Making pottery and making friends.

Ahh the simple joys in life! I am looking back on this past week with sheer joy as I think about all of the wonderful people I met and the fun things I did. The week started out with just some simple things planned--classes, test, meet up with tandem partner. It turned out to be a great week and I was even more reaffirmed that I love Santiago! First, although I have met some Chileans, I actually made a friend! His name is Pablo and I met him at church at San Joaquin. He works in the Pastoral UC and is a director of student affairs. We went around the city first to a Schoenstatt sanctuary, then to the sanctuary of San Padre Alberto Hurtado, and Cerro San Cristobal at night! San Padre Hurtado is one of Chile's two national patron saints and actually died in 1952 and was canonized in 2005. Not only is his tomb there, but there is also a museum where you can see a lot of the things he used etc, but I learned about his life and he seems to be a pretty amazing man. Ironically, my tandem partner gave me one of his books as a gift the first time we met up, so I am practicing Spanish and reading about an amazing man at the same time. It's called Un fuego que enciende otros fuegos and is definitely a nice change-up to the Spanish Picaresque novels that I have to read for one of my classes. Well the week went off without a hitch, I took my exam on Thursday, which is certainly nothing like the exams at UW-Madison, let me tell you. It was two essays that were each a page long, but for each one we could choose between three. Hopefully I'm not too overconfident on this one but I'd say it went alright. Ellie and I decided to celebrate after a long three-day week regardless and her, Laura, Ramiro (Laura's host brother) and I took a bus to Bar Apoquindo to relax, sit outside, and enjoy a trago, or drink. The next day was Friday so of course that meant getting not much done and hanging out with Mama. On Friday night however Yvonne and I did teach our English class at San Joaquin and although less students showed up than last time, I think the audience was a little more captive due to the fact that we were a little more prepared.

Friday night Laura, Ellie and I went with Laura's host brother's friends to a fire station turned private party and danced the night away. It was a lot of fun but the 7:30 alarm came a lot sooner than we all would have liked! However, that alarm was well worth it and Saturday was the best yet. When I first arrived in Santiago Mama gifted me a nice ceramic cup and saucer set and told me that there is a city nearby that specializes in greda and all of the other students that come here always end up buying some for themselves and taking it home. Since that first day I have wanted to go to Pomaire and Saturday I had just that chance! Our Michigan-Wisconsin program went as one of our three scheduled trips to Pomaire for the day and it was cool being so close to Santiago yet in a completely different world. The whole 8.000-person town revolves around the greda industry and their amazing gastronomical productions. They are known for their medio-kilo empanadas, pastel de choclo and other Chilean cuisine.

We got there just in time to enjoy a wonderful breakfast in a home of the people who would be our "guides" throughout the day and then went to a taller, or workshop, for greda and witnessed the process from start to finish, an incredibly laborious process! It was so amazing to see the guy just slap some clay on a spinning plate-type thing and within less than two minutes, bam! An amazing greda pot. The childlike nature of all of us came out when we were able to make our own! No, we did not get to keep them but I am positive that they will definitely be selling those beauts.
After that we walked to another house in Pomaire to make our own chanchitos! Pomaire is known for their pig-like pottery and chanchitos are little coin banks that are one of those "you have to do that in Pomaire" kind of thing. We went to the house of a sweet old man and he showed us the whole process from start to finish so that we could make our own. Again, it was fun taking a blast from the past into 4th grade art class and making pottery like children. Unfortunately, although not surprisingly, by the time I got home my chanchito had no ears and was missing a leg. But it was the memory that counts.
After that we all walked back to our starting point of the day where they had prepared us a home-style, Chilean lunch. They had "empanaditas" (which I find comical because that translates literally to "little empanadas" and these were anything but little!) as an appetizer (yes, I know what you're thinking) and then chicken and rice, corn, salads, and popsicles for dessert. You could say that I enjoyed Pomaire in all facets.
After that we were allotted some time to walk around, check out the artisan shops, see all of the different types of greda and see most, if not all, of Pomaire. You could spend an hour and a half walking and see plenty of the city, believe me. But after that we left, I zonked out on the bus home, and was in casa by 7:30 pm. That left me just enough time to get back to Madison to meet Kate and Leah at the Nitty to celebrate their big 2-1!
Well I may not have been there but it was actually Yvonne's 20th so we, and by we I am talking about 26 people, went out to celebrate. It was a lot of fun to be with all of these new people from different countries who only two months ago had no idea that one another even existed. We danced the night away and clocked in around 4:30 a.m. for the second night in a row. Oh the joys of being young! On Sunday I was surprised when the extended family started showing up and found out we were having a big barbecue for lunch! It was fun eating some more of Carlos' exquisite grilling delights, chit-chatting with all of my aunts and uncles and having them poke fun at me. At first I just got nervous and accepted everything they said to me with a smile and a nervous giggle but I think I can say that I have successfully graduated to a stage where I can tease back and add in my own commentary in conversations!

