Hi Everyone,
We finally found a place with a fast enough connection to upload our Antarctica pictures. Check out the album by clicking on the photo below.
Love,
Dena and Amit
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Beautiful Bariloche
| So it´s been about a week since our Antarctic adventure, and we´ve thawed out sufficiently to write another blog post... We left Ushuaia on Sunday morning, took an all day bus ride to a city called Rio Gallegos, then an overnight bus to Comodoro Rivadavia, and finally another overnight bus to Bariloche. This left us with an entire day to kill in the bustling city of Comodoro. We were hoping to spend it on the beach, but the gail-force Patagonian winds (which are apparently commonplace) prevented us from doing so. These winds were so strong they actually affected how we crossed streets, as we had to ensure an extra buffer for cars in case a gust came and stopped us in our tracks... The only attraction listed in the city in our Lonely Planet guide was the ¨state-of-the-art¨ Petroleum museum, but of course, that was closed (apparently closing Museums on Mondays is a worldwide phenomenon). Faced with the unpleasant possibility of whiling away the day in the bus station, we pondered where we might go that met our key criteria: free, comfortable, and sheltered from the wind. Drawing on my four years of consulting experience, we realized that a hotel lobby would be perfect! We opened up our Lonely Planet guide and for the first time turned to the ¨Top End¨ section of hotel list. We found a couple of hotels in the area, marched on in, and then Dena put on her sweetest face, spun a little tale, and voila: cushy couches, climate control, clean bathrooms, and that oh-so-wonderful hotel lobby smell! We were skating free and clear until at the very end of the day, back at the bus station, we ran into the doorman from the first hotel where we ¨squatted.¨ Caught in our web of deceipt we came clean, and the guy had a good laugh. We are now (or at least were when I started writing this post two days ago) in beautiful Bariloche, enjoying the sun (finally!), views, and food. At the northern edge of Patagonia, Bariloche is blessed with the breath-taking Patagonic scenery, but with much better weather than the rest of the region! Between Bariloche and a nearby town called San Martin de los Andes there is a 3-4 hour drive that takes you along seven lakes (this is after all the Lake District). We heard that the views were spectacular, so we decided to rent a car and see what all the fuss was about (we could have done it by bus, but it would have been harder to take pictures for you all to enjoy). After a little car rental agency confusion (I´ll spare you the details), we ended up with a "cozy" three-door VW Gol. Our theory is that it´s like the Golf in the US, except they chopped off some of the car, so they chopped off the "f" in the name as well. We did the standard walk around the car, signed the paperwork, got in, and were ready to go. Dena went to put the car in Drive, and only then realized that this car was NOT an automatic. We looked at each other, not sure what to do. Dena quickly got out of the car and asked the car rental agent if the company had any automatic cars. He gave her a quizzical look, so she started making some shifting hand motions while saying "automatico." He finally realized what she was saying, and then laughed, and sai,"Of course not." The guy´s son, who also works at the agency, helpfully added: "Don´t worry. It´s easy." SO, Dena got back in the car, we looked at each other again, and in classic Dena and Amit fashion, tried to analyze whether or not we should go ahead with our plans. Dena, I found out, learned to drive a stick 11 years ago on her Dad´s Corvette. Me driving was out of the question since I left my driver´s license at the TD Bank North Garden in Boston the day before we left for Argentina (it has since been recovered). In any case, I´m not sure my very limited prior experience driving stick shift (under dubious circumstances in Mexico a few years ago) would have proven very helpful. After carefully weighing the risks of getting into an accident with the comedic value it would provide for the blog, we decided to go for it. To appreciate the full predicament of our situation, imagine if someone dropped you at the top of a hill in San Francisco in a manual car, with almost no prior experience driving stick, double-parked on a busy road, and then add to that the fact that the right of way rule in Argentina appears to be that whoever has more momentum when approaching an intersection has the right of way. Fortunately, we were facing down-hill, so Dena put her foot on the clutch, and we slowly rolled our way down to the bottom of the hill. We then did a few loops around a relatively flat section of road so Dena could practice getting into first gear. It was a little jerky, but the car was relatively forgiving, and Dena managed a few consecutive starts and stops without stalling, so we started to feel pretty good. From there we were off to the races, Dena driving carefully and me side-seat driving the whole time ("Second Gear! Second Gear! Don´t forget to switch to second!¨). We finally pulled into Bariloche many hours later, and as we were waiting in line to refill our car, the gas station lights went out. We asked if the station was closing, and the guy said there was no power. We looked around and realized there was no power in the entire city. SO, Dena then had to drive into the city in the dark, without street lights, and more importantly without traffic lights (you cannot make this stuff up). Other than that and a few stalls in some not so fortunate situations, everything went fairly smoothly (mayby jerkily would be a better description), and the view was definitely worth the climb. The scenery was indeed spectacular (see a couple of pictures to the right). A couple of conclusions: we Americans should appreciate more our automatic transmitions (especially cruise control), and everyone should learn to drive a stick shift. A few other highlights from our time here:
