Today, I set off to Torres del Paine. I´m so excited, I´m exhausted. It also could be the lack of sleep since I left Buenos Aires. Although the sun here in El Calafate does not rise until a more normal hour, say 5 or so, I still sleep like a fish, about 40 minutes worth every hour from the time I set my head down.
I am ready.
Monday, December 29, 2008
Sunday, December 28, 2008
Photography Lessons
With much debacle, I did end up with a Canon Rebel XS in hand the night before I left for Argentina. I had no time to learn how to use it, and in a moment of brilliance, I left the manual at home. The fantastic truth is that I´ve learned more in the past 4 dys through the people I´ve met than I would have had I studied the manual.
There is no better place to test out bracketing and exposure levels than Ushuaia with its reflective Beagle Chanel, the snow covered hills an mountains, constantly changing weather of snow, sun, cloud, rain, sun, rain there, sun here, snow over there...Ian and Andy have been friends for 35 years and have spent the past 5 years vacationing together with their wives and photographing their journies. The guys are the professional amateur photographers you see carrying around several lenses and gadgets. I´m hopeful that with the tips on bracketing and adjusting focal point I learned from them, I´ll have some great photos to share with everyone. Once I find a memory card reader.
And since the common rooms at the Posada had picture windows, what a perfect studio to figure out how to compensate for backlighting. Katrina and I played around in the living room this morning as we waited for our rides. I tought her everything I learned from Ian and Andy. We promised to send each other the best photo at the end our trips.
I have arrived in El Calafate. It is fucking amazing here. I´m sorry to be so crass but I can´t find other words. Muy benito. Already I miss Ushuaia. Yesterday, Jey Jey drove me up to the glacier, where because it snowing (!), you could not see the glacier. And in the middle of the night, music flowed in through the windows at 2, 3 maybe even 5 in the morning. Was I dreaming, or was Ushuaia serenading me to stay. Ok, maybe it was the group of people having a bonfire and blasting music without any concern of me. But to wake up (for the 4th time) to snow falling in the summer, I must be in heaven! Except for the fact that it doesn´t snow quite enough to snowboard or ski year round.
Ah, and now El Calafate, where the glacier fed lake glows turquoise from silt and silica against a backdrop of blue and purple snow capped mountains.
There is no better place to test out bracketing and exposure levels than Ushuaia with its reflective Beagle Chanel, the snow covered hills an mountains, constantly changing weather of snow, sun, cloud, rain, sun, rain there, sun here, snow over there...Ian and Andy have been friends for 35 years and have spent the past 5 years vacationing together with their wives and photographing their journies. The guys are the professional amateur photographers you see carrying around several lenses and gadgets. I´m hopeful that with the tips on bracketing and adjusting focal point I learned from them, I´ll have some great photos to share with everyone. Once I find a memory card reader.
And since the common rooms at the Posada had picture windows, what a perfect studio to figure out how to compensate for backlighting. Katrina and I played around in the living room this morning as we waited for our rides. I tought her everything I learned from Ian and Andy. We promised to send each other the best photo at the end our trips.
I have arrived in El Calafate. It is fucking amazing here. I´m sorry to be so crass but I can´t find other words. Muy benito. Already I miss Ushuaia. Yesterday, Jey Jey drove me up to the glacier, where because it snowing (!), you could not see the glacier. And in the middle of the night, music flowed in through the windows at 2, 3 maybe even 5 in the morning. Was I dreaming, or was Ushuaia serenading me to stay. Ok, maybe it was the group of people having a bonfire and blasting music without any concern of me. But to wake up (for the 4th time) to snow falling in the summer, I must be in heaven! Except for the fact that it doesn´t snow quite enough to snowboard or ski year round.
Ah, and now El Calafate, where the glacier fed lake glows turquoise from silt and silica against a backdrop of blue and purple snow capped mountains.
