Sud America -- Buenos Buenos Buenos Aires!

Wow!!!... what a spectacular place. Really a gem of a city.

I am going to paste a quick email I wrote to my family below as a temporary blog update, a more detailed post with photos will follow soon.

Sent: 1/29
Nate and I are loving BsAs. We met a few locals who take us all around the city. We are both speaking a lot of Spanish and loving the culture here. It is so laid-back and friendly... very carefree and slow paced, a refreshing change to New York City. We spend most of our days in a usual pattern. Wake up at noon, walk to local cafes and eat Medialunas con Jamon y Queso and drink coffee. Then we go to the roof of our hostel and sit in the sun and read. At around 3 we go out and wander through a new barrio of the city, look at the shops, people watch, taste food, drink wine, and hang out. At 7pm we usually head back to the hostel, shower and relax at the internet cafe across the street. The sun sets at 9pm. At 10pm we go out and find a nice dinner spot in our neighborhood or go to other barrios. Dinner usually lasts from 1030 to 1230 and includes copious amounts of great malbec wines and Argentine steak (all for about $15). We then go to a local bar or club and hangout with our new local friends and some other travellers from the hostel (a nice Dutch girl named Sam) until 3 or 4am. Repeat!

Tomorrow we fly to Rio for Carnival. We are staying with a friend for 2 days and then a hostel for 6 days. We plan to do all the local tourist stuff, visit the Sambadromo and other Carnival highlights, hike Sugerloaf to the Cristo and spend time on the famous Copacabana beach. On 2/7 we fly south to a resort town called Florianopolis where we will stay for 4 days in a friends beach house. We plan to rent scooters and cruise around the island. On 2/11 we will take an overnight bus to Uruguay. We are going to stay in a small village that just got electricity last year nestled in amazing sand dunes. Its a dusty, very traditional environment. Then we go to Punta Del Este, a beach resort in Uruguay that looks like South Beach. We will be there for a day or two and then go to Montevideo. After MV we return to BsAs for a few days to stay with one of Nates friends. Then we will fly to Bariloche, a town similar to Boulder, famous for its adventure sports and massive mountains (Aconcagua of 23000ft). We plan to hike and take in the alpine beauty for a while. We are then going to trek South and further into Patagonia and El Chatlan for more hiking and mountain culture. Finally we will end up at Tiera Del Fuego where we will hike some glaciers and hopefully find a charter boat to take us to Antarctica. If we can find a good trip at a good price we will take the 10-16 day voyage to the southern ice cap. I heard from friends who did the trip that it is the most amazing scenery they have ever seen. After that trip we will take a 3 day boat up the Chilean coast to Valparaiso area. We will spend some time here and in Santiago. After Santiago we are going to take a bus to Lima Peru, visit La Paz Bolivia and then head to Cuzco where we booked a 7 day trek on the Inca Trail to Machu Pichu. After that we are not sure our plans... that should be mid-late April and i assume we will fly back to the US... or maybe stay... forever... That is the quick run down of our plans, of course its all subject to change, and there lies the beauty of freedom and a backpack. This trip is a total blast!