Aconcagua National Park

  

Aconcagua, all 6900m of it, is a bit of a beast. Unfortunately getting anywhere near the top requires a lot of money, time, and climbing gear. So instead we had a lovely walk around the national park that surrounds it, complete with tired old mules carrying supplies to and from base camp..

Mendoza

Mendoza's a beautiful town, sitting at the bottom of the (still snow covered) Andes. Hiring bikes and tasting your way through the hundreds of vineyards in nearby Maipu is the thing to do here, so after one flat tyre and a hell of a lot of Malbec, we felt pretty cultured, but mostly pissed. 

La Cumbrecita

A beautiful little German village, about 3 hours from Cordoba. Well worth the trip, we went on a good hike up to the amusingly named "Cerro Wank" - led the whole time by our fantastic guide "Che" - see second picture down. There were loads of mountain streams, including the one in the third picture, which dived underground - unfortunately we couldn't find our way in though!

Cordoba

But I didn't like it. It's pretty dull, lots of grey concrete buildings, little open space, and very commercial - if you're shopping for shoes or women's underwear, it's worth the pilgrimage, otherwise I'd steer clear. There were one or two interesting Jesuit churches, but this little photo kind of sums up the general greyness.

el Monumento Nacional a la Bandera

I'm not really sure what this is all about, there was no handy plaque explaining, but it was something to do with the founding of Argentina as a country and the raising of the first national flag. I think. 

Rosario

It's a pretty little town, about 4 hours away from BA, with the usual Argentinian mix of lovely old buildings right next to big ugly tower blocks, plus there's a nice lot of picturesque reminders of Argentina's abandoned railway network. And thanks to my great host, Emiliano, Mark, Katryn and I now know it has awesome nightlife as well, with loads of cool riverside bars!

Ushuaia

The so called "End of the World" was a brief, if fun day. We arrived a day later than planned, missed the famous boat trip around the Beagle Islands, had our coats stolen, but did manage to climb this small mountain. It was pretty chilly at the top, hopefully the last time i'll need my ski jacket this trip!

...debted to the lovely Lauriane

Who took this awesome photo of me, Adrien and Chris that now forms my blog title!

El Chalten, walking quite a long way..

We did two big treks here, the first one, 28k, to Laguna Torres (note beautiful weather and stunning scenery). The next day, 26k, heavy rain at the bottom and snow at the top, rather obscuring our view of  an apparently lovely lake and Fitz Roy  mountain behind! Fantastic couple of days walking with our Belgian friends though.

Perito Moreno National Park

It's a bloody huge glacier! 2km across, absolutely awe inspiring. Huge chunks fall off the face into the lake below making huge echo-y booms, and apparently it moves 2m a day.

a boat, next to a baby whale

This is a bit long and boring, but it gives you an idea how close we were to the whales. This is a baby Southern Right Whale, whose mother had dived for food, and was feeling a bit lonely and throwing a strop to get her to come back!

Peninsula Valdes

A massive nature reserve, Peninsula Valdes is incredible. The critically endangered Southern Right Whale comes to the warm water here to breed, and on our 2 hour boat tour we saw loads, breaching right next to the boat! We then drove 200km around the reserve, seeing penguin and elephant seal colonies, huge salt flats as well as foxes, snakes, hares and armadillos. All in 9 hours, a crazy day!

Peron's seat!

This is where the General and Eva made all the laws that Argentinians loved/hated. I felt slightly blasphemous sitting there.

La Cementeria de la Recoleta

Quite a haunting place - like a city made of tiny churches and monuments, and in the middle of a very 'urban' part of BA. 

Buenos Aires

Finally! Sorry this has taken a while, things are a bit less 'structured' here when staying in a hostel than staying with friends in North America. But here are some pics - BA looks like Paris, but with about 3 times as many people/cars/tramps and 3 times as much pollution/noise/chaos. It's super fun though, everyday has been spent with different people doing different things, including tangoing, eating steak, drinking and exploring...

fancy dress!

There's me, the joker, with my fantastic hosts Jessi & Chrissy (Batman and Robin) and with Jamie, Mikaela and Dawson. In the states you can dress and anything you want for Halloween, so we did! Had a good afternoon on Saturday carving those beastly pumpkins too.

The Modern Art Museum

It had some classic pieces - Warhols, Rothkos, Pollocks, and a great feature exhibition on Richard Diebenkorn, but what struck me most of all was the architecture. The gallery was designed in 2002 by Tadao Ando, and is one of the most beautiful and appropriate modern art galleries I've ever been in. Minimalist yet striking with huge amounts of natural light, it just worked with the pieces inside, and out.