OH! Hey! It's been a while since an update, but that just means we've been having SO MUCH FUUUUUN! So not to worry. We've made so many new friends since we left Salta. We would like to tell you about our past few adventures by introducing you to our new friends...
IGUAZU, Argentina
First thing first: Executive busses...can we just talk about them for a second. I'VE BEEN DYING to talk about the executive busses. Okay...so some annoying things about them are the GRINGOS that take them. We over heard a girl say to her friend "Oh yeah, just put your backpack in the overhead. Look around, everybody is speaking English. No one's gonna steal your bag." Just kind of ignorant stuff. They handed out tiny pieces of candy, like rewarding you for finding your bus on time. They give you blankets, pillows, WHISKEY...but they play the crappiest movies....sequels.
Leo- the Lion is actually the Argentine version of Todd Renier...no doubt. He is a living, walking, talking, joking, charming, tiny bathing suit wearing, energy drink drinker, coily innocent, rich, 19 year old doppleganger of Hannah's ex-boyfriend. When we arrived in Iquazu we got a good tip for a hostel with a pooool. We didn't meet Leo (and his friend Nico) until we got up the next morning for our breadfast. They had gone to the park the day before and had good advice on different hikes and trails to do in the park. They tipped us off on a SWEET hidden waterfall.
We got back from the park (which was amazing...double rainbows, super-soaker waterfall zone, GIANT LIZARDS, swarms of butterflies, scary swarms of bees, and the worlds most magnificent waterfalls.) and the boys offered to make us DINNER! We made the mistake of telling Leo that he was Hannah's ex-boyfriend's twin. We also included that that wasn't such a BAD thing...so he became quite keen on Hannah. It was interesting to say the least. (HOW CAN SOMEONE HAVE SOMEONE ELSE'S LAUGH?!?!?)
Hannah, Nico, and Leo
Nico- Leo's travel buddy was also an attractive, charming, young lad. He has dreams of becoming a chef so he stepped it up and made Noquis from scratch in our nasty hostel kitchen. (We were incharge of the dessert...we bought bananas and dulce de leche. We're really creative. Oh yeah, and we splurged on some OREOS). Nico was SUPER friendly so he also invited the ASSHOLE Spaniard, too pretencious for his own good, to join us in the evening's festivities. Seriously, this guy was really mean. We tried talking to him but he would constantly correct our pronounciation, conjugation, vocabulary, etc. Needless to say...he was not our friend...
Nico and Leo are from Buenos Aires so we're hoping to meet up with them again for an Asado and a drive around in one of their dad's 7, thats right...SEVEN, vehicles. They start UNI soon so we'll have to meet up with them pronto. Those guys were a great time. They really made our 2 days in Iguazu what it was. They even carried our backpacks to the bus station for us and gave us a lovely send off to our next destination of Cordoba.
DOUBLE RAINBOW! our eyes are closed because we are facing a WATERFALL!
CORDOBA, Argentina
We were feeling really tired and crabby when our bus arrived in Cordoba. We were dreading doing the same old "hop off a bus. hop in a taxi. find a skinking hostel. bargin for prices. yadda, yadda, yadda." But anyways, after a cafe con leche and a few medialunas we hit the STREETS and arrived at Lonley Planet recommened Tango Hostel. We decided to splurge a bit on the private 2 twin bed room off the kitchen with private bathroom. Everyone else was in dorms, but it didn't matter because the environment at this hostel was one of open conversations, comfort, and international mingling.
Tal- our first night in the hostel everyone was going out but we were just doing our thing: PLAYING CARDZ and drinking Fernet and Cola. One other kid stayed behind and asked to play cards with us. This guy was named Tal. About an hour earlier he had been jamming with a guitarist on his RECORDER. Man could he play that tiny, slightly feminine, wooden, flute. Seriously, he was an amazing improvisor. Both his parents are musicians. SO he's got a natural knack for it.
