Joel's Wander: February 2008

Oh, this puppies really rollin now....

I think my favourite thing about travelling is experiencing the incredible moment of realization where you ask yourself, "how the hell did I ever manage to get here?".

So after 5 days in BA, a late wake up (partied a couple of nights with the young Swedish landlord of our apartment and his girlfriend and sister - why not?), and an inspiring email from Uruguay, I decided to head to the Uruguay coast for a couple days for some beach time. Problem being that it is a combined bus-boat trip of about 8 hours to get there. So a pit-stop in the Uruguay capital of Montevideo was in order (find me a better name for a capital city, I dare you). What a cool city. Rolled in at 8 pm or so, found a sweet ass hostel with a spiralling iron staircase, met some great travellers (Jenny from Ontario, Jack from South Africa and Mattias from Brazil). Some street-side burgers, tall Pilsen beers, good roof-top conversation.... What could be better? "hey, amigos! comer over here a check this out!" Not sure if you guys had it but on this particular night mother nature decided to throw in a complete lunar eclipse for good measure. Got some sweet pix. Jack and I totally geeked out with our Nikons! "hey, man what settings are you using? nice tripod". A dork and loving it.

The next morning an extra early wakeup was needed to hit the streets of Montevideo to blaze off some pix before the 8 am bus to paradise.

so.... when I left BA my plan was to hit Valisez in the province of La Roche, but after meeting Jenny who is destined to be a travel agent, i was convinced that i absolutely could not miss Cabo Polonio. Yeah, Lonely Planet missed this one big time! After a nap on the bus and a nice chat with Noami (super sweet Uruguayan woman who gave me the name of her son who lives in Cabo Polonio in case i wasn´t able to find accomodation - have I mentioned yet that Uruguayans are absolutely amazing people? lovely). So... how to describe Cabo Palonio... picture rolling sand dunes (you need to ride in the back of a big truck with big tires driving through sand to get from the highway to the "town") molding gently into a gorgeous penincula with a beautiful beach on each side, lapping green Atlantic ocean waves, a rocky point overlooked by a beautiful big lighthouse and the rolling hills dotted with little "ranchos". These little houses ranged from beautiful beach-front cottages to shacks made out of cut up plastic water bottles. All were small, all were unique and most seemed to be pretty much hand made.

Can you see me?....

Yet another weird self portrait!

Home sweet home with my Argentine brother!

Mate mate everywhere! Litterally everyone you see is carrying one of these and thurmos with hot water. EVERYONE.

I had no idea where I was going to stay (no tourist office here!) but I wandered up to a cool looking guy running a kiosk for funky crafts and at the same time Emiliano from BA rolled up as well. The cool old guy rented us his place for $30/night. This dude was wild. He and his girl had lived here for 20 years! There is no power here. A couple places have generators but essentially you are working with gas stoves, candles, well-water (one of the most critical rules of where we were staying was to NEVER let the well bucket touch the ground as this could contaminate the water as there are lots of animals around). This place is like no other, that is for sure. You have everything from the Argentinean family holidayers to the young nomad-style wanderers stopping by for a Mate before dropping some acid and walking off to Valizas in the middle of the night (there is no road, you simply follow the beach for 3-4 hours). And as you might imagine, this place is very green. No trees though. Trees would be nice as it was flippin hot! My first little burn.... oh yeah!! Made a very good friend in Emiliano. Very cool guy. Super chill. Involved with some very interesting and important causes in BA and cooks up a mean meal. Best one yet on this trip! My second and final night warranted some Whiskey so Emiliano and I hit the pub. Well many whiskeys later..... the clock said i had 2 hours before i had to catch my ride to the bus.... so i set the alarm.... laid down my head..... and..... shit! missed my bus... my head hurts.... i need to get to BA tonight and it is (as previously mentioned) more than 8 hours away if everything connects - not very likely. The bus i had bought a ticket for left at 8:30 am. after napping in the trees beside the highway, a bus finally came at 3 pm.... seriously. so i show the guy my ticket... "no tengo los asientos" - translation... "i´m screwed" because he doesn´t have any free seats on this bus. I have not mentioned that at this point I have exactly 30 pesos which is not exactly but close enough to NOTHING (about $1.25)! There are no bank machines within 50 kms...... why do i love travelling?... because, minutes later another bus rolls up, it is practically empty and after a bit of begging and excepting the "stupid american" head shake, he accepts my ticket for the morning bus. I am off to Montevideo. Very very far from Buenos Aires but at least I am on my way. So I arrive into Montevideo at 8 pm. could finally get some money. could finally eat. i have never been so flippin hungry!!!

so now what?.... The port town of Colonia is still another 3 hours away by bus and then an hour boat from there to BA. oops, next boat isn´t until 6 am.... hmmmm.. so i had to drop some cash on the 3 hour direct boat to BA. pretty sweet ride.