It looks like it was a great week in Santiago overall, and I am still loving every minute of it, despite the "cold" weather that is starting to come in.
Until next time, chau!

Santiago is a wonderful place to be.

That is no lie! I was fortunate enough to spend the entire weekend here; that's right, no traveling for me this weekend folks! I love picking up and noticing the little details that make Santiago so great. For example, the weather is still beautiful. Sunshine every single day, knock on wood. I think that may be my favorite part. There is a nice little bench out on our patio and it's right in the sunshine. Of course Mama thinks I'm crazy when I sit out there in the direct sun, but don't worry, I take caution and apply SPF. ;)

Another fun thing about Santiago is surprisingly the stray dogs! While I avoid them every time I approach one on the sidewalk and by avoid I mean I either turn around and walk a different way or cross the street and hope he doesn't follow me, they use the sidewalks and abide by the crossing signals! Of course they like to roam in the parks and whatnot, but for the most part the dogs stay on the sidewalks and even if there are no cars coming, they wait for the "little green man" to cross the street in the crosswalk! It is so funny! I smile everytime I see it.

I think I am also getting used to the buses and the metro more and more each day. This is a definite plus because when you get the hang of how they operate it makes life a whole lot easier! Yesterday I went out to lunch with my friend Karrah and we just sat outside and shared a pizza del huerto, or rather, pizza of the garden. Corn, esparagus, eggplant, tomato, and mozzarella....mmm it was pretty delicious. And it was also my first time actually eating out in Santiago-I am used to Mama always cooking me meals so I don't need to spend my money, but I thought it would be a nice changeup, and a nice way to see some more of Santiago only costing roughly $5 for a full tummy.

Ellie and I have begun taking nightly walks which has also been nice; Las Condes is a really great neighborhood and honestly I'm more afraid of the dogs (although they really are harmless) than I am of the people. Funny story: the other day on the way to school the micro (bus) was really packed and there was a slightly shady man next to Ellie. She said he was acting kind of wierd (which was true) and when he got off the bus she looked and the front pocket of her backpack was unzipped! Luckily we have been warned not to keep valuables there but it was definitely an eye-opener for me because as many may already know, I can be very trusting, especially of the elderly. This reaffirmed me that I need to constantly be aware of the people around me, no matter their age.

It was a great weekend in Santiago for a few reasons, but especially because I was able to spend so much time with Mama and Carlos. If I have failed to mention Carlos he is Mama's younger brother who lives with us. It is actually really nice having him around because he is like my improv Chilean dad/brother. I was able to eat lunch on both Saturday and Sunday with them (which is a treat because I've been gone so often!) and even have once (OWN-say), which is kind of like their dinner but usually consists of bread and some extras, with them. They teased me for not being able to pronounce my r's, but I loved every minute of it. On Sunday, apart from being Divine Mercy Sunday was also the feast day of Quasimodo, which is an age-old tradition in Chile in the Catholic Church where they bring the sick and injured to mass to get a special blessing. I didn´t get to witness any of the traditions, but perhaps another time.

