Hola Argentina, Í´ve missed you!

After a long day two days of buses, buses, and more buses (4 in total). I finally made it to Salta. On the first bus out of Uyuani I befriended an Irish couple and after taking a much needed shower, I set off with them to find some dinner. They had gotten a recommendation from their hostel for a parrilla that was supposed to have the best steak in town - so off we went!

We got to the parrilla and it was packed full of locals - an excellent sign. We ordered our first liter of vino tinto and began scanning the menu. Ahhh it was great to be back in Argentina - land of huge slabs of meat for less than 10 bucks. I ordered steak and we split a side of salad and garlic fries as well as the copious amount of side that come with eating at a parrilla. It was delicious and after a few more liters of wine we were best friends with Fernando, our waiter, and had made promises to come back again before we left. If you find yourself in Salta, Monumental is a must. There are two that are across the street from each other. Go to the less swanky one with all the locals. Order the bife de chorizo and the papas provencal.

The next day I slept in and enjoyed the first day in ages with no nothing to do. I took a stroll around town to orient myself and spent some time walking around the plaza. Salta is an adorable city and it felt great to back in an urban environment. I walked down the pedestrian area and did some window shopping and then managed to make myself understood in an electronics store enough to be able to buy an adaptor. I also visited several tour agencies to see about prices in heading to Iguazu. The long and short of it being that for an extra $55 US I can take a plane that is only 2.5 hours instead of the 23 hour bus. I left booking tickets for another day, did some more shopping, and generally enjoyed the slow pace of a day with nothing important to do.

On the following day, I got directions from the guy at the hostel and took the number 7 bus to the end of the line to go hiking in San Lorenzo. You pay only 12 pesos to go to the park and there is a set 1 kilometer walk you can do. However, with my hand drawn map from the guy at the hostel I was able to hike up to the top of the mountain and get some amazing views of Salta. I had a nice picnic up at the top and then slowly made my way back down and into town. It took up most of the afternoon, so I went over to see my Irish friends. We hung out for a while at the hostel and then went back to Monumental. Our original Fornando wasn´t there but we had a new Fornando and the same excellent food. After dinner we headed over to a pool hall around the corner and spent the rest of the evening playing pool. Finally at 3 am the bar closed and we grabed a taxi home.

My last day in Salta was spent wishing a happy birthday to my Mom, buying plane tickets to Iguazu and then a huge lunch at a parrilla place the Irish couple had found a few days ago. After we had two bottles of wine and enormous brandys, it was nap time for me! I woke up in time to walk around the park for a while before meeting my friends again. We had decided enough was enough with meat and went out for sushi. It was a lovely change from meat, meat, meat, and then it was back to the pool hall to make more friends and spend the evening chatting with them.

The next morning I was up early to head to the airport. Adios Salta and Hola Iguazu.

Holy Cow!

Buenos Aires! My time in South America had officially begun. I got in around 7 am, checked into my hostel in San Telmo, took a quick siesta and shower, and was ready to begin exploring the city. I walked to the downtown area and took a detour a block off the main street. I was instantly inundated with deals from every restaurant on the block, for $25 pesos (US 7.50) , you could have a beverage of your choice, entree, and dessert. I walked into the first one that had a decent amount of people, sat down, and ordered the beef with agua sin gas. Holy Cow! They had given me a piece of steak approximately the size of my head. I dug in and it was delicious. The inside was a lovely shade of pink with the outside perfectly cooked. After my enormous lunch I walked up to Palermo, which was quite a haul. Jess was coming on Saturday and wanted to stay up there so I walked around the neighborhood to check it out.

There was tons of shopping in Palermo and on the way to the neighborhood. It looked cute so I check into the hostel for Friday evening. Woot!

The next morning I moved up to Palermo and explored more of BA. I walked down to the cemetery and saw Eva Peron's tomb and took a walk through some of the gardens. There was an artist market at Catadral, and then another crafts market in Palermo a few blocks north of the hostel. I sat and had dinner at one of the restaurants along Honduras. I ordered the house wine which was only $3 US and then was shocked to find I had ordered the whole bottle! As to be expected, it wasn't the best wine I'd ever had, but 1/2 way through the bottle it didn't matter.

The next morning I woke up surprised to find that Jess hadn't come yet. After I checked my email, Jess had written that her plane had been canceled and she wouldn't be arriving until late in the afternoon. I took the morning to go get a mani/pedi at one of the salons I'd seen. About 10 minutes into the mani/pedi it became clear they didn't do many, as it was the most thorough and intense mani/pedi I'd received in a while. About 1 hour in they managed to find an english elle from May 2006 for me to read, and 1 hour after that I finally left the salon. Back at the hostel still no Jess, so I wandered around several of the Saturday crafts markets in the area (including one where I bought a mug with a girl salting a slug).