Thursday, December 25, 2008
Remaining Days
thru 28.12.08 Ushuaia, Tierre del Fuego
28.12.08 - 04.01.09 Torres del Paines
04.01.09 - 07.01.09 El Chalten, El Calafate
07.01.09 - 10.01.09 Puerto Natales
10.01.09 - 11.01.09 return to San Francisco
28.12.08 - 04.01.09 Torres del Paines
04.01.09 - 07.01.09 El Chalten, El Calafate
07.01.09 - 10.01.09 Puerto Natales
10.01.09 - 11.01.09 return to San Francisco
Feliz Navidad!
At this time of year in Ushuaia and Tierre del Fuego, the sun sets at around 23:00 and rises at about 3:00. Looking south, towards Antartica, the sky glows bright all through the night as the sun never sets.
We toasted to Christmas at midnight, Ana, our host and her two sons, Guido and Paul, and Helmut and Simone, the father and daughter vacationing from Germany. And Ana´s dog who once at 18 croissants before anyone noticed. Ana and Paul have an endless number of stories of guests they´ve received over the years, the world seems to come here to Ushuaia, to their doorstep, in some odd ways. They suppose that indeed "end of the world" attracts some crazy people, fanatics, extreme athletes, well-sponsored spritiual leaders, tiny man who rode a scooter from Alaska to Ushuaia without knowing a lick of English or Spanish (he rode a scooter because he was too small for a motorcycle). And then of course, the rest of us like Helmut, Simone and myself.
Off to Tierre del Fuegore.
We toasted to Christmas at midnight, Ana, our host and her two sons, Guido and Paul, and Helmut and Simone, the father and daughter vacationing from Germany. And Ana´s dog who once at 18 croissants before anyone noticed. Ana and Paul have an endless number of stories of guests they´ve received over the years, the world seems to come here to Ushuaia, to their doorstep, in some odd ways. They suppose that indeed "end of the world" attracts some crazy people, fanatics, extreme athletes, well-sponsored spritiual leaders, tiny man who rode a scooter from Alaska to Ushuaia without knowing a lick of English or Spanish (he rode a scooter because he was too small for a motorcycle). And then of course, the rest of us like Helmut, Simone and myself.
Off to Tierre del Fuegore.
Wednesday, December 24, 2008
fin del mundo, principio de todo
Feliz navidad!
Ushuaia - end of the world, beginning of everything
Latitude:
-54.854° 48' 0" S54 degrees, 48 minutes, 0 seconds South
Longitude:
-68.368° 18' 0" W68 degrees, 18 minutes, 0 seconds West
I am so happy to be here it makes me sad to think of all the times I´m not.
Ushuaia - end of the world, beginning of everything
Latitude:
-54.854° 48' 0" S54 degrees, 48 minutes, 0 seconds South
Longitude:
-68.368° 18' 0" W68 degrees, 18 minutes, 0 seconds West
I am so happy to be here it makes me sad to think of all the times I´m not.
7 hours on foot
I´m down to me last few hours in Buenos Aires. Yesterday was another day spent alone, wandering through the city. Recoleta is a beautiful necropolis, some tombs well over a century old. Who are the one who still are looked after, that have their cobwebs removed, wood caskets polished, marble cases dusted, articifial flowers changed every now and again to prevent fading? Who are the ones who no lineage exists to come restore or paid to have restored the cracked plaster ceilings, broken glass swept, who hold the key to the rusted locked?
I spent the remainder of the afternoon walking what felt like one end of the city to the other but the map suggests I really only traversed through 3 or 4 neighborhoods. Either this map is completely out of scale, this city is deceptively huge or I´m just really slow. My motivation was dad´s gift, I know it existed somewhere in this city, and I went from Recoleta to Palermo to Barrio Norte to Plaza de Mayo (which I arrived at rather uncerimoniously in what seemed to be a transit rotary), to Retiro (which was far more interesting than Plaza de Mayo except for the madhouse nature of being caight at the terminus for every mode of transport during rush hour, and plus, I was going in the wrong direction), back to Recoleta.
Ah, and yes, Avenida 9 de Julio is actually 20 lanes. And you must take 2 light turns to cross.