That´s all for now. Tomorrow morning we´re off to Pucon, Chile, for some hiking, rafting, etc. -Amit and Dena | Dena shows off freshly purchased chocolates from Mamuschka, the best chocolate shop in Bariloch (in our humble opinion) Amit cuts into his steak from El Boliche de Alberto  A pictuure of my cousin Eitan and his girlfriend Maayan that we found at our hostel, where they stayed two years ago  Proof of the stick-shifting that was going on  Lago Nahuel Huapi, on which Bariloche sits  One of the other seven lakes (damned if I can tell which one)  Pasta making in action at the other El Boliche de Alberto  Finishing dinner at 12:30am (a little late, but not so unusual)  Folk music band in the main square of Bariloche  Beautiful vista outside Bariloche  Ditto  |
Saturday, February 14, 2009
Ice World, Part II
| Okay, so I guess I shouldn´t be surprised that this post ended up needing to be broken in half. After 12 days of this incredible trip, there is a bit more to tell you about than can fit in a single posting! First, I need to clarify a few things since the last post. Amit would like me to tell you that the Drake Passage is widely recognized as the roughest seas in the world! The convergence, which is an area of ocean where the Southern Ocean meets the Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian Oceans, is extremely choppy and dangerous, particularly between South America and the Antarctic peninsula... this area is actually the narrowest space that the Southern Ocean has to squeeze through to continue to circulate the globe (just to clarify: when we were in elementary school, there was no such thing as the Southern Ocean, there were only four oceans- the Atlanta, Pacfic, Indian, and Arctic... now there is a fifth ocean, the Southern Ocean, that surrounds Antartica!). Second, we didn´t really pack for this particular adventure... as far as equipment, our travel agent in Ushuaia loaned us some waterproof pants, the ship gives you a nice red and black waterproof jacket (which you get to keep), and you borrow a pair of rubber water boots (like galoshes) to use for all of the landings. Underneath that gear, we wore long underwear, sweatshirts, and t-shirts, as well as our own winter hats, scarves, and gloves, which we brought because we knew that even southern South America is not that warm in summer. Finally, on Antarctica, there are only science research stations... no commercialism at all. If you want more information on the governance of Antarctica, look up the Antarctic Treaty of 1959 (it is governed by cooperating countries who believe it should only be used for international peace and science). Oh, and one more thing... we heard a GREAT phrase to describe the penguins of Antarctica. The director of the oldest science research station (now a British museum) calls penguins: Environmental Terrorists! The move in to a pristine island and completely take over, ruining the smells, the sounds, and the landscape! And while we thought they were VERY cute animals and enjoyed seeing them, we completely understood why a resident of Antarctica would consider them as such! Okay, so on to more stories! In addition to our exciting adventures with penguins and whales, we also had three really special interactions with seals. We saw five different types of seals during our trip: Weddell Seals, Leopard Seals, Crabeater Seals, Southern Elephant Seals, and Fur Seals (actually part of sea lion family). The most exciting interactions we had, though, were with the Leopard, Elephant, and Fur Seals. For those of you who have seen the movie Happy Feet, you know that Leopard Seals don´t have the best reputation... in fact, they are one of the only penguin-eating seals and they have a very intimidating presence, as they swim back and forth along the shore of penguin colonies, waiting for the adult penguins to jump in the water so that the Leopard seals can have lunch. They are also very playful seals, and they are very willing to entertain a few rafts full of tourists in the water. We had two different experiences where a single Leopard seal (you only really see them solo) came right up to our raft, popping its head in and out of the water, then diving back down and swimming around in circles, then popping back up on a different side of the raft. VERY cool, but also a big tease because it is very hard to get a picture when you never know where he will pop up next! Then, on our final day of landings, we stopped at two places, Deception Island and then Hannah Point, where we found ourselves face-to-face with huge colonies of seals! At Deception