. We settled into a relaxed sleep, and left the following morning (after a nice long walk looking at the town´s architecture)to our final stop in Uruguay: Colonia.
The bus ride was awesomely latino: we broke down halfway to Montevideo!!! Impresively, we got new buses in less that an hour and we were on way (after some confusion that left Tomer on one bus and Stacen, Nicole and Ziv outside. Tomer stopped that bus!!). We got to Colinia late that night, and some pizza and headed to bed.
The next day, the 2 of us walked around the picture perfect town, enjoying the cobblestone streets, painted houses, artesan shops, and an extremely friendly cat. We loved it. Before we caught the awesome ferry to Buenos Aires that night (a yacht speeding across Rio de la Plata!!), we brilliantly rented a ... SCOOTER!!!!!!!!!! We were both so happy and had missed our old scooter so much!! It was such an amazing rush. We felt like badasses. We had to return it after one blissful hour, where we headed to the ferry station- which was more like a beautiful airport.
After a fast 75 minutes, we arrived in the gorgeous Buneos Aires, off to new adventures....