On Friday night was also the birthday party of our friend Kevin. He is a sweetheart from Michigan in our program and we all went to Jess and Alyssa´s house where they threw him a little party. There were a lot more Chileans than gringos which definitely surprised me! It provided a fun atmosphere to practice spanish and learn a little bit more of how young people actually speak, rather than always talking to Mama and Carlos. However, two things that are present in conversation regardless of age is the infamous "¿cachai?" and "po". Cachai is literally thrown in after every 4th or 5th word in most conversations and it translates to "understand?" I love it. And po is added to most, if not all words. I think it is something that although I am accustomed to, I will still smile each time I hear someone say sipo, OBviopo, Chilepo, etc etc.

In school-related news I officially have a tandem conversation partner, which is someone that signs up with the university to practice their English with a student who wants to practice their Spanish. His name is Christian Morales and we meet weekly to practice our respective languages, chit chat about life and whatnot. It's pretty fun and is helping me learn and gain confidence with my speaking. He is also an ayudante, or TA, of one of the classes I was about to take so I had met him before we found out we got paired together. Small world, even here in Santiago!

Lastly, on Friday night was my first night teaching English to Chileans! Belén UC is a volunteer program with the Pastoral UC on the San Joaquin campus and they have a program where they teach adults who either did not finish college, got pregnant, or who simply want to come back and learn a variety of subjects. My friend Yvonne from New Zealand actually signed up to teach as well and we got randomly paired to teach the same class! What are the odds? I repeat, small world. But it was definitely an interesting experience and I am already looking forward to this Friday! The students are mainly between the ages of 17 and 22 so they are my own age, except of course for the nice 60 year old caballero who sat right in the front row.

Overall, it was an enjoyable week in Santiagopo and I am looking forward to what this week has in store! Ciao ciao!

Time out!

Rather than being a post to describe some of my exciting adventures and life in South America, I want to give you a wonderful opportunity to help out at no cost to you! During high school I had a couple of wonderful opportunities to go on a mission trip to Mississippi and work with MadCAAP (Madison County Allied Against Poverty), and they are an organization that builds homes for single mothers who can barely feed their children. It was very moving to see the families of 7 or more children living in vans, tattered homes, and yet we came to the work site each day in our air conditioned coach bus. The crews that we worked with were incredible--friendly, generous, patient, humble and kind. They live to serve and it is extremely inspiring!

Sometimes we forget how lucky we really are! Pepsi is giving away a grant of $50,000 to the idea gets voted as the best and this is your opportunity to vote for MadCAAP!

http://www.refresheverything.com/madcaap

You can cast your vote each day until April 30th, please take just a few seconds each day to do this! Your vote will go a long way! We jumped 5 spots in one day, I know we can do this! Also, after you sign in you have to hit the vote button again, make sure that your vote counts!

Thank you so much for your help! MadCAAP will appreciate it!

Video from Iguazu

Here is a link to a little compilation so that you can actually see and hear the falls at Iguazu! Incredible!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MiPf4I49RdQ

Enjoy!

Could I please pay in Argentinian pesos and get Uruguayan pesos in return?