Island, a special doughnut shaped island that is actually an active volcano (the center of the volcano is currently filled with water), we walked along the beach and came upon a huge colony of about 40 Fur Seals. Now Fur Seals are special because they are not true seals... they are actually sea lions and they have a unique ability to stand up on the front flippers and walk, almost like a dog. The colony we saw was VERY active. A large group of males, they were fully engaged in fighting, playing, and chasing tourists on the beach! It was incredible to watch them, as again, we had the realization that we were very much the ones out of place... we were in their home, and what we were seeing was the furthest thing from training and taming that you can possibly get! Then, at Hannah Point, we once again were merely walking along a small trail on the shore when we came upon 3 different groups of 10 HUGE Elephant Seals. The largest member of the seal family, the Southern Elephant Seal gets its name from the special trunk-like appendage that the mature males develop to attract females. And not only do they have pretty impressive noses, but they have a pretty overpowering stench and quite notable vocals... they sound like some combination of a human baby crying, a large and angry dog, and a pig being chased around its pen! Again, standing only 15 feet away from these small groupings of Elephant Seals and watching them in their natural habitat was a completely humbling experience. In Antarctica, you finally have the opportunity to feel small and insignificant, one of many species that inhabits our planet. And with less than 50,000 visitors to Antarctica every year, the curiosity and friendliness of these animals is much more out of ignorance of human beings than out of overexposure to us (like park squirrels). As many of the Antarctic advocates claim, Antarctica is truly the last pristine wilderness and our experience with wildlife was unparalleled. One last story, and then I´m going to work on creating a slideshow to post on either YouTube or Picasa: on a few of the days of our trip, the sun peaked out from behind the clouds and we actually got pretty hot under our many layers and waterproof gear. At those times, it was extremely tempting to just jump in the water! At some point, I´m not sure when, I actually decided that I needed to go swimming in Antarctica. I just needed to say that I had done it... so I started asking the expedition staff when would be a good place. Finally, at Deception Island (an active volcano!), the staff offered to dig us a hot tub... right at the shoreline, the rocks and water is being heated by the magma that is relatively close to the surface and if you dig down 1-2 feet, you actually can create a HOT pit of water right next to the freezing Antarctic waters. So Amit and I put on our bathing suits (underneath our other 3-4 layers of warm clothes) and at the end of the landing, we stripped down, dove into the FROZEN water, and then immediately jumped into the hot tub! Then, just because we could, we went back to the freezing water for one more dip, and then back into the hot tub to warm up! It was crazy, but it was GREAT fun! We had a friend take our video, and lots of people offered to send us pictures of our dip, so we will post them as soon as we get them! A few more funny and/or interesting notes about our trip:
Overall, we had an incredibly wonderful time! Our first real experience on a cruise ship was fantastic (logistics, crew, food, accommodations) and our experience off the ship was even more amazing! After all of our encounters with the wildlife and our hours enjoying the scenery, we were pretty much left speechless... as a famous scientist once said so appropriately, we were truly aliens in Antarctica! If you ever want an experience to remind you why we need to recycle, waste less, drive our cars less, or make more frequent/larger donations to environmental conservation organizations, this was it. What a beautiful, untouched, untainted wilderness filled with fascinating, complex, marvelous animals! In addition to the pictures on this post and the last post, we plan to put up a full photo album of our best pictures from this trip. We will post a link on the blog directly to the album, so you should see it coming soon! Please keep leaving us comments... we LOVE your notes and will try to answer your questions whenever we can! Now we are off to Bariloche, chocolate capital of Argentina! Look forward to a yummy post coming soon! Love, Dena & Amit | Iceberg threatens the ship´s gangway (remember, you are only seeing about 15% of the iceberg, the rest is under water) Dena and our Polish Captain  A crabeater seal wallowing in a freshwater pool on top of an iceberg  One of the leopard seals that played with our raft  Vernadsky research station (Ukranian base)  Our expedition team pours shots to celebrate the southernmost point on our journey (which also happened to be the furthest south the ship has ever been)  Posing in front of a glacier in Neko Harbor  Two fur seals goofing around on the water´s edge  Barbeque aboard the Polar Star  Taking a dip in the frigid Antarctic waters (just so we could say we did!)  |
Ice World
