End of the year, end of the world

Can´t go much further, cuz there ain´t no more land...

So Puerto Natales, Chile for New Years... So much has happened since the last post...

I took a 26 hour bus from Bariloche in the lake district to Rio Gallegos on the southern Atlantic (by the way the moon is upside down here if I never mentioned this before... the light moves from left to right down here to become full, instead of right to left like in the northern hemisphere. This casused me some alarm as i have taught hundreds of children the saying, ïf it´s light on the right, the full moon´s in sight¨ i still haven´t found a good ryme for here, but I think the problem is the ryme might be in Spanish...)

Rio Gallegos is a town full of wind and natural resource merchants. nothing more. They told me the next bus to Chile was in 5 days, to hell with staying 5 days in that town, I found an appropriate Argentine town on the boarder about 45 minutes to Pto. Natales... The bus driver was standing at the counter ready to go, so I followed him out with my bag, and spent another 5 or 6 hours on the bus. I got to Rio Turbio around 2 am with no where to go, and here it is cold and windy at night... I Sat at a bar until it closed and then wandered into the town´s central city bus lot. I spent the night (about 3 hours) sleeping in bus 9, and in the morning woke up to a very unhappy bus driver...
No entiendo, no entiendo. I think he wanted to call the police, and then he wanted me to give him money, ( I wonder how much 3 hours on the floor of a freezing bus costs? maybe 3 pesos.) I didn´t want to give him any money so I left, I waited in a taxi dispatch office until my bus left for Chile, all the while feeling a little like one the the outlaws these pampas are famous for.

And now I am in Puerto Natales, 53 degrees due south from Vermont. It is almost the end of the year and I can see the light of the sun until 11:30 at night. On the first of the new year I will start my wandering among the southern ice fields, the largest permanent ice outside Antartica and Greenland...

Next time there will be pictures...

Be well friends.

Chile Photos

Katies got more of the good ones...

This last one is one of Fridas sketches...

Update!!!

This is an update about all the lack of updates... I am still here. I am in Santiago Chile and will have pictures to put up soon. I finished working on a wwoof farm north west of Santiago with Jessie and Katie. They have headed back toward the northern reaches, and I am travelling solo again. We worked at 3 farms in Olmue. The coolest of which was owned by an old Chillian farmer named Don Luis, who loves the land, and his tomatoes...

I´ve been in Santiago for 4 days or so now and actually like it for a city. The downtown has something like 10 square blocks of pedestrian streets, and in the main plaza their are painters and it smells like oil paint when you walk through. I had a delicious fried eel at the market, and split a delicious corn chicken kind of sheppard´s pie with the girls...

Today I walked to a park and went to 3 museums, all for less than a dollar. The first was a really cool children´s art museum that was packed with summer vacation kids learning about art. The I walked around the Museum of natural history and a compleatly empty Museum of modren art.

We went to a Frida and Diego exibit the other day and that was really sweet. Something I wanted to run into while I am down here.

OK until next time... Be Well Friends.

Macchu Picchu and other ruinas

Wow! This place is mind blowing. You look at these buildings and you know that it´s impossible for someone to have built them up here hundreds of years ago, but there they are...

The mountains are almost more beautiful and impressive than the ruins are. The hike up to Wanyu Picchu is great, and is quite similar to angel´s landing in Zion, Utah, only it´s green and there are really old precariously perched ruins to wander through.

I came to aguas caliente (macchu picchu peublo) the back way. Bus from Cuzco to Santa Maria, then taxi to the hydroelectric dam. After that it´s just a 2 hour walk to aguas caliente.

I walked up to Macchu Picchu at 5 and beat most of the buses. I also passed about 30 hikers on the way. Yeah campcraft!

Be Well friends!

Palabra

Hola mi amigos... thought I would put up a few photos of Arequipa and send along the news...

This week in Peru... many people urinated on the street, a mother was seen helping a little boy do this.

also the church had an anniversary. The locals celebreted by getting drunk and urinating on the church...

Also, gringos went to the convent.

Lima dos!

Well, I´m just going to talk to the internet because it´s a huge pain in the butt to talk to anyone else here but the dog. That being said a surprisingly large number of dogs here wear shirts...

This week in Lima... APEC!

That´s right tons of Asian summiters and trades people as well as world leaders will turn out for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperaion...
Rumormill in Lima says that USA´s own President Bush is going to show.

Which gets me thinking... Bush never visited Vermont while in office did he? Knowing King Bush the second may be able to navigate this vast desert city makes me think this gringo can too. This would mark Bush´s second visit to Lima during his reign.

Lima

Just a quick entry from Lima...
I have arrived safely and met up with my couch surfing host with no problems. We are staying at her cousin´s apartment in Lima, somewhere between the city center and the hip tourist bourgh of miraflores. With all the worry before the trip (must be from the Milaria meds), Lima is actually a lot cleaner and more friendly than expected. I prefer it to San Jose, Costa Rica, and am already getting more comfortable here.

Be well friends...