Tal and Javier jammin'.
Anyways, Tal is from Israel so NATURALLY, we asked him if he wanted to play the only Israeli card game we know "YANIV!" We actually ended up teaching HIM the rules. But we were glad to get in the practice....it will come up later...
Hannah, Tal, and Marie. Kickin' it in Cordoba.
When we first hung out with him that night he seemed pretty calm, cool, and collected. He was like that older brother neither of us ever had. He is a sweet boy. Very smart. Awesome at the recorder...not so good at cards. And he was travelling alone and we were more than happy to include him in our plans and make a trio!
That night we played cards (yaniv, and bullshit mostly) with Tal and the dude working the night shift at the hostel Felipe. Little did we know how close we would get to Felipe later in our trip.
The next day we took a stroll with Tal (who was on the waiting list for SKYDIVING) to the walking street area of the city. We browsed some sunglasses stands, got ice cream, tried to replace our iPod charger, got pizza, and learned more about Tal. He was eager to show us his brand new TAT! that's right...Tal's got a sweet tat of a Saxophone on his pec. Theres some musical notes in there too. Its right above his heart. How sweet.
That night the crowd at the hostel was really feeling like partying. There were 2 hilarious Brazilians, an English girl, a Canadian, 2 Austrians, 1 German (craziest dude ever. opened a beer bottle with his EYESOCKET), us, and a buncha Argentines.
We played Circle of Death with the whole crowd and needless to say we picked up a few new rules. Like, Brazilians always institute the rule "Whenever you drink, the person to your right has to drink, too." (I dunno, they really like to drink I guess). We learned the new game "The Which" which is also the most complicated game to explain in shitty spanish.
Most of the foreigners got pretty smashed and went to bed but we are awesome warriors and we stayed up with the hostel employees and the brazilians for the after party, so to speak. Felipe, like the Pied Piper, led us all to the "Chimichanga"...basically a weirdo garage attached to the side of the building...also the window to our room looked out there. We had a crazytown dance party (by crazytown i mean...wild. not that gross band from the 90s). It was...an unforgettable night.
Tal finally got his chance to go Skydiving the next day so we took ourselves to the Che Museum not far from Cordoba central. Yes, Che's family moved to Alta Gracia because the air there is apparently super pure and helpful for those who have asthma and other breathing problems. (I dunno if I really buy it but...it was like the 30s or something...)
Everyone at our hostel was a super Buena Onda. We had really nice, hot weather in Cordoba so the chicos from the Hostel planned a group trip to an area that features super deep, dark, natural swimming pools. It reminded us of our times on SoJo and the ritual REZ PARTIES!!!
Felipe and Javier - These guys are brothers. They are from Colombia but Felipe works at Tango and Javier goes to Uni. He's studing Law. They pretty much led the group to the pools. They also had the great idea of making MELON WINE!!!! Oh yes, it's our new most favorite thing in the world. Step One: Buy a Honeydew Melon. Step Two: Cut a hole in the melon like you're gonna carve it like a pumpkin and remove the seeds. Step Three: Dump a buncha sugar in that melon. Step Four: put COLD, cheap, white wine in there (if its not cold, you better get some ice because ARGENTINES WON'T DRINK IT UNLESS ITS BIIIEEEEEEEN FRIA). So yeah, we made these 2 melons full of wine BEFORE we started hiking into the park to find the really remote, secret pools. This kinda slowed us down and everyone we passed on the path told us to go back...but we were kinda drunk...so we just kept going. It was totally worth it and Felipe kept morale high the whole time. Sing alongs, following every pharse with "in my pants", renaming the melon's "baby", etc.
We probably stayed at the pools a little too long and several of the girls, including Hannah, were wearing inappropriate hiking footwear. It got dark, and the rocks were kinda slippery, but we made it back to town alive with the help of a friendly local dog we nicknamed Simba. Seriously....he led us to the path when we wandered and he also FOUGHT ANOTHER wild dog. It was awesome.