Feliz Pascua a todos! I hope everyone had a great Easter, mine was definitely one that will be remembered, but first to tell you about the rest of my trip to Argentina! To begin with, Iguazú Falls was hands-down my favorite part, no contest. After being able to spend nearly a day and a half in the park frolicking through the falls, wandering the trails, seeing little raccoon-like coatis snatch people's sandwiches, taking moonlit tours... it is easy to understand why we all liked it so much. Whenever there is a full moon, for the five nights surrounding it the park does tours to the Garganta del Diablo (devil's throat) to see the falls by the moonlight. It was such an amazing experience and to think that we just happened to be there at the right time with beautiful weather is incredible. We ended up doing the tour and a dinner at a fancy restaurant inside the park where there was some amazing steak and an all-you-can-eat buffet (uh-oh...). We enjoyed some exquisite Argentine dining, fine wine, and even caipiriñas, which are sugary cocktails popular in Argentina and Brazil. It was definitely a different experience to visit the park at night; there were different aromas, sounds and overall a much more tranquil feel than during the daytime. There were a lot of people there and when we were eating dinner the lights went out (which quite frankly didn't surprise me) so we were able to enjoy our fine dinners by candle/cell phone light. The harpist continued to play, almost as if out of a movie. How romantic. We also met some girls from England and California that came with us and it was exciting and inspiring to hear about their travels. The number of people that are simply traveling for five to six months is so cool; there are so many young people just like me who are simply taking advantage of the time and their youth and backpacking through South America. Although I'm technically "studying abroad," I sometimes feel like I'm doing the same thing! The next day our bus was not scheduled to leave until 2:50, so the four of us girls walked around Puerto Iguazú, wandered in and out of tourist shops and enjoyed delicious $.75 ice cream cones and believe me, they were worth every peso. It was extremely hot (although no complaints here, I thrive in the warm weather); in fact so much so that even ice cream shops were closed due to the heat! Imagine that! Puerto Iguazú is a really quaint little Argentine town, basically thriving off of the tourist industry being the main gateway to the falls, but one thing that it does have will blow your mind: an uncontrolled 7-way intersection! The Siete Boca, which roughly translates to seven mouths, is pretty interesting and I sure am glad there is nothing like that in Wisconsin! We eventually made our way over (all the way across the street from our hostel) to the bus terminal to await our shuttle to our next destination: Buenos Aires (referred to as Buenos or B.A. in this post). Our 2:50 scheduled take-off time turned into 4:00, so unfortunately we had not eaten lunch and were getting a little testy. About an hour after being on the road we were stopped in the middle of the countryside for another hour and after many detours, pit-stops and practicing our patience we finally had a dinner consisting of three empanadas at 1 in the morning. I will say no more about this bus ride except for the fact that I *publicly* do not recommend the company Expreso Singer because a 17-hour ride can quickly turn into 22.5 hours.
After arriving in B.A. we all took much needed showers, ate a wonderful meal and got ready to enjoy our time in one of South America's biggest metropolis'! The next few days are all sort of rolled into one: we did some sight-seeing, went to a famous cemetery in La Recoleta which was really cool, and we even got to see the tomb of Evita (Eva Maria Duarte a.k.a. Evita, wife of former Argentine president Juan Peron). We went to La Boca neighborhood which is famous for its colorful buildings, traditional Euro-Buenos flare, and a bunch of artesanas, tourist shops and restaurants. We had lunch at a nice little restaurant where I decided I would order the milanesa completo, because here in Santiago the "completo" signifies lettuce, tomato, avocado and mayo (I usually nix the mayo), but apparently in Argentina it means cheese, ham, tomato and lettuce...not the same. Needless to say my sandwich turned out to be a fail, but it was still fun being entertained by the tango dancers on the stage and Lyndsey and my Kiwi friend Yvonne got pulled up to dance with them!

After finishing up in La Boca we made our way across the city to the cemetery and spent a little bit of time oohing and ahhing at the extremely ornate and decorated tombs. Our last night in B.A. we ended up going to a tango show and there was a special promotion with our hostel that included transportation, a free lesson, an amazing meal and a show all for roughly $45US. Not a bad deal! It was a lot of fun to get all dressed up and go experience a little more of the Buenos flare, and the tango is just such an amazing dance when the dancers are good! For dinner we had amazing Argentine steak (jugoso or medium rare) with all-you-can-enjoy red wine, followed by a delicious brownie for dessert. They even invited people to dance with them during the show and I decided to accept the offer and danced with one of the performers! Everyone was in agreement that the night was a success after two previous nights of letdowns with the discotheques and afterward we came home, had ample time for girl talk and hit the pillows. Karrah, Lyndsey, Laura and I got up nice and early to go catch our ferry back to Uruguay and made it there in about an hour, which was MUCH faster than the amount of time it took to get there! After getting to Colonia we took a bus back to Montevideo, grabbed some lunch to use up the rest of our Uruguayan pesos and before we knew it we were back in the airport, laughing and getting ready to board the plane. The plane ride was great, until of course we approached the Andes where the pilot advised everybody to stay in their seats and buckle up. I wondered why because I figured it would be just like flying over any other piece of land, but I soon realized why when we took a 45 degree nose dive and were experiencing some heavy turbulence. It is the norm when they cross the cordillera; I'm assuming because they have to make it over the mountains, it just caught all of us off-guard. I made it back home and realized just how much I missed Santiago when I heard the passport guy use the phrase "al tiro" which is exclusively and also very frequently used in Chile. I do love the Spanish here and would absolutely love to have the ability to speak like they do.