By the time I arrived back to Recoleta, eyes bleary from the constant exposure to smog and congestion, sticky with sweat from the humidity, feet about to fall off, I really just wanted a cold beer and good food. Tempted to just return to La Cholita, I decided, I should try another place and went to the seemingly more populat Cumana. It seems fate wanted me to drink a lot of beer yesterday. At lunch they could only offer me a .75 litre beer which I turned down. At dinner they could only offer me a litre of beer. Given it was my last night, I gave in.
It seems, I also can´t eat vegetables. I knew somewhere in the back of my head that spinatta is not spinach. It´s salami, as I realized when my sandwhich at lunch arrived. And my vegetales rustica cazuela at dinner came with every non-vegetable - potato, mushroom, onion, yam and squash. Where were the zucchini, carrots, and cauliflower I just saw at the market just down the street! Good thing I had a litre of beer calories to consume! Yes, so when in Buenos Aires, stick with the steak. Or empanadas.
Onward to Ushuaia
I spent the remainder of the afternoon walking what felt like one end of the city to the other but the map suggests I really only traversed through 3 or 4 neighborhoods. Either this map is completely out of scale, this city is deceptively huge or I´m just really slow. My motivation was dad´s gift, I know it existed somewhere in this city, and I went from Recoleta to Palermo to Barrio Norte to Plaza de Mayo (which I arrived at rather uncerimoniously in what seemed to be a transit rotary), to Retiro (which was far more interesting than Plaza de Mayo except for the madhouse nature of being caight at the terminus for every mode of transport during rush hour, and plus, I was going in the wrong direction), back to Recoleta.
Ah, and yes, Avenida 9 de Julio is actually 20 lanes. And you must take 2 light turns to cross.
By the time I arrived back to Recoleta, eyes bleary from the constant exposure to smog and congestion, sticky with sweat from the humidity, feet about to fall off, I really just wanted a cold beer and good food. Tempted to just return to La Cholita, I decided, I should try another place and went to the seemingly more populat Cumana. It seems fate wanted me to drink a lot of beer yesterday. At lunch they could only offer me a .75 litre beer which I turned down. At dinner they could only offer me a litre of beer. Given it was my last night, I gave in.
It seems, I also can´t eat vegetables. I knew somewhere in the back of my head that spinatta is not spinach. It´s salami, as I realized when my sandwhich at lunch arrived. And my vegetales rustica cazuela at dinner came with every non-vegetable - potato, mushroom, onion, yam and squash. Where were the zucchini, carrots, and cauliflower I just saw at the market just down the street! Good thing I had a litre of beer calories to consume! Yes, so when in Buenos Aires, stick with the steak. Or empanadas.
Onward to Ushuaia
Tuesday, December 23, 2008
Tango, no Tango
A cheap taxi ride (approx $5)down Avenida 9 de Julio, which really does have at least 14 lanes if not more, transports the Riley brothers and I to a Buenos Aires of a different time. San Telmo, with its slightly off-kilter, cobblestone streets,and antiquated buildings of only a few stories, this is a Buenos Aires of yesteryear. The metropolitan air I felt all afternoon walking through Palermo and Recoleta evaporated.
We sought a sidewalk cafe to drink beer or wine and sure enough along one block of Chile, the sidewalk is lined with outdoor seating, groups of people enjoying the evening. But streets filled with tango music were replaced with dance and pop tunes, our waitress spoke perfect English with an Australian (I think)accent and we turned the corner to find the street tore up in itself. El Viejo Almacén was closed for the evening by the time we finished dinner, afterall it was already midnight on a weekday evening. The only tango to be heard but not seen was at the corner bar where the band played but no one danced. Despite romantic notions of tango unfulfilled, it was still a lovely evening in another part of this wonderful city.
And what better way to end it than an ice-cream at Volta. And a nightcap at the bar next to the hotel.
We sought a sidewalk cafe to drink beer or wine and sure enough along one block of Chile, the sidewalk is lined with outdoor seating, groups of people enjoying the evening. But streets filled with tango music were replaced with dance and pop tunes, our waitress spoke perfect English with an Australian (I think)accent and we turned the corner to find the street tore up in itself. El Viejo Almacén was closed for the evening by the time we finished dinner, afterall it was already midnight on a weekday evening. The only tango to be heard but not seen was at the corner bar where the band played but no one danced. Despite romantic notions of tango unfulfilled, it was still a lovely evening in another part of this wonderful city.
