Back In Action!

Argentina - July 07, 2006

We're finally in the process of beginning to get our life back in order. Thank you all for your patience with the lack of updates over the past few weeks. Patrick just returned from the States with the replacement items, including our laptop and digital camera. Ironically, it was cheaper to book a ticket back to the U.S. to get our items then it was to have a box shipped to Argentina (Argentinian customs would have charged us import duties of nearly 33% on the total value of our items)! Our many efforts to work with the US Embassy in Argentina proved to be a 3 day long rabbit trail and as a result we decided to book a ticket home to get the items. We're happy to be able to start getting our life back together after a month of anxiety and complications. Great news as well: We were more than happy to find that nearly everything we thought we had lost was recovered, mainly in part to a back up we recovered from our external hard drive. Needless to say, this was a huge relief to us!

We are currently in Bariloche, Argentina. Bariloche is called the Switzerland of South America and it's easy to see why: snow dusted mountains, beautiful lakes, chocolate and jam shops and Middle European style architecture. Oh, and they have great chocolate here as well (did I say that already?). The weather has been fairly overcast and rainy the past week, quite normal for Patagonia during the winter season.

Earlier this week we traveled to Puerto Madryn to view wildlife on the Valdes Peninsula. Many animals can been seen here, including sea lions, elephant seals, guanacos, gray foxes, armadillos, magellanic penguins and even orcas (killer whales). This is considered off-season, but we were still able to spot a few whales and around 50 sea lions. During peak season, the number of sea lions shoots up to nearly 2000, as Puerto Madryn is a prime mating spot. The very lucky can even see killer whales during peak season (February - April).

We've spent quite a bit of time on buses the past week. Our first leg was 17 hours Buenos Aires to Puerto Madryn, then we traveled 18 hours from Puerto Madryn to Califate and after that over 32 hours from Califate to Bariloche. One of our highlights was witnessing one of the most active icefields on earth, the massive Moreno Glacier. It was nearly impossible to grasp its sheer size: 4 km width, 14 km in length, 60-80 m high. The sound of the glacier was amazing to witness as well. Lonely Planet says it best: "Massive jagged ice peaks sheer off and crash land with thunderous rifle cracks, birthing small tidal waves and large bobbing icebergs - while your neck hairs rise a-tingling."

At the moment we are rehashing our schedule, looking at every opportunity to try and gain a few days back here and there. We have currently lost about 6 weeks from our initial schedule, due to the theft and several intentional delays in Guatemala and Bolivia. We are also in the process of editing and preparing all of our photos from South America to post and going through our recovered journals. Look to see some new content springing up in the next few weeks. We just spoke with American Airlines yesterday and it looks like we'll be departing for New Zealand from Santiago, Chile on the 16th of this month.

ps. We just hit 100,000 visitors today!

 

 

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