blog attempt

Wow, I think I have just met the most annoying computer in the world. I can´t believe i`m paying for this.

I’ve been inspired by my parent’s blog to write more, but since I only get to be on a
computer for bits at a time, you’re just going to get some giant blog dumps gleaned from
my written journal which is almost as sporadic and poorly kept as this blog. This was
written two weeks ago:

Life is crazy good and just crazy. I’ve been camping the past two weeks at different
national parks. We’ve been hiking every day in monkey puzzle forests which are
insanely beautiful and prehistoric. The monkey puzzle tree is considered a living fossil,
since it is so ancient and use to kick it with the dinosaurs. According to the Mapuche,
the trees marry each other by linking their roots or using birds as go-betweens. My first
hike I got lost with Amy and Katrina. It’s hard to figure out where you are in the middle
of a forest of trees so unclimbable that they would “puzzle a monkey.” By the time we
bushwhacked to a path it was pouring rain and I was completely soaked. The next day
we moved camp to a lake and the next hike we tackled I got even more lost, only by
myself this time. I wandered off because I fancied some alone time and wanted to
sneak in a swim, so I found a spot where the river pooled deeply, stripped down and
jumped in. The water was heart-stopping freezing cold and I decided that wouldn’t do so
I attempted to find my way back to camp instead. I tried following the river but every
path I found turned out to be animal trails that would end a few meters later. I tried to
cut across a field that turned out to be knee deep swamp. I started getting kind of
worried and frustrated so I just began crawling under the spiky calafate bushes in
search for a path but they just got denser and denser. It was hot and there were flies,
big biting ones that would not leave me alone even after I tried explaining to them that
no means no! At this point I started to freak out because I had no water and I start
screaming at these flies when I heard a whistle. I looked up and there suddenly
appeared two gauchos on horseback with three dogs following behind. The older one
took off his boots, rolled up his pants and lead me through the swamp. I followed them
to higher ground and ran into Sam. I was so happy to see him after feeling so lost and
alone! We walked back and bought a goat from the Mapuche village. Turns out what
happened to me was one of the luckier cases. Pretty much everyone in my class got
lost and two of my classmates weren’t found until way after dark (it gets dark here at 10
pm). It’s probably good they didn’t know about the puma skins hanging up at the
Mapuche houses. My professor lost his new cell phone while crawling under bamboo
whereas when I crawled through calafate I found someone’s digital camera with a 4gb
memory card. I was also the first person to get back. We crucified the goat over the
bonfire and it was ridiculously delicious. The next few days consisted of more hiking,
feather finding, wild mint mojitos concocted by my professor and wrestling matches
spurred by said mojitos. Then we moved on to El Bolson, stopping in Bariloche for a
mamuschka fix. El Bolson is a wonderful place, a town in a valley between beautiful
mountains. Throughout the day you can see hang gliders up above the mountains,
looping around like condors. The campground we stayed at felt like festival camping and was 4 blocks from the town plaza. The farms surrounding the town are where most
of Argentina’s hops are grown, so the town is full of artesenal breweries. This adorable
march-forth-like band played at our campground and I danced until morning. Lots of
people in clown makeup, it felt like home. The next day we went out to the lake for
some swimming. We kicked it with some sweeties from Buenos Aires and cooked up
some tuna melts on the sandy beach. I fell in love because a boy played me some
smashing pumpkins and radiohead songs on the guitar with an adorable accent. Then
we went back into national park land and continued our hiking expeditions. Took a ferry
out on the lakes to see a glacier and old growth forest, smeared calafate berries all over
our faces to make war paint, had a girls night out by the lake, threw Tez a birthday party
complete with puppet show and a dinner where every dish consisted of potatoes, made
patches for Ashley’s baby blanket and then headed back to El Bolson where we learned
that Ashley had her baby (a boy, little baby Luca!). Then I said goodbye as everyone
went their separate ways. I woke up and my little pup tent was all alone. My family has
scattered and for the next month we will be having separate adventures.

Went to brush my teeth in El Bolson, looked next to me and there was a Nessa monster!
She led me to a Pete! And then life was good. We stenciled (clothes, pup tent, Nessa’s
leg), drank cynar, crossed peligroso bridges, hedge dived and read nurse novels. You
know, the usual. Got to stop in Bariloche one last time for some new woman and
mamuschka. Camped in the hostel parking lot cuz there was no room at the inn. Then
went off to Chile, where it rained a lot and there were sick kittens at our hostel. We
bought them cat food, did some gambling, ate seafood stews, danced with some locals,
then Nessa and Pete left and I was bummed out and homesick for a lil while, but I’m
better now. I’m in Chiloe, a beautiful island thats surrounded by islands and mountains.
Its absolutely surreal and feels like the never ending story sometimes. We rented a car
and have been driving around seeking tide pools to study. I stumbled across two red
octopi crawling around on the beach! I also got chased by a pack of scary beach dogs
and threw my field notebook at them which was really dumb. But a fisherman found it
and returned it to me an hour later. Now I’m having repetitive dreams about getting
attacked by dogs. We found a beachside farm that let us camp on the beach for a
couple days. It was heaven. They sold us garden vegetables and I got to work on
overcoming my fear of geese which backfired because I only got more squeamish after
the geese started chasing car while hissing! Now we are in the most beautiful
campground that has a zip line over the water for 10 bucks. Low tide isn’t until noon
tomorrow, so I think I need to take advantage and go flying after breakfast. I’ve been
curing my new mate gourd which is an interesting process because it feels to me kind of
like bonding. Why have I been bonding with inanimate objects lately? I find myself
talking to pup tent when I’m trying to coax her into the bag every morning. More like wrestle, she is a fiesty one. Its probably cuz I miss my teddy bear. Wait, I didn´t really just admit that...I was sad to
part with my trusty rope sandals, but when I was packing them for Chiloe I almost puked
because they smelled so bad. My attempts at hand washing them were all in vain. Aw well. Headed up North to desert! Iquique, here we come (after 2 days of bus riding)...