Lucas- another Tango Hostel employee. FACT! Lucas loves the hit TV series FRIENDS. FACT! We met him the night when things got crazy over circle of death. He was the one who was peer pressuring everyone at the hostel to go to "the res". Lucas was really sweet and wanted everyone to have the best time while they stayed at Tango Hostel. Also, he was one of the most good-looking guys we've laid eyes on in argentina thus far...his dance moves were awesome as well. He was really into basketball and gangster rap. Marie taught him some slang and we loved singing rap songs like "P.I.M.P" while walking with him down the street. All around, awesome dude...mmm hmmm....ok moving on...
So where were we...i got distracted...thinking about ...ok
Javier, Felipe, and Lucas. Trying on silly sunglasses. CUTE!
After the res party, we all took lil naps on the bus ride back to the city. We all gathered with other hostel peeps in the courtyard, drank some beers and started dancing the night away. We went out to a club with Lucas, the brazilians and Tal and seriously woke up with crazy brain.
Sascha- where do we EVEN THINK to begin...whooo-eee. So let's describe him physically. He is a giant australian man. Blonde, tan, loud, lil ponch, a bit clumsy and kinda looks like a dude-bro...oh but he is so much more. After getting to know him we would say he is a kindred spirit.
So we decided to go to some walking streets with Sascha and Tal after saying goodbye to Lucas and some other Tango friends. After about 20 minutes of walking we decided that Sascha and us just clicked. The four of us just clicked. We were like four peas in a pod...mmmmmm PEAS!!! We had the most crazy espresso a.k.a short black experience with Sascha that ended when he stole the tiny espresso spoon we all fell in love with at the cafe. Sascha not only sticks out like a sore thumb among the argentines, but his personality sets him apart from other open hearted travelers we have met.
Sascha and his ICE CREAM and tiny spoon he fell in love with. Well...we all fell in love with him.
Here are some quotes that made us double over in pain from the laugh attacks...
While sitting in a cafe with a McDonald's nearby Sascha proclaimed "How sneaky is THAT McDonald's?"
Um so we also talked about this for a while and he said "Why don't they just have McDonald's in clubs? I mean if I was in a club and saw one I'd be like FUCK YEAH! I need a hamburger...they could charge whatever they want I would totally buy a hamburger."
On hangovers..."I laid down to rest but then my head started pounding and I was like 'FUCK OFF HEAD' but like it couldn't fuck off because it's attached to my body and shit."
On rabbits..."It's like when I de-sexed my rabbit because it was humping the other rabbit."
On his plate full of desserts at the all-you-can-eat buffet..."So, if I was in a cartoon and vomitted this is what it would look like. Ah, that's a friendly vomit."
While being drunk on wine..."I think when I'm a bit wine drunk, I'll dissappear into the sky."
On looking on the bright side..."It's like the chocolate at the bottom of my chocolate milk."
And yes, we did write all of these down. If you just read these quotes without using a thick, heavy aussie accent, well DO IT OVER!!!!
So basically, we had such a blast hangin' with Sasch and Tal we convinced Sasch to leave Cordoba a day early and take the night bus with us to Mendoza to hit up the wine country. So he did! We left Cordoba, but we will always remember the good times at Tango Hostel.
MENDOZA, Argentina
We arrived in Mendoza at dawn...ok not really at dawn but the town was a friggin' ghost place. It was early morning and all four of us looked like classic backpackers. We had a map and told Tal to work his magic and find us a kick-ass hostel. After using some internetz, making a new stray dog friend in a subway, a few SMASHs, we DID find a killer hostel. It had a pooooool. CHECK! It was also a favorite hub for hottttt israelis. CHECK! Also, the dude at the reception named Toto was wearing a Ramone's shirt and was super friendly. CHECK!
So after getting settled in our new Mendoza home for the week, we decided to make plans to go horseback riding and do the wine-bike tour and maybe a hike.
