Puerto Deseado

I'm currently in Bariloche, a touristy town gateway to Nahuel Huapi National Par with plenty of outdoor activities. The architecture of wood and stone give it a Swiss alps feel. We are staying in the Condor de Los Andes hostel downtown close to the plaza which holds different events, most recently an antique car show.

Last week was full of traveling and exploring Puerto Deseado, the farthest south we are going on this trip. This small fishing city lies on the Atlantic coast. We took a boat excursion to Penguin Island, a small island inhabited by magellanic and rock hopper penguins, and other sea birds. This area is prone to extreme weather and we were warned that we would have to leave if the wind picked up. Sure enough we had to leave early and had to battle massive waves. The guides decided it was too dangerous so we docked on a spit of land far away from town.for several hours we waited for the wind to die down, there was even talk of us having to stay the night where we were. This was the first time this has happened on one of their tours and we handled it very well by exploring the surrounding the area, writing in our field journals and napping. Eventually we headed out in the craziest boat ride ive ever experienced. The waves were still pretty large so we often jumped off of waves, flying through the air and landing really hard. We had a hell of a good holler on this bumpy ride and were thankful to make it back to land alive. Needless to say, they felt bad that happened so they took us out on another boat ride up the Ria Deseado to observe marine mammals.

On my birthday, 23 de Noviembre, we took our rental cars into an area called Reserva De Ria Deseado where Darwin once explored it's canyon walls and valleys. We found a large cave to have lunch in with alfajores and mimosas for desert. I was also sharing a birthday with my classmate Sam. After this we did a plant survey then headed back to our camp. We stayed at a locals home that they sometimes have people camp on their property and host dinners. Their property was beautiful, right by the river and next to a small lake home to flamingos and other birds. We provided the food and they cooked us an asado of chorizo, grilled corn, papas, different meat portions, and plenty of malbec wine and cervesa. Our host played the accordion and his friend played a card trick and they told plenty of stories. We danced and sang into the early morning. This was a very memorable birthday, what an amazing experience!

We also visited Cabo Blanco lighthouse then I drove our crew back to Rivadavia where we then took a bus and 17 hour train ride to Bariloche. The train was super antigua with plenty of dust flying around. Seats of two could turn around completely and the bathroom toilets had a tube headed straight out onto the tracks. We had an awesome dinner and watched a movie in a small theatre!

I'm so happy now that I'm clean and well rested, traveling that much was taking a toll on everyone. I will be downloading photos soon!

Whales, guanacos, and rheas...oh my!

I´m back in Puerto Madryn at the hostel and have to leave in 45 minutes to take a bus south to Puerto Deseado. I don´t feel like writing but wanted to write a little about Península Valdés. We stayed at a research center in the middle of nowhere, it´s called Reserva de vida Silveste San Pablo de Valdés. check it out!
http://www.patrimonionatural.com/HTML/provincias/chubut/sanpablo/sanpablo.asp
Yesterday I explored the beach cliffs full of fossils that date back to 10 to 40 million years old. Sea lions roared and played on a small rock cliff in the water while southern right whales and their young breeched (jumping out of the water) off in the distance. I had an uplifting moment where I realized this was exactly what I love doing. When not by the water we were exploring the rest of the Península or on the reserved land conducting plant survey´s. Every being was in motion with their young, guanacos, maras, and falcons. The dead lie scattered throughout the dry salty habitat. The hot sun scorched our skins while the cold wind sent a chill to the bone. Small scorpions and buckets of bugs ate along side us in the kitchen. The Patagonian Mockingbird sang car alarm sounds every morning to the rising sun. This is Patagonia.

catch up

WOW, there is so much I want to write about. My last entry was on my way to Bs As then Puerto Madryn. I never wrote about Iguazú. We stayed at the Gueme Hostel in Puetro Iguazu, this is in the Provincia de Misiones, north of Buenos Aires. It is a tourist town, close to an amazing park called Cataratas del Iguazú (waterfalls of Iguazu) which lies on the border of Brasil and Paraguay. This area is a sub-tropical rainforest and very humid. We were very happy that the hostel had a pool.