After visiting a couple other South American countries I really do prefer Chile and one of the reasons is that overall Chile is a much safer and secure país (country). It is the only country in South America where the cops cannot be paid off with bribes and there is also not the problem of counterfeit money as much as in other countries. Little to my knowledge I was handed a 50-peso bill in Argentina and when I went to exchange it for Chilean pesos at the airport I was informed that it was false. Due to the fact that it is actually about $14 I decided that I could not just throw it away, so I found a convenience store where luckily the cashier was not very attentive and ended up taking it. Technically, had I never gone to the currency exchange place I never would have known, so it's okay that I did that, right? Right. I also did get ripped off when I went to buy a glass of milk and paid with Argentine pesos and got 2 Uruguayan pesos in return, when I should have gotten 24. I may be a gringa but I'm not stupid.

Today was Easter and I finally got to experience a little bit of the tight-knit family life that most Chileans have. Almost all of Mama Maria's family came over and after going to mass at Las Nieves with Laura I ate lunch and sat around talking and sharing with the family, watching three-year-old Esperanza hunt for huevitos (little chocolate Easter eggs) and just enjoying some new and some familiar faces in the comforts of my own "home". Also, I have never seen people eat as much meat in one sitting as I saw today: fat and all! Carlos grilled out and returned with new pieces of meat every 20 minutes for a few hours and some people just do not turn him down! People actually laughed at me for staring but it was just something I have never seen before, even with my own dad!
I am excited (as well as Mama Maria) to stay in Santiago for a while and practice Spanish, catch up with my studies (and my sleep schedule!) and actually experience life in this city for a while! I hope you enjoyed my trip to Argentina!

Iguazu: Where Water Falls and Rainbows End.

Feliz Domingo de los Ramos! (a.k.a. Happy Palm Sunday!)

I am currently plopped in Puerto Iguazu in northeastern Argentina, which is a small town famous for its entrance into Parque Nacional Iguazu. This park boasts some of South Americas largest and most stunning waterfalls and let me tell you, they are amazing. Laura, Karrah, Lyndsey and myself all left on Friday morning from Santiago to fly into Montevideo, Uruguay. We had some time to kill before taking a bus to the ferry which would take us over to Buenos Aires, so we walked around the old city a bit, ate our lunches in a small plaza, and enjoyed walking by all of the peddlers trying to sell everything from antique phones to old silverware to license plates. Montevideo is definitely a really cool and old city, and a great way to pass a few hours of the afternoon. Something we really enjoyed was seeing the national culture of yerba mate. For those of you who do not know what yerba mate is, it is a strong tea that basically courses through the veins of Argentinians and Uruguayans alike all day every day. Every other person, whether a construction worker, police officer or shopkeeper would walk around with two things: a thermos of hot water and a cup of yerba mate. They keep the herbs in the cup all day and continually add hot water. We have yet to try it, but Laura and I are determined to have a sip before we leave Argentina!