Diego- We booked a sweet, asado n' wine included horseriding trip. In Sascha's words, Diego was more than just a name from a spansih book, he was THE MAN. He was quite the gaucho with his boots and dapper hat. He was a horse whisperer. We all saddled up and rode off into the sunset. The beautiful andes were in the backdrop and we meandered through a trail filled with cacti. Diego let us gallop really, Really, REALLY fast towards the end of our ride. Diego also, let us go riding again, after we finished our steaks and jug o' wine. But this time, it was bareback. In the moonlight. Que Mystical...In Hannah's word's it was "Like a fairy tale" referring to when Diego hopped on the horse with her.
The next day, the four peas boarded a bus to go to the vineyards. We found HUGO's bike company to rent bikes from and then peddalded our hearts out around wine country. The best in the world? I think so...
We visited an olive farm and tasted all they had to offer which included absinthe. This almost made Sascha casually vomit. We had so many taste explostions from the olives and the wine that day. Riding a bike after drinking wine in the afternoon is the best...simply the best (cue music...)
Dima and Yosi- First and foremost, these israelis are crazy. We met them at our hostel in Mendoza after swimming in the pool with them, smoking nargila and bonding over the clever-awesome-hilarious international hit of 'dick in a box'. This is only the tip of the iceberg...
Let's talk about Dima. Russian-jew from Tel Aviv. He was very friendly, usually smiling, built Russian tough guy, but really a sweetheart. He was traveling with Yosi, his best army buddy. Dima wore crocks, FACT! Dima loves smoking nargila and getting everyone to sit around and smoke together FACT! Dima lives up to his russian heritage by drinking the better part of the day away. FACT! This guy was insane. One morning after going out, he pondered over what he should buy BEER OR WATER? He chose a 6-pack of heinekin...whoa Dimz that's a lotta beers to put in your mouth before noon. Seriously, Dima is awesome and little did we know we would meet up with Dima and Yosi again in Santiago.
a blurry and red-eye picture of Yosi. Still captures his beauty, i think.
Now let's talk about Yosi...just a lil bit...here are some FACTS!
FACT! Yosi thought Hannah looked like Courtney Love...Hannah indeed DOES NOT even resemble her FACT.
FACT! Yosi never wore a shirt.
FACT! He lives in Tel Aviv.
FACT! Jew fro.
FACT! Killer smile.
FACT! In the army for five years with Dima. Computer Nerdz.
FACT! Referred to himself as 'ASS DICK' while playing cards and video games...not sure why.
FACT! we both beat him at his own israeli game Yaniv.
FACT! Laziest guy ever...also addicted to nargila.
FACT! wore matching outfits with Dima when we went to the amusement park. Black and White muscle tank tops and cargo-like shorts.
Yosi.
We also met Ori and Daniel, two more israelis that we need to mention, mostly because we feel we had misconnections with them and still always talk about them. We played and epic game of Yaniv with them and not gonna lie...we put their names in our SMASH. They made us a traditionaly israeli dish called Shashuka. It's got some eggies, tomatoes up in thurr, peppers, onions, garlic...you know all the good stuff. You eat it with bread. Don't tell Tal...but theirs was better.
One night we had a smashing good time with Sasch, Tal, Yosi and Dimz. We ordered pizza, that took FOREVER and then played a killer game of telephone. It's a perfect game to play because we played with foreigners. It was only a matter of time before Tal or Dimz would mess up the phrase. For example, "Too many mother'uckers, uckin' with ma 'shi" came out "hummm mmma leapsdflkj BLANKETS!" Ah, children's games + mixed with friends + pizza + beers and language barriers = great time.
Also, Sascha realized he knew how to play telephone, but in australia they call it "Chinese Whispers"...whew so racist.