The first day into the park I went on my own. Took the local bus from town into the park and hiked almost all the trails. I saw Brown Capuchin Monkeys, lizards, a variety of birds, and plenty of Coutis (related to racoons). While having lunch on the lawn I was very fortunate to see a very shy bird called the Black-fronted Piping Guan eating berries in a tree. The second day in the park my classmates and I went on a bird watching tour. I counted and learned about forty-nine species of birds including several Toco Toucans! After the tour a few of us contineud to explore the park. We went to Garganta de Diablo (throat of the devil) where the water begins and comes together to flow into one massive waterfall area. The tallest waterfall is El Salto Unión Avalancha at 80 meters. Took my breath away.

After Iguazú we took a bus back to Bueños Aires to then catch another bus south to Puetro Madryn. First off, these buses are pretty cool. Besides getting bus sick often and staying up late worrying that the driver would fall asleep, the accomodations are great. The seats recline pretty far, endless movies, and we were served dinner and breakfast. Even got wine with dinner, coffee afterwards, and choice of champagne or whiskey to put you to sleep.

Onward to Puerto Madryn. This has probably been the busiest week we´ve had. The group was split into two because of hostel arrangements. Some people stayed in a hostel and the rest (myself included) are staying in a small house. November 9th we went to Punta Tombo to the Area Natural Protegida to study the Magellanic Penguins. These penguins are approximately 1 meter tall and are black and white. There are approx. 1.8 million breeding pairs and they live 20 to 25 years. They are monogamous and lay two eggs which incubate for forty dayes. They lay their eggs in either burrows in the soil or under shrubs. We saw them before their chicks will be hatching in the next couple of weeks. The weather was pretty nasty, blue skies, sun out, expect extremely windy and cold. None of us expected this so I got plenty of funny pictures of us huddling in groups or staying low to the ground where the warm pebbles lay. We did a study that will be comparing the response behavior of the penguins when approchaed by humans in two areas of high and low tourist areas. Punta Tombo is a high tourist area, the penguins didn´t care if I was right next to their nest staring at them. We will be doing another study next week in a low tourist area and comparing our data.

The next day we went swimming with sea lions in an area outside of town called Punta Loma. There are approx. 15 seals in the area we swam in. They are very curious and social creatures. They would gently bite our goggles and any other areas on our bodies they found curious. Someone had their butt nibbled and another their groin. One flipped onto its back in front of me so I pet it for some time. I´ve done some pretty cool stuff but this is definetly the top on my list.

THEN we went on a biking adventure. We rented bycicles and took them 14 kilometers (8 miles) to a wildlife observation area. So a total of 16 miles. It was a wild adventure, everyone was scattered. I got a huge thorn in my tire which flattened it so I had to change my tire. Not all of us made it to our desination. One student, Levi tried to do a stunt off the side of a sketchy hill and face planted into the dirt receiving a mild concussion then going back home with another student. Needless to say, once we got to the observation area we did a mammal study and learned about shrub-steppe plants. On the way back Big Bens bike failed on him and broke so he took Ashley´s bike and this bikes back tire came off sending him over the handle bars. aaahhhh! Why did he take her bike? Ashleys pregnant but still joining us on our journey´s and studying. She´s like seven months pregnant and agrees that she must be crazy. She´s kickin some ass BUT it is very challenging for her. She got a ride back to town while Ben took her shitty bike that could have failed on her!

Yeah, there´s more. I told you we did a lot this week! Yesterday we went to Punta Ninfas for mammal observations of Southern Elephant Seals. We hiked down a tall cliff to the ocean and walked through millions of year old marine fossils. We didn´t get much time to study them because we hung out with the seals. I sat two feet away from a male seal as it napped and snorted out sea salt. I learned that they spend ninety percent of their time in the water. I counted approximately 222 individuals on the beach. woah!

