Dan Leif, the Grand Inquisitor: Hey, man. So what have you been up to?

Dan Leif, the Responder: Quite a bit actually. Earlier this week I went over the cordillera to Chile.

Inquisitor: The cordy-what-now?

Responder: The cordillera. It´s what they call the string of mountains that separates Chili and Argentina.

Inquisitor: I thought those were called the Andes.

Responder: Yeah. They are, but people also just say cordillera.

Inquisitor: People say a lot of things.

Responder: Uh, yeah. Anyway, wanna know what I did in Chile?

Inquisitor: Hey. I ask the questions around here. Look at my name, travel boy.

Responder: Okay. Fine.

Inquisitor: So, uh, what did you do in Chile?

Responder: Well, I went to a small city called Osorno in the middle of Chile´s cattle country, and from there I took a bus to a place called Aguas Calientes, which is this little area set up around natural hot springs. 

Inquisitor: I´m lost.

Responder: Basically, over on the Chilean side of the cordillera…

Inquisitor: Just say Andes. You´re not impressing anyone.

Responder: Okay. On the Chilean side of the Andes, there are several large active volcanoes. And I´m not exactly sure how it happens, but somehow the volcanic activity under the earth causes really hot, really pure water to make its way to the surface. Water from these springs is supposed to be really good to bathe in. It´s got a lot of nutrients. Or something. And since I was kind of sore all over from backpacking, I thought it would be cool to go soak myself.

Inquisitor: So you went to Chile to take a bath?

Responder: Yeah, you could say that.

Inquisitor: Good. Cause I just did. So how did it go? The volcanoes didn´t erupt on your head, did they?

Responder: No, no eruptions. And the water felt really nice. But the whole process was also a little different from what I was expecting. I was kind of thinking there would be these naturally formed pools of hot water along rivers or in the middle of the woods, but in reality there´s a large swimming-pool type thing the Chilean national park service constructed, which they then fill every day with water from the springs. So it´s not like you see this water bubbling up from the ground or anything. Here´s a picture.

Inquisitor: Hmm. Looks like the Y. And were there kids in there?

Responder: Yeah, they were splashing around. Having a great time.

Inquisitor: And the water was warm?

Responder: Right. Like almost 100 degrees F.

Inquisitor: So the kids probably, you know … tinkled in there?

Responder: Um. Maybe.

Inquisitor: Ha. Hot springs indeed.

Responder: All right. Listen. The large pool was only one option. For about $15 US you could get your own private tub that was filled with water from the springs. So one day I did that. They also put some aroma stuff in the water so it smelled pretty. Real relaxing. Here´s a pretty fun picture of that.

Inquisitor: Ahh! There´s a giant ferret in the tub!

Responder: Yes. Yes. Laugh at me. It was a fun experience, though.

Inquisitor: So that´s it? Just sat in water for three days?

Responder: No, no. Aguas Calientes is actually right in a Chilean national park and there was really lush forest all around that I hiked through every day. I didn´t really even try to go anywhere on those walks. Just wanted to go out and really listen to the sound sof the rivers and the birds and just experince being in that place and…

Inquisitor: Okay, Thoreau. Sorry to interrupt, but they´re actually closing this internet cafe. So we gotta wrap it up.

Responder: Oh, okay.

Inquisitor: So what´s next?

Responder: Tomorrow I head to El Bolson in Argentina to start working on that farm.

Inquisitor: You´re a real peach.

Responder: Thanks.

Inquisitor: A peach that looks like a ferret.

All right. So backcountry backpacking was one of the biggest reasons I wanted to head on down here to the bottom of the world, and this last week I made my way out into the woods. From San Martín I took a bus south 200 or so kilometers (yeah, I´ve been bit by the metric-system bug) to Bariloche, which is a pretty big city by Patagonia standards (100,000 habitantes) and is really touristy but which has a good transit system that can take hikers out to Parque Nacional Nahuel Huapi an hour or so outside of the city center. And Parque Nacional Nahuel Huapi is pretty much one of the most staggeringly beautiful places I’ve ever been.