| I barely know where to start with this post... so I will start with the basic facts and then try to work my way toward our impressions. This morning we returned from a 12 day trip to Antarctica, which was one of the most incredible experiences either Amit or I have had in our short lifetimes! We heard about the possiblity of visiting Antarctica from Amit´s cousin Eitan and his girlfriend Maayan, who traveled there two years ago. When we first arrived in Argentina, we immediately sought out a travel agent who could sell us last-minute seats on any of the Antarctic cruises. As you already know from earlier posts, we were able to purchase two seats on the MV Polar Star, a medium sized boat that is most well-known for its itinerary that takes the ship below the Polar Circle, something that most other cruises don´t do. So on the day of our embarkation, we packed, did laundry, sent out some final emails, and then went down to the dock in Ushuaia to check in with the ship. We found our room on the ship, a small cabin with two twin beds (there are almost NO double beds on board, and the ones that exist are given to the special folks who pay FULL price) and the most beautiful sight... a private bathroom (hostel life can make you a bit sensitive about these things)! So about an hour later, we pushed off from the dock, sailed down the Beagle Channel (where we saw our first wildlife, Magellanic Penguins!), and that night, we entered the dreaded Drake Passage. Now for those of you who know Amit, you know that he traditionally doesn´t do well on boats (think: immediate green complexion when we went out on his first dive trip in 1-2 foot seas!), but he was feeling brave with his sea-sickness patch stuck behind his ear and we both did very well the first evening and first full day. We were also VERY lucky, as the Drake was much calmer than normal and we only had 4-6 waves/swells. Day 3 (the second full day) didn´t go quite as well, as the seas picked up (6-8 foot swells) and Amit didn´t get a chance to enjoy much of the delicious lunch or dinner prepared for us that night. But the end was in sight, and on the morning of Day 4, we woke up and looked out our window to see our first iceberg!!! Just a quick review of the activities on Day 1-3: there isn´t really anything to see as you cross the Drake Passage except for albatross and other sea birds flying around the ship, so during these days, we ate a lot and enjoyed lectures and films prepared by the ¨Expedition Team¨(the adventure staff, as opposed to the kitchen/operations/mechanical staff), all focused on Antarctic geology, history, and biology. On Day 4, we finally arrived at the Antarctic Peninsula, the most accessible and interesting part of the Antarctic continent. In fact, there are almost no land animals in Antarctica... all of the animals who nest or make their homes in Antarctica are aquatic (penguins, seals, sea lions, whales, various other sea birds) and the only come on land to do some of the life cycle activities, so the peninsula offers them lots of ocean access with just enough land to take care of business. So on each of the subsequent 6 days, we would cruise to a different part of the peninsula, get on our waterproof gear, and get into little black inflatable (but motorized) rafts to get to land or cruise around the icebergs. The two main focuses of the raft-based adventuring (which were called ¨landings¨) were to find and/or observe wildlife or visit current or historic research stations. The latter was less interesting to us, so we´ll mostly be showing you pictures of the incredible wildlife... and of course the scenery (icebergs, glaciers, and crazy steep mountains everywhere!). A few specific memorable events to tell you about: First, on just about every day of landings, we had extremely close encounters with penguins... hundreds of thousands of them! They were on every island or beach that we landed on, and boy do they smell bad!!! Antarctica is actually somewhat of a desert, in that it gets very little precipitation every year, so there is nothing to wash away all of the POOP that the penguins leave everywhere. So it sticks royally any time you are close to a penguin colony. We got to enjoy three specific types of penguins... Chipstrap, Adelie, and Gentoo penguins. There are only about 17 types of penguins in the world, so this was pretty special. Each of the penguin colonies we visited had tons of baby penguins running around, as you will see in our pictures, and as you will experience in our video (to be put together at a later date), the penguins also blessed us with the very LOUD and GRATING squaking! But despite the smell and the sound, we had an incredible time seeing these beautiful birds in their natural habitat, playing, eating, swimming, and interacting with their fellow penguins with very little regard for the strange red and black animals swarming their neighborhood (as you will see from our pictures, all of the passengers on our ship received red and black waterprood Polar Star jackets and it really made us look funny when we all landed in the same place at once). Okay, one more story and then I´m going to keep you in suspense by extending this post into two posts (there is just TOO much to write in one post!): The most incredible animals we saw on our trip were, of course, the whales. There are about 6 types of whales that hang out in Antarctica in the summer, and we had the priviledge of seeing two, the Humpback and the Minke. Minke whales are