We eventually got to our ferry that we were parked on for the next three hours, and it was actually quite fun! There was a lot of room for seating, sandwiches and alfajores (a delightful, Argentine cookie, you will see photos later) for purchase, and even a singer for entertainment! It was mainly tourists, but we ended up saving ourselves a roughly $140 entrance fee into Argentina by plane, so it was all worth it. We got into Buenos Aires around 10:15 pm, got our bags and then ran to El Retiro, the bus station that a sweet old lady recommended to us. We got there by taxi, each paying about $.50 and then ran upstairs to the different bus companies. Alhtough most of them had closed for the night we were determined to find the one that would sell us a bus ticket for Iguazu for that night. How naive we were. Nearly all of the companies had buses that left daily at 6 pm, and due to the fact that it was getting close to midnight we missed our shot. So we purchased our tickets for the following day and headed for a hostel in the San Telmo neighborhood of Buenos. We got a great hostel, slept well, had a good breakfast, and then got up and got to see some of the hotpots in Buenos--an awesome artesan market in San Telmo, La Casa Rosada, which is their version of the white house, except pink! (of course I was delighted) the famous Plaza de Mayo, the Catedral Metropolitano and enjoyed our first hand-made alfajores! We got a lot in before 6 pm when our bus left and after a 17 hour, super luxurious bus ride, we arrived in hot and humid Puerto Iguazu! The ride was by far the best one I have experienced thus far, and the longest as well! The seats were big and comfy, there were a couple of movies, and even a snack, a WARM dinner and a breakfast. Unfortunately Laura and I turned down the breakfast because she was serving it at 5:45 am, not knowing that that was our only chance. So when 10 am rolled around we were getting pretty hungry, but it was a beautiful day, and driving through the rainforest in a double-decker luxury tour bus is always kind of fun.

We got in this morning at 11, walked across the street to Hostel Marcopolo where we had made a reservation in Buenos, and then headed out to the park! It was only five pesos (about $1.50) to get there and it was worth all of the traveling we had done in the past week to get here. It really was indescribable and I am so excited to show you my pictures when I get back to Santiago! Until then this is one I pulled up from google images, just so you have a little taste.

We got back and Laura and I headed down to the local cathedral to see about mass times, and luckily we were about an hour and 45 minutes away from the next one! We came back, got cleaned up and headed back to mass at the pink cathedral (I am not quite sure why Argentines love pink so much, but it is A-OK with me!) and got to experience Palm Sunday Argentine style. Me gusta mucho. Now we are awaiting a few more days here in Iguazu and then back to Buenos until Saturday! Agenda for tomorrow: spend the day in the park, check out the trails, and tomorrow night go see the falls by the light of the full moon.

Life is good! Nos vemos!

Ciao ciao

Torres del Paine = Patagonia on Steroids

When describing Torres del Paine National Park one of my friends described it exactly as this: Patagonia on steroids. I had no idea what she meant until I finally saw for myself...

I am just going to begin this post by telling you that by posting pictures I am in fact not trying to make you jealous, I just want to show you how great God's creation really is!!
It all began on Thursday night when we went to the Santiago airport to await our 12:05 am flight. The terminals are still damaged due to the earthquake so we sat in a tent and laughed until the time finally came to board. We even got to walk on Air Force One style so that was pretty neat. The flight went well and we got into Punta Arenas right on time--3:30 a.m. While the majority of us slept comfortably on the airport floor, I stayed up to do a little reading for the quiz that awaited me when we got back on Tuesday. After a little work we found a number for a cab driver, Angel Gabriel, who picked us up and took us to the bus terminal in Punta Arenas in two groups. We made it to Puerto Natales within a few hours and by noon we had tickets to Torres del Paine for 2:30 and three tents. We were so excited. In fact, I was so excited that I tuckered myself out and on the bus on the way from Punta Arenas to Puerto Natales I fell asleep on the not-so-well-groomed man next to me. Even thinking about it will bring me a smile and a little chuckle. After getting our bus situation worked out we treated ourselves to one last good meal before the camping began, and had lunch at a little pizzeria downtown.

