Sliding down

The most fun part was sliding down on our asses, this way it only took us like an hour to get down, and we had quite a few laughs watching the other people , tumble down the hill downing summer salts and other maneuvers (unintentionally).

Close to the top

At this point, fumes from the smoking volcano engulfed every once in a while, suffocating us with sulfur and other gases, it was not that bad though, as we did not have to put on our gas masks,

Tough climb

The part of the climb was optional, it was possible to take the ski lift instead, but I decided with three other people to do it by foot, in retrospective I should have just taken the ski lift, since even with the ski lift, hours of hiking were still needed to get to the top.

The hike was quite tough, especially with the heavy boots we had, midway I was feeling my leg muscles, later though I got into a good rhythm and forgot about the pain (or maybe I just got to numb to feel any pain)

Fully equipped

As part of the tour we are provided with proper clothing for climbing on snow and ice, including an ice pick, useful on steep icy parts, but most importantly, is the only thing that will stop you from rolling all the way down if you slip.

Finally climbed the Volcano

So finally we had good weather on Sunday and went ahead with the climb the volcano. I am little disappointed as when we reached the top it was cloudy up there, and we could not see the lava. But never the less, it was a great hike and the weather was great most of the way up, add to that the fun we had sliding down the mountain on our asses, and I feel it was worth the wait.

What a bad week !

I have been waiting since tuesday for good weather to climb the volcano, which did not happen, my ipod is broken and Man United have just been humliated 4-1 by Middlesbouro, I am setting here now wandering if it is going to get any worste. There is a glimpse of hope though, it turned sunny and warm this afternoon, a good sign that tomorrow maybe finally I can climb that volcano.

As for my ipod it looks really serious this time, it seems like a disk failure , which means my ipod is kapot. The only way to save it would be to send back to Apple support with warranty information, and get a replacement , I am not sure how to get this done from here though !

Pucón Chile

I came to Pucón Chile in order to do one thing : Climb the active Volcano. But this climb can only be done on a good weather day,unfortunately for the 3 days I have been here the conditions were not right for it.

I took the opportunity to visit one of the national parks around , while waiting for the weather to improve, the scenery was very beautiful and I took quite a few pictures.
everything here is twice the price compared to Argentina, so I really do not want to linger here too much, I hope tomorrow I will be able to climb the volcano. I found a Kayak school here, so I might stop by here again on my way north to learn kayaking, it is not a cheap activity though.

Cerro Tornador

Or Thunder mountain in English, called this way because of the continuous thunder like noises created by chunks of ice separating from the glacier, and tumbling down the steep cliffs of the mountain

The weather has improved, it is sunny and kind of warm now, perfect conditions for taking pictures of the beautiful nature around, such as above picture of a lake with perfect reflections.

Bariloche

The Capital of Patagonia, a region of amazing nature and protected national parks. The area is home to many big lakes surrounded by snow capped mountains, while exotic forests cover the lower altitudes. The weather is unstable at the moment, switching between sunny and rainy every a few hours, and it is always windy.

On my second day here I went on a boat trip, it was cloudy and raining outside, which made the trip very boring. Towards the end of the tour though, it partially cleared up, which allowed me to take a few nice pictures. Today I went un a short excursion to climb a mountain, to get a nice panoramic view of the region.

There is endless outdoor activities that can be done here, but none of them is really special, I am more looking forward to my next destinations : Climbing an active volcano at Pucon, Whale watching at Puerto Madryn, visiting the Glacier at Calafate ....

Tennis

I have been taking some Tennis classes, and I quite liked the sport. I played a couple of games and lost both, but that is no surprise since I only played Tennis only once before, and I am getting better at it.

Beauty Contest in Cochabamba

Miss Panama in a march as part of a beauty contest, the contestents were carried by fancy convertables and pickup trucks, all this taking place in the poorest country of south America.

Parillas

Parillas are grill places, and you can find them all over Buenos Aires, they offer the best beef in the world at unbelievable prices. A steak sandwich for 1 Euro and 20 cents, and a full tenderloin steak for less than three Euros. The problem is if you are looking to eat something other than meat, then your choices are very limited.

Football at the River stadium

The stadium maintenance putting down the toilet paper fires set by the away fans after the game, these events seem to be common, and mostly harmless, and they seem to be quite prepared to handle them.

The home crowd cheering after River Plate scored a goal , the final result was 3-1 for River, two of the goals were scored by an 18 your old star, both were wonderful.

River Plate playing Independiente in the River Stadium . The atmosphere was fantastic, the pitch was top quality and so was the football. This was definitely the best football experience I had in south America.

The only gripe I had was with the guy at the ticket office, he sold us the tickets for 30 pesos instead of 24, but as I was walking away I noticed that the price (24) was written in the ticket, so we went back and confronted the guy, he realized we were on to him, and he murmured something about getting confused and gave us our money back.