Tomorrow we are renting cars and heading to Peninsula Valdez. We will be camping and whale watching in Puetro Pirámides then head roughly 20km NE of their to study and live at a research station for four days. The four days there will be spent traveling to three areas of the peninsula to study the marine mammals. While we are on these adventures we have to take accurate field notes, daily field journals and a species account book. On top of this we have individual species presentations AND seminar discussions on various scientific research papers. I recently lead one today on xeric plants (plants in dry habitats) and if extra summer water pulses are used and how. The paper was beyond my level of understanding but I did learn a lot.

The groups way past the honeymoon stage. We find ourselves trying to balance the stress of studying in a new country, traveling around, and living in a small group. I feel we are all doing the best we can and having so much fun at the same time! ¡Tiempo por cena, chau chau!

Ocupado

I´m leaving soon on a bus back to Buenos Aires. Will be there for nine hours then taking another bus to Puerto Madryn so will be arriving there sunday the 6th.

Several people have asked for an address to send care packages and mail. As much as I would LOVE to receive these things, this is not possible due to traveling AND I´ve heard that the postal system is horrible.

Will try to write a more thorough blog when I get to Puerto Madryn.

Tiempo para viajar

I can´t believe I´ve been here for a month. It´s official, I obtained my certificate for spanish level one! I can ask for directions, buy food, try on clothing, and make very small talk. As I improve my spanish, my english gets worse.

We are here during an interesting time. The ex president Kirchner has passed, therefore several stores are closed. They also had a national census day so everything was closed. We bought tickets in advance to see a show and it was cancelled. We rescheduled it for sunday evening. Not really sure what it is but supposedly strange and worth seeing. A couple nights ago I went to a parilla and...you won´t believe this, I ate rare steak with vino tinto. It was ¡Que Bueno! Later on that evening we went to one of the older Tango places in Bs As. The building is very antigua, old and facinating with art everywhere and the music was fabulous.

I leave the city monday to travel. We are taking a bus to Iguazu Falls, staying there for four full days. Besides checking out the area we are going on a bird tour. After this we come back to Bs As for 9 hours then take a bus to Puerto Madryn. Not really sure what we are doing here but by the end of November I will be in....Bariloche. Whew! I have plenty of studying to do identifying plants and animals, plus learning their spanish names. I will be doing two species account, one on th endangered Geoffry´s Cat and the other on Austrocedrus chilensis (cedar tree). This morning I went on a bird walk with my classmates at the Wildlife Refuge that is on the Rio de la Plata. I´ve also been to th Museum of Science which was pretty amazing. I ALSO went to what i believe to be the largest book store in Argentina. It was previously a theatre turned into a book store.

Times up, gotta go. Will be in touch. ¡Que desfrutes!

Union wars y futbol

I think I had mentioned in my last post about someone getting killed. There always seems to be worker strikes going on. Most recently there was a very large union strike. One person was killed and two others injured. There is confusion as to what is really happening. I heard that there are two union groups and one of them is some type of gang. Well the boys family and friends were pist so there was a massive march in memory of him.

The headline in La Nacion periodico read, ¨Una marcha cargada de emocion y dramatismo.¨ And on the inside, ¨Investigan a la policia por su actuacion en el choque gremial.¨ It was an emotional march and their investigating the charge of the criminal. It was held on avenida de corrientes where the hostels on but several blocks away, they did shut down the street, it was strange to not hear cars. When I got back to the hostel there was a really ugly looking woman talking on the TV, little did I know that was la Presidenta, Cristina Kirchner.

another story....

GGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAL!!!!!!!!!! GGGOOOOAAAALLLLL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

At first I couldn´t understand where the hoarse screams were coming from or what they mean´t. Then my classmate yelled, ¨gggoooooooooooalll!!!!¨ I always knew that futbol was popular in south america but I had no idea how much until I got here. It´s engrained in the culture, it´s in very young child playing futbol with their amigos 11pm at night. It´s on every television in the cafes and bars, it´s in the eyes of all. Just today when I was enjoying a cup of cafe someone scored a goal and all of the cafe workers went insane. I have to say, I´m impressed and I´m becoming a big fan. Oh yeah, I never explained where the screaming was coming from. I was walking down the street and the screams were coming from an apartment. Todo bien. All good.

Viernes, 22 de Octubre de 2010

This has been a fairly busy week and to top it off, I´m just getting over a head cold. Along with studying spanish, my Biology classmates and I attended two seminars (two hours for each seminar) this week. There were nine scientific papers presented which meant we had to read all 9 papers. Por ejemplo....

My paper was titled, ¨Afforestation causes changes in post-fire regeneration in native shrubland communities of northwestern Patagonia, Argentina.¨

Some other papers were about the Andean Condors, ring-tailed coatis (raccoon family), plant-pollinator interaction, and a very interesting paper about Kulp Seagulls eating the blubber of Right Whales in the Peninsula Valdez. All very interesting studies that help us to better understand survey methods, data analysis, graphs to represent data, and local biology of Argentina.

Onward.

On my walk from the escuela (school) to the hostel I took a mental note of the different types of ¨things¨ one can buy on the calle (street). I don´t know if a high percentage of these were stolen, I´m guessin they were. You can´t leisurley stroll on a calle in Bs As. Besides swerving and dodging around vehicles, poop, and people, there are usually several pieces missing from the sidwalk. I´ve tripped more than I cant count. There are at least two people on every cuadra (block) aggresively trying to hand you a flyer. What I think is most facinating are the people selling random stuff. There´s señor hombre selling only tissue paper. Then theres la mujera selling socks and bras. You can also buy a plethora of toys and on my way home today I saw a man selling only womens electric razors. I could, technically, leave the hostel naked and buy everything I need by the time I get to school and it would cost me roughly 20 pesos or $5.

On the busiest sections of Avendia de Corrientes there are señor hombres selling bags of fried peanuts, etc. for 2 pesos, .50 cents. I´ve also noticed that Barney and The Simpsons are popular and believe me, the Simpsons is hilarious en español.

Wednesday was a full day. I had spanish from 1 to 4 pm then a field trip. W didn´t leave for a long time because of a protest (will explain in more detail later). When we finally got rolling we went to La Boca which translates to, the mouth of the river. This is a neighborhood known for their pinturas and rightfully bursting with pastel colors. Apparently there are only a few safe streets so it took us roughly 20 minutes to tour it. We passed two outdoor seated restaurants with live tengo dancing.

When we got back we were all tired (and I was ill) so we didn´t feel like walking back to the hostel. Instead, we took the subte (subway). I must stress that I have to be somewhat desperate to ride the subte. Once the subte pulls up, it´s a fight for all. You have to shove your way into the already sardine-like packed space. Once inside, it´s like playing bumper cars only some bumper cars are much larger and sweatier than others. Amy Flynn defined it very well, ¨it´s like surfing!¨
I got off near the hostel and picked up my laundry from the Lavanderia. I had it done for 10 pesos, roughly $2.50. On my way back to the hostel I pass a flora mercado and sometimes pick up vegetables and fruit from a verdularia (market of vegetables and fruit) for my dinner. But that night we went to a music show that was out of this world!

Tonight I´m having an ensalada con sauteed asparagus, mushrooms, garlic, and sauce. My amigo señor Julio gave me an alfajor con dulce de fruta, so I will indulge in this for desert. I will write about the protests later. Chau!

Night Life

It´s 5am and I´m still awake. I´M STILL AWAKE! We had an asado that started roughly around 11:30pm. We grilled up tons of meat and veggies. There was a live band playing music less than one block away so we danced and enjoyed the scene. A few of the band members (all hombres) were wearing dresses (one was a sweet black and white stripped, low cut). A girl even came out and performed flaming batons. The crowd blocked the street completely and we danced the night away....

