Bolivia here we come...

We have been on a bus from Mendoza up to Salta and spent the afternoon walking around enjoying the architecture that Salta is known for.  We are hopping on a night bus that takes us to the border of Bolivia where we will catch another short bus to Tupiza.  There are some amazing salt flat tours around that area so we are definitely getting excited about seeing them.  We are taking the tour towards Uyuni and then Potosi.  We probably won´t have access to the internet while on the trip so this might be the last post for a few days.  Not sure when the new pictures from Mendoza will make it up, but hopefully soon!!  Hope everyone is doing well.

Seven Lakes Drive, Nahuel Huapi National Park

As planned, we rented a car with 2 friends that we met along the way and drove through the park and stayed in San Martin de los Andes. The lakes were all amazing....so serene and beautiful. We wished the weather was a little warmer so we could go kayaking...but it was still an awesome trip!

View from atop the cliff on one of the lakes...

One of my favorite pics so far from the trip...good job Kerry ; )

Picture of the crew in front of our sweet ride which we called ¨La Kanga¨...it was definitely a babe magnet...also you can kinda make our the clouds over the valley in the background which is where we stayed the night.

Proper sword fight on the lake...kill shot!

San Martin was a really cute little town that is supposedly one of the most posh in Argentina. It looked very much like a ski resort town. We rented a Cabaña which was a nice and needed change from the hostel scenery.

Both days were amazing. Hope you enjoy the scenery!

Quick Update

We arrived in Mendoza this morning coming from Bariloche.  The past few days were were driving around the 7 lakes which we absolutely breathtaking.  We will post pictures soon hopefully!!  Off to the wine tours for the day to try the region´s Malbecs!

San Carlos de Bariloche

We left El Bolson this morning around noon for a short bus trip north to a bigger town called San Carlos de Bariloche (just Bariloche for short).  We did a crazy steep hike this afternoon (instead of using the gondola to the top) and got some great pictures overlooking the lake that surrounds the city.  The mountain was called Cerro Otto and has a rotating restaurant at the top.  After our long hike we were in need of some sustenance and libations, but they were charging an outrageous fee just to enter the area.  So we did what any good backpackers with little to no money and sneaked our way into the restaurant after being told we needed to have a special ticket.  The rotating restaurant kept circling the area with the guard so we had to turn our faces away from the windows to avoid being caught...yeah I know nothing like acting like a rebel.  As my dad always said..."Its easier to ask for forgiveness than permission."  Our return trip to town took us through random paths with a vague sense of our direction.  We ended up hitchhiking our way back into town (moms do not worry--it was completely safe...we outnumbered the old man 3 to 1 and besides the whole town seemed to be doing it because the buses were on strike, which consists of the buses lining up along the main square all day blaring their horns every few seconds...you have to love South America).  All in a days work. 

The picture doesnt show how freaking steep of a climb this was....my calves were sore the next day! (-Kerry, obviously Scott is in tiptop shape and wasnt slowed down at all)

Our hiking buddy Chris who we met in El Bolson...evidence of us breaking the rules!

We took a different path back and the sun started to set before we got back to the city. It was absolutely amazing!

We have planned to rent a car with a couple friends for a 2 day trip around the Tres Parques Siete Lagos (Seven Lakes) which is supposed to be absolutely beautiful.  We are staying the night in San Martin de los Andes and returning to Bariloche on Friday.  We plan to hop on a night bus Friday afternoon to Mendoza so we aren't sure whether we will be able to post anything in the meantime so we just wanted to give everyone a heads up as to our plans in case we are MIA.  Hope everyone is doing well back home and elsewhere...we miss everyone!  Rock 'n Roll!

El Chaltén - Lago de los Tres, (mysterious) Fitz Roy

Day two in El Chalten was cold and rainy so we hung around town and did a short hike to a waterfall, Chorillo de Salto. Although nothing compares to the falls in Iguazu, it was a nice waterfall with beautiful colors around it. [Tech people, it reminded me a bit of the Cascades]

Day 3 wasn't much better but we decided to suck it up and hike to Lagos de los Tres, which is where we were supposed to be able to see the famous Fitz Roy point. It was posted as a 4 and a half hour long trek one-way and we figured that it was probably pretty despite the weather and it would be a good adventure either way. It definitely was both!