I did one of the park’s well-known treks, the three-day Circuito Chico, which starts at a ski area and heads up to a ridgeline above the trees. Along the ridge you seen dozens, maybe I’ll even say SCORES, of snow-covered peaks. Then there was some fun climbing over boulders, some yodeling and then a pretty tiring, steep descent at the end of the day to Refugio Frey (a little mountain hut in the middle of the wilderness where you can sleep if you don’t have a tent and buy Coke, chocolate and other such consumer goods that at the end of a day of backpacking seem like the absolute most wonderful things in the world). The refugio was down in this basin next to glacier-fed Laguna Toncek and below rock spires that shot up from the ridge above. I camped along the shores of the lake, half a kilometer or so (HOLLA METRIC SYSTEM!) from the refugio. In the following space find pictures I took with a camera:

Pretty as a peanut.

Refugio Frey and Laguna Toncek. 

 

Looking across the lake to top of basin the next morning.

So yeah, day one was beautiful and involved a bit of up and down, but wasn´t all that tiring. Then there was day two. Day two basically destroyed me. Part of this had to do with the fact I hadn´t really done too much backpacking or seriously physically exerted myself or even really sweated too much for a year or so. And part of this had to do with the terrain. The thing about camping in a basin — like the one Frey is located in — is that you gots to climb out of it the next morning. By the time I got to top, I was ready for a couch … and I still had the majority of the day’s walk to go. Immediately, the trail dropped off the other side of the ridge and I spent the next couple of hours trying not to flip over as I slowly slid down the loose-rock slope (the thing I’m noticing about Patagonian national parks is that when the going gets steep they kind of abandon the idea of a “trail” and let you figure out your own way down or up).  Then the route made its way down through a valley, then climbed back up another slope, went back into the valley and finally made a wicked climb to the top of another ridge. My guidebook described this ascent as “strenuous but short.” I’d revise that to say “strenuous and never-ending and will make you contemplate throwing your 40-pound pack off your back and into oblivion while you lay down and succumb to nature.” Anyway, after much starting and stopping I made it to the top. I was greeted by another amazing view, but my face was too covered with sweat and snot to enjoy it too much. I then navigated another intense descent, dumped the rocks out of my shoes and limped to my campsite, which was beside another refugio (called San Martín) beside another lake (called Jakob). I threw my pack down and plunged into the icey water. Being cold never felt so perfect.

OMG, photos!

View from last ridge of the day down to Laguna Jakob.

Dan Leif poses with Laguna Jakob. Afterwards the two shook hands and promised to get a Middle East peace treaty hammered out by August.

Okay, so the third and final day was longer than the first two, but was pretty flat…oh so gloriously flat. The trail brought me out to through the same valley that Laguna Jakob is located in, so that meant no more ridges or inclines or ridiculous formations of that nature. My lower back was pretty sore from lugging my bag up and over the mountains for the two previous days and my legs had had about enough of the walking thing so I took it slow and peridically stopped to dip my head in the river the path ran along. The trail ended at a road I could then follow to Colonia Suiza, a little vacation village on the edge of yet another lake. There was a nice open campground with lots of little kids and dogs running around and down the road I could buy a hamburger, fries and a liter of Quilmes for a total of $6 American. Then I stretched out on the shore of the lake as the sun went down and looked back at the mountains I had just climbed through. When you’re exhausted, lonely peaks are that much more astounding.  

More pics be here.

Why hello there. Please find in this post some snappershots from in and around San Martin de los Andes. I was in this little lakeside city for five days. Mountains rise up all around it, which makes for good hiking, great camping and simply phenomenal grave hunting. Well, there isn’t actually grave hunting. OR IS THERE?!?! Okay, pictures…

The lake is called Lago Lácar. I don´t know how deep it is. Thanks.

 My main man Matias. We both came into town with no hostel reservations, but using his mastery of the so-called “Spanish” language, he helped me find a place to sleep the first night. Then we explored San Martin together for the next couple days. He never, ever stops giving thumbs-ups.