This city never sleeps. When on my way out the door, headed for school, I was often asked by the hostel employees what I had done in the evening. My bedtimes roughly 11pm and this always shocks them. Pablo or Marcelo ask, ¨why aren´t you partying at the clubs!? That´s what you should be doing here!¨I decided it was time to live the argentinian life at least a couple times before we headed off to the campo.

Friday night was ladies night. We had dinner and drinks in Palermo then wandered around aimlessly trying to find a club. What seemed like two hours later (by now it´s 2am) we find the club. Everyone headed to a bar while my classmate, Kailee and I checked out the club. We spoke to a mother and daughter who couldnt get into the club because they didn´t have ID on them. So they gave us their tickets! They were super sweet. So we go into this club and it´s drenched in weed, no ones dancing, and there´s midgets dancing on stage. It gets better. There´s an old wrinkly, tall man in a dress swaying in the breeze of marijuana. There´s more. This gorgeous woman comes onto th stage wearing a bikini. It took a long time but the midgets slowly painted her and eventuallly all her clothes came off. Boring. I´ve seen naked bodies before. Long story short, we somehow found our way back to the hostel in time to watch day break. ¿Bueños noches, or should I say, Bueñas Dias!?

BTW, I bounced off the tire of a motorcycle a couple nights ago. I was heading back from playing futbol with my classmate David and it was en la noche. It was his fault. I was crossing th street to greet him when i was side swiped by a motorcicleta (whose light wasn´t on for I didnt see him). I obtained a few scratches and bruises and learned a great lesson. Vehicles don´t stop for pedestrians in Bueños Aires.

Buenos Aires, Argentina

I´m living a month in this busy city full of three million portenas. This word refers to the people that live next to the port, the Rio de La Plata which translates to River of Silver. This river is the widest in th world, with a total of about 13,500 square miles.*

15 students live at the Rancho Urbano hostel on a busy street called Avenida de Corrientes and roughly Avenida de Gascon. I share a very small room with three other chicas and one tiny bathroom. We are served a free breakfast which consists of th popular pastry, medialuna. Choices of manteca (butter), sweet dulce de leche, y variety of jams. There´s also small pieces of toasted bread (not sure what it´s called, everyone can hear one bite into it). There´s also frosted flake cereal for the norte de americanas which surprisingly none nof us really eat. To drink we geet cafe con leche y super sweet juice.

This is how I start my day and do my spanish homework. The hostel cat, Vito is usually around to perch on a shoulder or lap. I just bought a yoga mat (ssshhhoga colchaneta). The ¨y¨ and ¨ll¨ are pronounced with a ssshhhh. I look forward to doing my yoga every morning. I tend to get stressed being in the big city. The other students feel the same for we are students of biologia and we prefer las montañas, floras, y arboles (mountains, flowers, and trees).

I walk to and from school everday. It usually takes about 35 to 45 minutes depending on the foot traffic. There are extremely congested areas with people selling random things like socks, stolen jewelry, lots of kids toys, and yummy postres. There is a lot to see, such as beautiful flower shops, and kids getting out of school wearing their white or blue doctor looking jackets. There are always dog walkers with as many as 7, maybe more, dogs on and even sometimes off the leash.

I study spanish from one to four in the afternoon. The school is also on a very busy street full of ruidos (noise)! I´ve never heard so many different noises in my life! The bus can make a variety of whistles, honks, and tweets. The knife cutters perform a tune to let people know their there. Every car is constantly honking and one time in class someone laid on the horn for a good minute.

I share a local computer so have limited amount of time. I hope this gives everyone a feel for what I´m up to. There´s still so much to tell you! Until then, let me know if you have any questions. Chau

btw: this computer is old and a lot of the e´s dont get inserted.

*Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc. 2010. ¨Plata, Rio De La.¨ 9, Octubre. 2010. blah blah blah