Basically, Mendoza was kick-ass. Definately a highlight. We consumed so much wine in that week so we will most likely live... FOR-EV-ERRRRR. We were really sad when we had to say farewell to Dimz and Yosi, but we made plans to reconnect with them in Chile and maybe go to the world's largest pool.
Our second to last night there, we went to an improv-jazz-jam session because Tal played with his dad's friend from Mendoza who invited us. It was awesome, Tal wailed on that recorder like a champ and Marie convinced Sascha to hop on the mic and freestyle some blues.
So that brings us to Chile...
Here's Marie displaying her WAD-O-CASH (like, 10,000 Chilean Pesos is about 20 dollars)
SANTIAGO, Chile.
Eyal a.k.a Roomie-
So we used this website that the israelis told us about to find a cheap hostel in the city. It was nice to get off the lonely planet track. We stayed at a hostel called Terra Extremus. We were a little shaken up (NOT FROM THE EARTHQUAKE) but from our recent brush with bed bugs when we arrived. Luckily, we took care of business ASAP and we had an amazing time in Santiago despite those pesky bites that drove us crazy for a lil while. We also lucked out with our roommate, the only roomate we had in a six person dorm room. Another israeli who stole a piece of our heart. We technically met him our first night when he burst into the room and demanded to know, "Which one of you is Hannah?!" Hannah raises her hand and gives a confused glance...."why?" "Do you speak HEBREW? Are you from Israel?" "uh. no." "AH! I just thought you might be because I saw your name in the registry and you have a Hebrew name and I've been DYING to speak HEBREW!" "sorry man....can't help you there." But no worries, this didnt get in the way of us forming a lasting friendship.
A Fiesta at Santiago Hostel.
playing with chopsticks like walrus teeth!!! we're so silly.
Ok so get this...be prepared it's a little mind blowing, small world tale. Eyal ALSO knows Dimz and Yosi because they met in Mendoza before we got there. We had sent them a message with our hostel's address and told them to come find us at our hostel when they get to Santiago. When we came back from walking around the city who did we see when we walked into the hostel?!?!??? YOSI AND DIMZ. They hadn't even received our message and came to the hostel because they knew Eyal, our roomie. Classic, meant to be story. This gave Hannah the courage to tell Yosi that he was the most beautiful man she had ever laid eyes on. Turns out, he thought the same of dear Hannah. Classic open-hearted traveler love story. The rest is history and needs to be turned into a book...or blockbuster movie.
Here's a shot of the sweet AIRSHOW we caught on the beach in Chile.
Speaking of movies, you know what's a brilliant activity? MOVIES WITH ROOMIES! Eyal, is holistically the best roomie ever. We watched movies with him, went out on the town with him, ate a delicious pasta dinner with bacon and even had late night roomie talk, which ended in a three-way hug. Also, we met up with Roomie in Vina del Mar. Before his arrival we were having a serious case of the GLOOMIES :( Once he waltzed into the hostel, the clouds dispersed and the sun came out! We were them able to enjoy some more classic roomie activities such as: eating "israeli food" and scoring some free coca-cola (OP!), walking along the sea-side , rubbing sun block on eachother's backs at the beach, trying to wade in the massive pacific waves together, scanning the radio and singing along to 80s jams, eating powder-sugared doughnuts, laughing, talking about life, etc. It couldn't have been more perfect (cue theme song from Three's Company).
Eyal with Powdered Sugar ALL OVER HIS FACE!
FACT! Roomies are the BEST. FACT!
VINA DEL MAR and VALPARAISO, Chile.
So, after chilling at the beach in Valparaiso and Vina del Mar for a few days we FINALLY bought our tickets to Buenos Aires. Another 24+ hour bus trip but no big deal...we've been dying to get here. Also, we bought our flights home, people. We will be in Chicago 4 of May! Just a quick layover in Canada (that adds another country to our list on this trip) and we'll be back in the states.
So, as you can tell, our trip in February was really about friendship. and not dying in earthquakes! suerte!
food for thought: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Q7FFjUpVLg