Holy crap, Lago Lácar. If you were a woman and not a geological formation, I’d marry ya.

A fool standing in front of a lake on the Ruta de los Siete Lagos.

 View from inside my tent when I was camping at Quila Quina, part of Parque Nacional Lanín.

 A really awful sunset.

You can see even MORE pictures in this album I’ve set up using the power of the Google Corportion.

So I’ll throw some negative at you to start. I had my camera stolen. Last Monday night when I was at the bus station in Buenos Aires, as I was set to start heading south. I had gotten to the area where my bus was gonna leave from and was sitting on the ground (as I’m apt to do in transportation hubs) with my main pack beside me and a smaller bag on top of it. I was pretty tired and ultra-paranoid the bus was gonna leave without me knowing it (there were around 50 buses all leaving within one ten minute window and all kinds of announcements about platform changes were being made in Spanish I couldn’t even begin to understand) so not that aware of my surroundings. Then some dude came up on the other side of the window that I was resting my back against and started tapping on it, as if he urgently needed my attention. I turned and he tapped lower on the window and I followed his hand. Then he tapped lower and I followed his hand again…and then he took off running. Right then I realized what was going on. I swung back around, but it was too late. The smaller bag was gone. The dude must have had some amigo inside who snatched it.

I was pretty furious–not so much that I had gotten robbed, but that I had been duped so easily. I kind of had a mind-set that I was savvy, that I wasn’t the head-in-the-cloud kid just asking to get fooled. I mean, I was wearing one of those made-for-traveling fanny pack, for God’s sake. So for five minutes or so, I was angry at myself, at the bus station (for having windows that could be used to distract me) and at this older woman sitting ten feet away who was looking at me and shaking her head as if to say “you stupid foreingers.” But after I went through my mind and figured out exactly what I had lost — my camera, two books, a notebook,  an international cellphone and a half-eaten sandwich — I relaxed a bit, knowing there wasn’t anything that would be too difficult to replace. Well, Ithe camera had 100 or so pics on it from BA that I guess I’ll never get back but most of those were somewhat worthess anyway (I took about ten of an ad for “I Am Legend” in Spanish) and I’m planning to go back to Buenos Aires at the end of the trip so I’ll take more then. Anyway, moral: If you’re ever in a bus station in South America and someone starts tapping on the window behind you…shoot flames out of your mouth and kill everyone everywhere. Or else you could lose a perfectly good sandwich.

The good news is that even with all that happening I managed to get on my bus (and call the ‘rents, who graciously cancelled the cellphone for me). The next morning I was in Santa Rosa, a city 450 miles south of BA and the capital of La Pampa province, which is pretty renowned for its lack of anything. The land is real flat and real arid and really not a good place for walking around in the middle of the summer during the day because the sun destroys everything.

 From Santa Rosa, I took another bus further south to Parque Nacional Lihue Calel, a national park at the bottom of the province where this little range of mountains jets out of the desert. This isn’t on the main circuit most tourists take through Argentina. I can understand this because on its surface it doesn’t seem to have the spectactular landscapes of Patagonia further to the south and certainly doesn’t have too many ammenities (the one restaurant in the area was 4 km away and serves grilled lamb and nothing else). But I’m really glad I went. The little mountains were really easy and fun to scale (as long as you don’t do it during the middle of the day when the heat is kinda unbearable) and from the top you look out and see dry, flat nothingness forever. The sky was huge overhead and there were never any clouds which made it seem even bluer and more expansive than normal. And insane stars at night. My guide book says La Pampa has a “pincushion night sky.” I think that’s a perfect description. Also, since the park isn’t a major destination there were never many people there. I camped there two nights and hardly saw anyone the whole time. I talked to the rangers a little, but basically spent the whole time in this almost eerie state of isolation. There was so much space and just me to occupy it. No ads or TV telling me what to think and no people I felt like I had to impress. For the two days I found this amazingly liberating and would laugh out loud knowing I had these crazy desert sunsets to myself. I talked to birds and made up songs when I jumped from rock to rock on the mountains. But then the last day I was there I really really wanted people, friends, around me. I think it was such a giant flood of alone time that I started getting sick of myself to some degree and just wanted to hear what other people had to say. I also really wanted to eat some good food…cause I had eaten nine consecutive meals of ham and cheese on crackers.