The pictures can´t don´t do justice, but the trees were blazing with red, yellow and orange. The trees looked liked big bonzi trees with small branches spreading out and tiny leaves...very pretty. We weren´t very far when it started to snow. At first, we werent very cold and it wasn´t sticking to us so it looked really pretty within the trees. Again, the pictures weren´t capturing the snow flakes so it just doesnt look as good here as it was in person!

Lago Capri...very pretty but I´m sure much more so when it´s not so cloudy

Our goal...

One of the bridges we had to cross...until yesterday one of the scariest...more to come on that!

We literally had to climb up and over the close mountain...it´s hard to show the perspective of the sheer upward climb we did through the snow and wind! I felt like we could have blown off at any moment!

Our warning before we hiked up...

Picture atop the mountain...with the lake in the background.  The weather started to get really bad so we quickly headed back down.

After the ascent and once we made it back to the camping area the area cleared up briefly so we got so good pictures without the snow.

We are thinking of starting our own bottling company...mmm glacier water

Posing after a days hard work...

El Chaltén--Laguna de Torre

El Chalten is a very small town known only because it is the base of a ton of hikes and mountains, where some of the most world reknown climbers come for a challenge. Of course, we stuck to the more basic climbs but even those werent simple! Unfortunately the Patagonia weather, which is known as being predictably unpredictable, didnt cooperate with us. We only saw the famous points of Cerro Torre and Cerro Fitzroy from afar on our first day. We did the treks anyway...and were blown away by the beautiful nature on the way (as you can see in our pictures below).

Our first trek was to Laguna de Torre and to see Cerro Torre, meant to be a 3 hour trek one-way (we are awesome so we did it slightly faster!). The sun stayed out and we were actually hot but we didnt quite see the peak of Cerro Torre. Next time!  

One good thing about the time of year is that all the leaves are changing colors...it looks different from back home, but really pretty

Glacier Grande - Leads into Laguna Cerro

 

Laguna Cerro. As you can see, the weather started to change on us. Straight ahead is Cerro Torre but we couldn´t see the top.

Chunks of the glacier floating in the Lago

The weather taking over...we really booked it back thinking we were going to get rained on!

We kept thinking the trees looked like something from Nottingham Forrest

Arrival in El Bolson...

We have had a chance to update the blog with pictures from Buenos Aires including Caminito and the soccer game...so check out those new pictures.  Also, updated are the pictures from Perito Moreno Glacier, which was absolutely amazing!! 

The trip to El Bolson was a lengthy bus trip, but not as bad as expected.  We luckily had enough room to stretch our during the trip, which made the cramped seats much better for sleeping.  We arrived here at 5:30 in the morning to a bus stop that was closed and it was raining outside, temps hovering around 40 F.  We had to find our hostel with a little doing but luckily it was not too bad...nothing like a little travel story.  We should be here for the next few days so updating the blog shouldnt be too hard.  We have pictures from El Chalten where we did some hiking.  The are was amazing despite the bad weather we had on a couple of the days there.

El Bolson is in the northern part of Patagonia, but still has great outdoor activities so we will see what we can get outselves into during the next few days.  The little of the town we walked this morning looked really nice, so we are super excited to get out after being on the bus all day yesterday.  Ciao for now!

Glacier Perito Moreno

Here are some pictures from the Perito Moreno Glacier that we visited by boat and did the trekking on. 

Boat to the trekking section.

After the ice chunks breaking off the glacier it would create huge waves and ice would float away...

High point of the glacier

Trekking on the glacier with our new friend Jo

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Example of how blue the ice and water are, although the picture does not do it justice.  This was a very deep crevice that we look over into...pretty scary!

Falls leaves...great colors

Crampons on our feet

Actions shot of a piece breaking off...

Group trekking on the ice...shows just how big this place is!!

Whiskey on Glacier ¨Rocks¨