There is no such thing as time........ After an epic day of hauling ass backpacker-style, I arrived in BA at 2 am. I was supposed to be crashing at this Couchsurfer´s place who was having a party at a club near her place..... what to do?... no problem. flag down a cab, borrow his cell, call Paula, she meets me outside the club, walks me to her place for a quick shower and change and to the club we go for a little dancing till 7 am. What a day!!

My first couchsurfing experiencing was incredible. will keep it short but the summary is. Paula is rad! as i already mentioned, she helped me out huge the night i arrived. at this party she introduced me to tons of great people and we did some seriously fun dancing! The next day she scored me a bike and we cycled all over BA. So cool. a very special day.

Hopped on a plane down to Ushuaia today. AKA - The bottom of the world! It is so beautiful. Jagged mountain peaks in all directions. The flight was incredible as well as it was a beautiful sunny day. There is a "smokin deal" right now for Antarctica cruises... $4000! no joke. will keep sniffing around but it is looking unlikely that i will be checking that continent off of the list....

What a plane ride!

I hope you all well. Thanks for the replies and comments!

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Thanks for reading.

much love from the bottom of the world!

Joel

$2.50 steak, only a pan to cook it in, one of the best steaks i have ever eaten. seriously Phil.

Well it took a bit of work but the eagle has landed. Love it already!

Where to begin...

I spent the first night of my trip in a Toronto hotel..... My flight out of Van was delayed by 4 hours which meant that I missed my connection out of Toronto. Shiza! So, I rolled into TO at 4 am, hit the complimentary hotel, slept most of the day and then spent the entire afternoon and evening chilling in the Maple Leaf Lounge. For those that don´t know, this is Air Canada´s sweet ass pampering, all you can drink open bar, all you can eat, free internet... Pretty rad. Oh, the joy of travelling! Love it.

So I am getting nicely settled into Buenos Aires (BA). Been walking non stop. I have mastered the metro and the tan is starting to take its magical form. The architecture is beautiful, there are tons of parks and the people here are super friendly. And it is stinking hot! Mid 30´s and sticky sticky humid. Feels great to sweat!

I have been here for two nights and they have both been late ones. Shocking news I know. This city is amazing. At 4 am the patios of the pubs are still packed out onto the sidewalks and the clubs are "just starting" to fill up. Crazy. The city is actually fairly quiet for BA standards aparently as most locals head out of town during the summer weekends.

My second night was pretty incredible. Rob and Breanne (friends from Vancouver) had a connection that incredibly landed all of us at an amazing mansion in a suberb of BA for a party. It was a launch party for a travel website that is starting up and the party was at the most beautiful place. Gardens, gazebos, swimming pool, and of course a big grill barbequing up the most amazing argentinean beef. mmm mmmm. It was a very cool group of locals as well as Americans and Canadians as they have writers that are from all over.

sidenote: this was definitely a party where you didn´t need to bring ANYTHING. but of course we did (good canadian kids after all). "I feel pretty weird carrying these plastic bags full of booze.." - Rob

They definitely earned a plug for their website. Pass it on!
www.argentinastravel.com (sorry, still sorting out how to do links in this sucker)

After the party Chris (Montreal guy on his last night) hit up this wild nightclub. Cash-only bar so I made do with a single crazy energy drink they sell here that is apparently 5 times the strength of Red Bull. This stuff is pretty nuts. Wouldn´t be legal in Canada that is for sure! So I danced my face off till the sun came up and dragged my ass home. Great night. Glad the weekend is over though!

A pic from our apartment. Thanks Rob and Breanne!

A BA wander...

Here are some pix of La Boca, the neighborhood where the Boca Juniors soccer team play. They are the most famous team in Argentina and one of the most famous clubs in the world.

The Spanish is coming along pretty good. I am really enjoying working through conversations with people that speak no english and actually making it work. great feeling. will be amazing when I can actually have a real conversation.

Well, this seems to be pretty damn long..... Oops!

I will end it here. I am heading off to a Couchsurfing party pretty quick so I will sign off.

Love to you all,

Joel