That night I took a bus back into Santa Rosa and then connected there to one down to San Martin de los Andes, which is this beautiful vacation town in the Lakes District of Patagonia. There are lots of people here and that sense of loneliness I felt earlier has been dashed by this dude Matias, an Argentinian I met on the bus and who I hung out with all day today. He doesn’t speaka the English–and neither does anyone else here it seems–so it’s been all Espanol for me. But I’m totally cool with that. Just conversing with people in any sense and seeing the landscape around here is enough for me.

 Oh, also, I got another camera here. I won’t have an pics from La Pampa unfortunately, but I already have some great ones of San Martin…but this computer is being muy tonta and won’t let me hooks my stuff up so this post will have to go up unillustrated. To get a sense of the Lakes District, go here.

Also, go Pats!

Whoa! First off, thanks for all the comments. Each one of those responses was like a little virtual hug. And maybe some time when I get back I´ll get around to reading them. No, no. I read them all at least 20 times and in fact printed out the one from my Mom and will be dropping copies of it out of planes over all of South America.

 Anyway, Buenos Aires. That´s where I flew into last Thursday and where I’ve been exploring the last four days. Well, not really exploring. More like sitting. Cause I think my favorite part of this here metropolis has actually been just hanging out with the people I´ve met at the hostel I´m staying at. I guess it´s a bit of a traveler´s cliche to bunk down in a youth hostel and make all these connections with other “wandering young people from across the globe” (I´m sure that´s a quote from somewhere some time) but regardless of the corniness factor, I’ve found the experience to be incredibly cool. For the most part, none of us have anything to actually do and we´re all kind of interested in getting to know people and they sell beer at the hostel for real cheap (three liters for about $1.25 American). That´s all led to a lot of sitting out on the terrace and having conversations about things like U.S. foreign policy, British slang for genitalia and snow (everyone I’ve met LOVES to talk about how much snow they do or don´t get in their respective countries and I think I´ve blown the minds of a few Brazilians by bringing up the concept of a snow day). Most of the time the conversations I get involved in are in English (let´s hear it for the universal language, yo), but I´ve also had a few in Spanish. These are fun — as long as the person I´m talking to is willing to put up with my inability to conjugate most verbs correctly and my penchant for using the term “ridiculoso.” And the enjoyable thing about a lot of the espanol converations I´ve gotten into is that myself and the other person will spend a signifcant amount of time talking about the absolute most basic aspects of existence. I talked to this Mexican dude Eduardo for no less than 15 minutes and we covered the following topics: the correct pronunication of the Mexican president´s name, what foods we like and … snow.

The picture above depicts me and two Brits who have been staying at the hostel. They claim to know the rules of cricket.

 But yeah, I have actually spent a lot of time walking around BA (that´s what you call Buenos Aires when you´re in the know). Overall, I really dig it. Even the overwhelmingly touristy aspcts of it — tango shows, La Boca (an artsy little barrio in the middle of an otherwise downtrodden part of the city and the home to the major soccer team here), the main government plaza — have all been interesting to check out. Also, the city´s beautiful and the people are friendly – even when they know you´re a dirty, captialist American. See pictures below for visual confirmation of some of the above-stated things.

  The Argentine capitol building on Plaza Mayo.

 

House in La Boca

Guess it really does take two to tango (AHAHAHAHAHHA! WHAT A CAPTION!)