Finally at about 6 pm Jess was in - unfortunately her luggage was MIA. She spent some time trying to find someone at LAN who was helpful and eventually we gave up and went and got some dinner in the hood.

Maiden Voyage

After a long day of travel, I finally arrived in Jamaica to be immediately surrounded by my SF homies. It was just like being back in SF only way way better. It was Emily's 30th birthday party and the festivities were underway.

The others had gotten in early in the afternoon and they quickly got up me up to speed. Our pied a terre was a quick 15 minute jaunt to the beach, Gloria, our personal chef, had made delicious jerk chicken for dinner, and best of all . . . Brian had brought a suitcase full of beach toys. Awesome!

As soon as Brian was up the next morning we put the raft into the pool. The raft was all of 2 feet shorter than the pool so there wasn't much ground to cover. After we went round for a spin, and others humored me and let me take them for a spin too, Brian and I began to plan our maiden voyage. The plan was to take the snorkeling gear and the raft down to the ocean. We'd paddle out and then take turns snorkeling around while the other person stayed in the raft.

Once we had our stuff down at the water, the ocean was a bit choppier than expected. Undeterred we said our goodbyes, walked the raft out as far as we could and hopped in. The voyage was underway!

Brian and I paddled as hard as we could and got a decent way out. He took a quick dip and then I got out to swim around. As soon as I was in the water, the surf took Brian and the raft back to shore. Our voyage hadn't lasted long - but it was fun. The lifeguard let us store the raft at the beach and we went back up to the house to immediately plot tomorrow's adventure. We agreed that going in the morning would have less waves and allow us to get further. Brian also created an anchor to keep the raft in place.

Day 2 was far more successful. We were able to get the raft out further and drop anchor. we donned our snorkel gear and began the fish hunt. Only there were no fish! After swimming around for 20 minutes Brian finally found a few. Brian went in and Ethan and I swam a bit further by the rocks and found a variety of fish, including some small angel fish.

The rest of the time was spent lounging on beach chairs and catching up with everyone. It was a very relaxing 5 days and a very happy birthday for Emily.

Fun In the Sun Part 2

Well it was Adios to my parents and Hola to Playas del Coco. The bus dropped me off downtown and it was not long before a friendly Austrian guy picked me up to show me a room I could rent for $15 a night. My flops were made for walking - particularly to the beach, so in a matter of moments I was back out the door and down at La Playa.

It was a blistering hot day, but the ocean was cool and as long as I kept hoping in every 20 minutes, it was a delightful time. On my way home I stopped at Johnny´s and ordered the meat of the day. It was certainly an odd cut of cow in a soup with a bunch of vegetables. I didn´t recognize much of my meal, but it was all delicious.

The next day was more of the same and the day after I signed up to go diving in the morning. The water was quite chilly and the visibility was a disappointing 20 feet, but we saw the largest white tipped shark I´d ever seen plus a couple of sting rays which were gorgeous. I also befriended the two other divers. Dana (one of the divers) and I rented bikes and biked the 3 km down to Ocotal. We were not particularly impressed, but it was nice to see a different beach.

The next day I worked diligently on my tan and then hung out with Carrie whom I´d met diving the day before. She had found an awesome deal on a hotel room. It was a hotel that was currently closed, but since she knew someone who knew someone we could have a 2 bedroom, 2 bath room for $50 a night.

The next morning was dive time again! We saw the shark from two days ago and then went to a new dive site, where it was a sting ray convention. It was amazing watching all of them glide through the water and I was surprised about how close they would let us come!

Thursday Carrie and I took it easy. We did some souvenir shopping in the morning and then went to Hermosa beach for the afternoon. Our evening ended with us hanging out with the band that had played at the pizza place we went to. It was an early morning (3:30 am) when I hopped on the bus to the airport and said Adios to Costa Rica.

Rafting is still good fun, the zip line, however, leaves something to be desired.

I spent the first 10 days of my latin american trip with my parents. While planning the trip my mom surprised me with a request to go white water rafting - and so I set it up!

We arrived in Costa Rica on Thursday and had a rather long and bumpy ride to Arenal, where we started our trip. The next day we had a relaxing morning by the pool and an excellent guided tour through the rainforest, concluded with an evening dip in the hot springs. The flora and fauna of Costa Rica in Arenal is amazing rich, there were birds and monkeys galore on our tour (and Jay was wise enough to get us into the forest early so we were before all the other tour groups!)