And what better way to end it than an ice-cream at Volta. And a nightcap at the bar next to the hotel.
Monday, December 22, 2008
Sleep and Penguinos
It´s true, I traveled several thousand miles from home just to sleep. All morning and afternoon! The scratchy throat and congestion, overcast sky and eventual rain, made for reasonable excuses to stay in the hotel room all day (don´t I have a city to explore?), but really working off a sleep deficit from the beginning of the month was the true motivation. It was truely enjoyable, and I´m not sure when I´ll be able to indulge again. I highly recommend this strategy of going far far away from home if you too are sleep deprived.
But that did result in my being so unfashionably early for dinner. Even at 7:30 I was still the only person dining at La Cholita (thanks for the recommendation, Corey!). No matter, my bife de lomo was delicious. I considered the penquino but figured 1/2 liter of vino was more than I could consume just to expereince the novelty of vino served from a ceramic penquin.
That is until I returned 3 hours later with a new friend who lost his luggage and had not dined yet. I led Jay to La Cholita, to the exact same plate I ordered. And yes, the penguino is worth sharing although the visual of vino tinto dribbling from the white penguin´s beak and down its shiney white belly was a little Disney meets horror.
But that did result in my being so unfashionably early for dinner. Even at 7:30 I was still the only person dining at La Cholita (thanks for the recommendation, Corey!). No matter, my bife de lomo was delicious. I considered the penquino but figured 1/2 liter of vino was more than I could consume just to expereince the novelty of vino served from a ceramic penquin.
That is until I returned 3 hours later with a new friend who lost his luggage and had not dined yet. I led Jay to La Cholita, to the exact same plate I ordered. And yes, the penguino is worth sharing although the visual of vino tinto dribbling from the white penguin´s beak and down its shiney white belly was a little Disney meets horror.
Saturday, December 20, 2008
Arriving Solo
It was not my preference to travel here alone. But I realized that if I waited for someone to get with my program, I´d never come.
The greatest anxiety I felt all week was trying to figure out how I would get from EZE to the hotel. Bus? Taxi? Van Service? All it took was an email from Em´s friend confirming that the taxi would be the best option to have the weight taken off. Best $35 spent all day. I have arrived, safely and successfully in Buenos Aires. I feel, well, exactly where I am, a million (or several thousand) miles away from everything. When I left San Francisco, it was raining and cold. Here, it is 80 and sunny and humid. It feel like New York City in the summer time. With its tree lined streets and mix of old and new architecture, it even looks like New York. Everyone says BA is the Paris of the south. I´ve never been to Paris so my New York comparison will have to do.
The greatest anxiety I felt all week was trying to figure out how I would get from EZE to the hotel. Bus? Taxi? Van Service? All it took was an email from Em´s friend confirming that the taxi would be the best option to have the weight taken off. Best $35 spent all day. I have arrived, safely and successfully in Buenos Aires. I feel, well, exactly where I am, a million (or several thousand) miles away from everything. When I left San Francisco, it was raining and cold. Here, it is 80 and sunny and humid. It feel like New York City in the summer time. With its tree lined streets and mix of old and new architecture, it even looks like New York. Everyone says BA is the Paris of the south. I´ve never been to Paris so my New York comparison will have to do.
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
Becoming Wild
“It’s been two years since I’ve been here,” I told her.
“That long? Wow, so what do you think?”
“You probably can’t see it; you’re here every day. But the entire place feels different.”
“How so?”
“It’s ineffable. But it’s the feeling of a place becoming wild."
I've lifted this straight out of the Patagonia winter 2008 catalog. Credit to Rick Ridgeway http://www.patagonia.com/usa/patagonia.go?assetid=37718. He writes about his return to the Chacabuco Valley in southern Chile. I've borrowed it because it speaks to my journey, the return to my self, my being.
Count down to departure: 10 days 11 hours
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