Upon being dropped off at the park we (as in John and myself, everyone else fell asleep on the van ride!) were greeted by amazing views, flamingos, sheep, llamas, foxes, you name it! This park actually has WILD animals! It's pretty great. But anyway, after getting our gear on and setting out we soon realized we forgot the third two-person tent in the van and unfortunately our driver was MIA so we decided we would get it from him the next day and just rent another one for the night. We started the long trek to Refugio Chileno where we set up camp for tne night. We had no idea that the hike would be entirely up and over a mountain! It definitely was hard, but a great bonding experience and a great way to feel like part of a team. We did end up racing the clock as we did not get to the park until after 5 pm and had a 3.5 hour hike ahead of us. John, Alyssa and I made it to the refugio just as night was setting in, rented an extra tent and started setting up. Everyone else got there in no time and we took advantage of the table space to bring in our peanut butter sandwiches, tuna salad on the spot, bread and jelly and heaps of peanuts and raisins. We did not stay up too late because we knew were going to get up before the crack of dawn to trek 2+ hours to the famous torres to see the sunrise. Before going into our tents and nearly tripping over the fox lingering around the doorway of the refugio, a couple of us took a romantic moment to just gaze in awe at the stars. As you may already know I am a sucker for celestial bodies (especially the stars) and this was the first time I have ever seen the Milky Way with my naked eye! There were so many stars that we couldn't even find the Big and Little Dippers. It was pretty awesome.


The next morning we had planned to be out the door by 6 am to trek to the torres (large towers from which the park derives its name) and unfortunately due to our friend the fox stealing Jess's shoe, it set us back a bit and a couple wrong turns led a couple of us to actually *mistakenly* leave the path and crawl up the side of the mountain on our hands and knees. That was a big whoops. The only view we got of the torres was the top half but we know in our hearts what it looked like, thanks to one of the actually successful hikers showing us his pictures as we met him on his way back down the mountain. Although we missed the sunrise and it was starting to sprinkle, we made it the rest of the way to the torres and got to see exactly what the hype has been all about. They are extremely massive and like everything else, pictures just do not do it justice.

After navigating our way back down through the rocks and boulders we got back to Refugio Chileno, packed up our things and set off to head back to the park entrance where our escort was going to take us to Lago Pehoé, from where we were going to catch a catamaran to the other side of the lake equipped with campsites and another refugio. The catamaran was absolutely great! Within five minutes of boarding and dropping our mochilas (backpacks), we were offered coffee and/or hot chocolate with cookies! One of the crewmen told us to drink it fast because there were waves, but we didn't really know what he meant. As the good students that we are we listened to him and within 10 minutes the boat was hitting enormous waves!! It was unreal, but quite the adventure! People were squealing with delight, getting seasick and just generally having a great time. Within no time were arrived to the other side where we paid our $9/person to sleep outside, yet again, set up our tents and relaxed the rest of the evening, enjoying the campers' kitchen and making friends with some people from Israel! Apparently this park is a hot-spot destination for Israelis because there were a lot of them there. After scarfing down our dinners and drooling over the actual campers' warm food, we set out back to our tents where we made it to sleep within the hour.

Steph, Laura and I slept all together in a cozy two-person tent, but had some great giggles and actually woke up in the middle of the night sweating! And let me tell you, it was not warm out! Apparently those tents really do a great job of blocking the wind!

The next morning we got up and set out to go see Glacier Grey. Minus the "DANGER" warning sign painted on a rock for part of the path, this path was a breeze in comparison to the last two and seeing the glacier was pretty amazing. We decided to not hike an extra four to five hours to the next lookout point and just take our time coming back. We were all glad we did because we got to frolic around a bit and try getting blown away by some of the extreme wind. For a split second I opened up my jacket and parachute mode kicked in and I was nearly knocked off my feet! It was unreal! We eventually made it back to the site and after being welcomed by an amazing view of the lake through the valley we took much needed showers, ate some dinner and then tried to warm up by sitting in the bar enjoying some chelas (a.k.a. beers). We retreated back to our tents quite early, despite the rain and extreme wind, and the next morning woke up, a couple times, and eventually made our way back on the boat, to the bus, to Puerto Natales where we had a delicious fried meal followed by chocolateria hot chocolate and desserts! It was quite the weekend.
We had a ton of laughs, learned a lot about camping and I know I got bit by a Patagonia bug and cannot wait to go back! While I hope you enjoyed reading the literature, I really just want you to enjoy the photos. Included are a couple of my favorites.