VERY fast and skittish, so our experiences with them were limited to just viewing them from a distance, but the Humpback whales are actually very social animals... and boy did we socialize with them! On three different occasions, once from the side of one of the inflatable rafts and twice from the deck of the ship, we had the chance to see Humpbacks VERY CLOSE (like 5-10 feet away!) and watch as they fed, danced, and played with our ship/raft. The most incredible occasion was from within the raft... the whale was swimming, twisting and playing right at the surface of the water near our raft that it was what some would consider a miracle. The whale could have easily flipped our raft but instead it was curiously checking us out or giving us some sort of show... it was absolutely amazing, and it went on for more than 20 minutes!!!!!! At some point, I just put my camera down in my lap and watched... it was so hard to capture the emotion that this type of close encounter evokes and I really just wanted to experience the moment (but don´t worry, we got plenty of pictures and video!). The second occasion was unique because for 15 minutes or so, we watched three Humpback whales feed on krill (Antarctic shrimp), bursting through the surface of the water and then diving back down - over and over! Okay... so I have to stop or this post will get completely out of hand... but I promise to write again in the next day or two with some final stories, impressions, and more PICTURES from our trip!!!!! Lots of love (and off to warmer places!), Dena & Amit | Amit faces off with a Gentoo Penguin at our first landing  The close encounter with a Humpback whale from our raft (we had to zoom OUT to capture this shot)  Beautiful iceberg  Gorgeous scenery from our southernmost latitude (South of Antarctic Circle at 67.5 degrees South)  Us admiring the landscape (small dots in background are penguins)  Calm Antarctic bay  Small penguin colony  A few Penguin chicks "chillin" in the sun  Baby penguins... need we say more?  A "firesky" sunset  |
Monday, February 2, 2009
Torres del Paine, Chile
Hi Everyone, We are back in Ushuaia today (southern tip of Argentina), and in four hours we embark on our Antarctic Cruise!!!!!!!! (two of those exclamation marks are mine and the other six are Dena's :) ). Before we go offline for 12 days or so, we wanted to give you all an update on our camping / hiking trip in Torres del Paine national park in Chile. It was a fairly grueling trip (especially for someone as out of shape as me), covering about 50 miles in 5 days, almost all either uphill or downhill (my knees still hurt, 2+ days later). The camping added an element of difficulty / funkiness, but we navigated our tiny two person tent and mini gas stove fairly well, including delicious dinners of instant soup & rice, mac & cheese, pasta al pesto, and tortellini! Why did we subject ourselves to all this (not to mention the rain and crazy wind, up to 70mph in some places)? In short, the spectacular views. The three highlights of the trip were:
After the hike we went back to Puerto Natales (the launching point for going to the park) and had a very chill recuperation day, and we even managed to watch the Super Bowl. It was't easy finding a bar that had the game, but we finally saw a place with a satellite dish, looked inside, and saw a bunch of Americans sitting around a TV... It was a great game, but I have to say it wasn't quite the same without a) the Patriots playing and b) the commercials... One final note about the very interesting hostel we stayed at it Puerto Natales, called Erratic Rock. It is owned / run by three Oregonian ex-pats, who range from far-left to ultra-far-left (i.e., socialist) political views. This works out well for us visitors, because they really are trying to help you enjoy the park, rather than nickel and dime you for every service. They give a free, incredibly helpful 2-hour talk every day to any prospective hikers, regardless of whether or not they are staying at the hostel. They serve the best breakfast we've had yet in South America (eggs, homemade banana bread, etc.), and most importantly, they have a good sense of humor. For example, above one of the toilets there is a sign that says "If you poop here it will not flush and after you leave everyone will look at it." That's all for now. Wish us luck (and warmth) on our cruise! Love, Amit and Dena | Glaciar Grey  French Valley  Amit modeling the "two-man" tent  Cool tree  Warm and toasty in our sleeping bags, waiting for the sun to rise at the Torres viewpoint  The Torres del Paine (cleverly named, North Tower, Central Tower, and South Tower)  Us on day 5, at our funkiest... Good thing cameras don´t capture smell :)  |
Sunday, February 1, 2009
And we´re back...
Hi All,
After five days in the Patagonian wilderness, we are back on-line. As promised in our previous post, here is a short video of me doing something stupid... Check back shortly for a post on our recent treking adventure to Torres del Paine national park.
-Amit and Dena
After five days in the Patagonian wilderness, we are back on-line. As promised in our previous post, here is a short video of me doing something stupid... Check back shortly for a post on our recent treking adventure to Torres del Paine national park.
-Amit and Dena
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)