The last thing I´ll say about BA is that I´ve been struck by the number of stray dogs there are here. They kind of run around in groups of two or three and I’ve seen them sniffing around trash and sleeping under benches in both the poorest and richest areas of the city. I certainly didn´t expect this and actually don´t think I´ve ever heard of the existence of large numbers of stray dogs before (though I´m sure there are plenty of them in cities everywhere). Anyway, it´s been pretty sad to see on the one hand, but also further proof of dogs´ superiority to every other kind of animal: I´ve seen probably 20 or 30 strays in my four days here, but not one of them has looked back at me with any agression and none of them actually seem too discontent with their situation. In fact, a few times, they´ve trotted down the sidewalk right beside me or other people, looking as though they’re glad just to be out and about on a sunny Argentine day. Yeah, even when dogs get stuck in horriffic living situations, they’re more happy than hateful. Other animals should take note (I’m looking at you, stray cats and people from Jersey).

OK, OK, sorry about the sad paragraph. Now, I can´t imagine anyone´s actually still reading right now, but if you are I’ll leave you with an anecdote. I brought with me a small travel-size tube of toothpaste, but it’s actually been used by other members of my family before and after using it my first night here, I noticed there really wasn´t much left. I could have just planned to use at a regular pace and then buy another tube when it runs out (it has maybe 20 more teeth brushing sessions left in it). But no, after that first night, I thought I´d go into toothpaste-surivial mode and I´d sneakily top my brush from other traveler´s paste tubes when possible. That way I´d never have to go into a store and buy more (a situation that would surely expose my embarrisinlgy bad Spanish pronunciation skills and cost me a few precious pesos). So anyway, two nights ago before bed I noticed a tube of toothpaste out on the cunter at the hostel. My eyes widened as I reached for it and applied the white substance to my brush. It was some Latin American brand. Must be one of those silly Brazillians, I reasoned. Always getting exploited by the Americanos! I was smiling as I put the brush in my mouth and started my normal vigorous brushing motion. And then I noticed something was wrong. This toothpaste tasted a little, well, soapy. My brushing quickly came to a halt, and I looked down at the tube and read the label carefully for the first time…

Creme de barbear? I was brushing my teeth with shaving cream. Blast those Brazilians! Blast them!!!

You done made it to my blog. Good. Great. Yee-haw! Basically, this is where I, Dan Leif the gringo, will be chronicling my trip through Patagonia, a region in Argentina and Chile. I’m flying tomorrow (Jan. 10)  to Buenos Aires and will be spending the next 14 weeks backpacking around the Andes mountains and working for a month or so on this organic farm. I’m also hoping to sharpen the ole Spanish skills. Aqui tiene! (that means “Here you go!” and probably doesn’t exactly fit in the context of this paragraph, but it’s fun to say so whatever).

 Anyway, a little about Patagonia. It was invented by Richard and Betty James  in 1945. No. Ha. The Jameses invented the slinky. Patagonia wasn’t invented by anybody because it’s a giant landmass. The exact borders of Patagonia (or as the locals call it, Patagonia) are a little ambiguous, but it basically starts at the Rio Colorado, which is several hundred miles south of Buenos Aires and stretches all the way to the southern tip of South America. According to a book, Patagonia comprises about a million square kilometers (I know, kilometers, right? What is this, Toronto?) and contains only 5% of the populations of Argentina and Chile even though it makes up about 30% of those countries’ total land area. So yeah, not too many people but lots and lots of mountains and lakes and volcanoes and glaciers and national parks and llama-type things called guanacos. It’s also the region Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid fled to when the Wild West stopped being so wild and some people say it’s the place Hitler went when he “feigned” his suicide at the end of World War II (I’m pretty sure that myth is false…Hitler actually moved to Hawaii where he began a new life as surfing pioneer Laird Hamilton).

 Yo, enough with the history. I’ll leave you with a picture of all the stuff I’m bringing.  

You may notice that my parents’ cat, Beverly, made it into the shot. She’ll be staying here. I asked her if she wanted to come, but she refuses to fly in anything less than business class.

Anyway, next time I write it’ll be from the Southern Hemy(sphere). Aqui Tiene!

(PS: Thanks be to Jakey Goldman for helping me get this webpage up and for having the courage to Photoshop my head onto what is otherwise a beautiful mountain-landscape photo.)