Day 3 we were up and off to white water rafting. Gerald was an excellent guide, he did a great job of keeping my mom safe (although I did take an unexpected dip outside the raft) and he kept us laughing all day with his jokes. Luckily the rapids were not too vigourous, yet still we were all tired at the end of the day. We had one final woot and high five with our paddles before it was time for lunch. That evening I got the local tour as Gerald and his roommate took me out to the drag racing.

We were sad to say good bye to Arenal the next day, but Monteverde did not disapoint. We took an amazing boat cruise arosse Lake Arenal to head to Moteverde,which my mom did not want to end. The view of the volcano was stunning and with hardly anyone else out on the lake, it was incredibly peaceful.

Ever day so far had been amazing and my mom was overwhelmened with the beauty and hospitality of Costa Rica. I kept reminding her to remember how happy and fun each day was, because we were destined at some point to have one bad day, so it was good to remember each of the fun days.

And boy did that bad day come. We were signed up to do zip lining, with an option to the canopy tour after lunch. At lunch I asked my mom if she was going to sit out zip lining, but she was adament that she was going to do it. I was shocked. My mom is very much afraid of heights, so I couldn´t believe she was so intent on doing it. I thought the costa rican spirit must have gotten her!

We arrived at zip linning and my mom and I were both quite nervous. We insisted on watching everyone else go before doing the zip lining ourselves. We did the test one and we both made it - so we decided to continue on. I will not give you the intimate account, but I will merely say my dad loved it. That made one of us. By the end of the 10, I´m not sure that I would say that I was having ¨fun¨ but I was also no longer petrified. I can confidently report that by the end of the 5th one all my mom wanted to do was be done and drinking a glass of wine. It was an intense day for all, and we spent the evening reflecting on how much fun white water rafting is. I took away from this that I find my fun more in depths rather than heights.

The next day we were happy to have an afternoon tour of the cloud forest with Maria. She showed us a wide range of birds, a tarantula, many nests, and some adorable racoon related animals. We also got to spend 20 minutes by the humming bird feeders watching all of the different humming birds come in for a nosh. One feeder often had several birds at once - conference call!

From the cloud forest it was on to Flamingo Beach and some fun in the sun. My dad took the resort course where they teach you some basic scuba skills and then him and I went diving in the afternoon. We saw jellyfish, a lobster, angel fish, damsel fish, snapper, and many others. The visibility was only about 15 feet, but it was still fun being under water.

After four days at the beach (our condo had the most amazing view of the sunset over the water), it was time for my parents to head back to reality. Not so for me - as they headed to the airport I headed to Playa del Coco for 7 more days of beach, including a few days of diving.

On The Road Again

Well my life as a stay at home daughter has come to an end. My days of waking up lesiurely, reading the paper, heading to the gym, cooking dinner and trying to catch a salsa or tango class are over. I had a blast while I was at home. It was fun to unearth my culinary skills for an appreciative audience. While I was home I also found time to travel to Mexico (twice), San Francisco for 10 days (thanks to my many great hosts and all those that rearranged their schedules to spend time with me!), Austin, Denver, and NYC. Plus many many evening back in the old hood of Arlington. It was a blast, but by the time April rolled around I was ready to get a move on.

I´ve now started the Latin American half of my year off which will hopefully include Costa Rica, Argentina, Chile, Peru, Bolivia, and Equador. I´m doing most of the traveling alone, although various people will be meeting up with me here and there. Let me know if you´re looking for some fun summer plans and come on down!

Come Fly With Me?

For those of you wondering what I have been up to since I've been home - well I've spent a lot of time trying to book flights.

I had thought I'd stay in the US through the first week in April and then head to Central America.  Given my current employment situation (not), I thought it would be an excellent time to visit friends!

So - can you please explain to me why it is $291 to fly round trip from D.C. to Costa Rica but I can't find a reasonably priced flight to Denver?

Another fun quandary I encountered today involved the following:

To fly from San Jose, Costa Rica to Montego Bay, Jamaica costs $773 when booked as an independent ticket

To fly from Montego Bay, Jamaica to Buenos Aires, Argentina costs $1100 when booked as an independent ticket.

However - if you book a San Jose to Montego Bay to Buenos Aires ticket (please denote nothing round trip about this) it costs $663.  This is for literally the exact same flights as above.

So I spend a lot of time on Kayak trying to figure out how to see my friends state side and figure out how to move around once I head down south.