How to have duende: October 2013

Monday, October 21, 2013

Iguassssssuuuuuu: The land of mosquitoes the size of small mammals

This weekend I went to Iguazu Falls! The most breathtaking thing I have ever done. My camera died 4 pictures into the trip, so almost all of these pictures have been stolen from my lovely group-mates who were sweet enough to take pictures of me. Highlights: buena onda at the hostel, jungle hiking, swimming in a waterfall, and boating into the base of the widest falls in the world. Bad points: 18 hour bus rides ~36 hours apart, mosquitoes that show no fear and are excessively large, being chased by a monkey with freaky little hands, and humidity that turned me into a little italian boy in all of these pictures.

Being a wimp before just man-ing up and jumping in.

Check out how close the platforms get!

Pre-boat ride excitement!

Waterfall life chats! That's me in the pink sports bra with sub-par posture!!

Rainbooooow!

Brazil in the background!

Tuesday, October 15, 2013

Pinguinos, bellenas, elefantes, oh my!

This past weekend was a long weekend and our group directors planned an amazing trip to Puerto Madryn in the Chubut province of Patagonia. I'm so thankful that they decided to take us there because I would have never been able to make a trip that amazing happen on my own. We took an 18 hour bus ride on Thursday afternoon and got to Puerto Madryn Friday afternoon. We walked around the town and had a delicious lunch with some torrentes wine.

My delicioso langostinos al curry.

Alli y yo en frente de la playa del Puerto Madryn.

Stephanie y yo, lista para nuestras bellenas.

Sea lions!

Whale sighting! The best part about this gulf was that, unlike whale watching in the US, you are GUARANTEED to see whales at this time of the year. And they were right. I saw at least 15 different whales, including an albino baby! I did, however, get some motion sickness. Que lastima. The first full day we saw whales and elephant seals. And a lost penguin that we named Douglas. But the second day we went to Punto Tombo and saw the Magellan penguins. We walked through the breeding grounds and I was inches from penguins. Absurd. More than 250,000 penguins!

Alli and I, seizing from penguin exposure. And then a picture of us with the Argentinian flag. If you look very hard you can see penguinos swimming/playing in the water! What an amazing long weekend!