Christmas Vacation

With our bags packed we headed to the airport with Liandro and Cianna. He was taking her to the airport so she could go home for the holidays so we hitched a ride. It was better than getting up at 3:30am to catch a flight the next morning. We had a three hour flight to Buenos Aires and then another 3hour and 40 minute flight to Ushuaia. In Buenos Aires, we had a pretty tight connector and that was stressful enough as we had to completely exit the airport and come back in and go through security and customs all over. But then, as we are almost through security, they pulled Trevor’s bag and start rifling through it. They pulled out our hiking poles and told him he would have to go all the way back out to the airline counter and check them. We had already been on one flight with them. It was so frustrating especially when we saw our plane was about to start boarding. The security line was long but we talked to the security guy and, although he wouldn’t relent on checking the bag with the poles that had already been with us on the first flight, he did allow Trevor to skip the security line when he returned sans backpack. Thankfully we made it to our flight on time and traveled from the big city of Buenos Aires to the quaint town of Ushuaia.

We’ve never been a big-gifts-for-Christmas kind of family, especially not Trevor. We would rather go do something; have an adventure. So that’s what we did this year, with no presents under the tree, we hopped a flight to Argentina; to Ushuaia, aka the End of the World. Ushuaia is known as the “Southernmost City in the World” and “The Gateway to Antartica.” We had been to the southernmost point in the United States down in the Keys so, of course we needed to keep going. The Ushuaia airport is small but beautiful with it’s wooden vibe. I was a little concerned, however, when the pilot ended the normal, we are about to land welcome to our city speech, with “in the event of an emergency please leave all your personal belongings behind”. Everyone burst into applause when we landed on the small runway along the water after circling a few times in high winds. The lady beside me had the most thankful look on her face like its not always this easy.

Ushuaia is breathtakingly beautiful. The city is built right there along the water’s edge and rises along the majestic mountains surrounding the little town. I took photo after photo and couldn’t capture even the tiniest bit of what it felt like to be here.

We walked around town the first day getting our bearings. It was 30-40 degrees and my kids are in shorts for crying out loud.

Our hosteria was quaint; old but clean. A hosteria and a hostel are two different things. A hosteria is kind of like a little inn, offering a full breakfast, linens, etc. A hostel is just renting a bed in a room with maybe some toast for breakfast (you can buy two eggs for a little less than $2 dollars). You bring your own towels, etc and you wash your own dishes. By the way, Tucker would be upset if I didn’t mention, the croissants.We ate the best croissants we’ve EVER eaten in our lives (and we’ve had them in France before). They were that good!

One thing I didn’t think about was sunlight. I checked to see if there was a time difference and there wasn’t. The sun however, being this far south, likes to dominate the sky during this time of year. Sunrise was about 5am and sunset wasn’t until around 10:30am. It was very disconcerting to start with. I’m usually in bed by 9pm but when it’s daylight, it’s hard for the body to know it’s time to go to bed.

Our first full day we headed off on a tour. Not just any old tour but a very special tour. It started with a bus ride through the mountains with our guide giving us lots of history and information about the city.

We were headed to Harberton Ranch. Our first stop was the Museum of Bird and Marine Mammals. This museum houses the most species of marine mammals in Argentina. Besides the one room of fossils, we were taken behind the scenes to see the students working on cleaning the bones, the place where they house and catalog the bones, and “The Bone House” where they work to remove the flesh from the bones. It was quite fascinating, although the bone house looked like something you would find in a horror movie. Pretty cool field trip though.

Then we were off to board a small boat to go to an island to see the main attraction; the penguins. Our tour company is the only one that allows you to walk on the island with the penguins. Others will bring you in the boat and you can view them from the boat but this one allows you to get off the boat and wonder around with the penguins in the wild. The water was so clear.

There are two types of penguins that inhabit Martillo Island; the Magellanic (bottom right all black and white with white stripes around the head) and the Gentoo (top and bottom left with orange beaks and feet).

We happened to come at a great time because the baby penguins had just hatched a couple weeks prior. Here’s a clip of one of the Gentoo penguins helping move rocks for the nest. They stay together and build their nests on top of the ground.

The Magellanic penguins build their nests underground. As these are wild animals and not zoo animals, we had to be careful where we stepped. A group of scientists had been out to the island earlier in the season and marked the nests, sometimes with wood pieces and others with ropes, creating a path for us in areas where many nests were close together to help keep anyone from accidentally stepping on top of one of the nest and crushing it and possibly the penguins inside.

I love penguins! This was a once in a lifetime experience. So thankful for my husband planning it. The only down side was it was 20 degrees and we didn’t have proper coats or gloves. We don’t need them in Brazil. My fingers had gone numb and the boat captain felt sorry for me and shared his gloves with me. I was a little embarrassed but extremely grateful. The tour company was very strict about not touching the penguins or being too close to them. The tour guide gave me a very resolute NO when I asked if I could pet one.

It was amazing to know they were wild penguins. No one comes by and feeds them and takes care of them. They were just living and we got to be a part of that.

After our time was up with the penguins, we boarded another boat, a bigger proper boat, to return to the city through the Beagle Channel. Along the way we stopped by a small island with a lighthouse and a rocky island filled with sea lions. It was awesome. We didn’t see any whales but the sea lions were cool.

We have been told that Argentine steak is the way to go, although in this region lamb (pictured above) is extremely popular. So we found a rodízio type place, and cold and hungry from our all day adventure, we went in. I have to say we were severely disappointed. Not only was it super expensive (we would soon learn this whole area is expensive) the meat was awful. I didn’t even go back for seconds. Dessert was the best part of the meal and it was just ok. Looked beautiful but was just meh.

The next day we boarded a bus to go to the Terra Del Fuego National Park for a tour and train ride.

Once inside the national park we drove out to the literal end of the world post office. The wind was crazy strong. Look at how the trees had grown slanted due to the force of the wind.

This place is beautiful and peaceful. It was cool to see how different the same scene looked as the clouds rolled in and out.

If there’s water and the boys can’t swim in it then they are definitely going to skip rocks across it. Check out the Indian bread (top left). It’s an edible fungus native to the region. And in case you’re wondering you can’t take any home or any rocks, etc. They are pretty strict in this region. At the airport you can see where security had confiscated numerous items of such.

The sign in the restaurant window read Merry Christmas, Feliz Navidad, and Feliz Natal. Communicating was difficult as we couldn’t understand the Spanish and I kept speaking Portuguese, a fact Mason was quick to point out. I have spent the last almost two years saying obrigada and I was having a hard time remembering to say gracias. Often when someone would speak to me I would stare for a while before speaking because my mind was going no English, then no Portuguese, then oh no, how do I say this in Spanish. I was not a glowing example of how to be a good tourist. Fail. Argentines are great but they’re not as gracious as Brazilians in their patience for English speakers.

Of course we had to get ice cream when it’s 20 degrees. I was digging the Dubai chocolate; chocolate gelato with pistachio and shredded phyllo dough with hints of tahini and cardamom. Yummy.

After three days in Ushuaia, we headed to the airport to fly a couple of hours to El Calafate. The landscape was quite different; a lot flatter. The lake in the top picture is Lake Argentina and it’s the largest freshwater lake in the country. The turquoise milky blue is due to the fine powder from glacier abrasion.

El Calafate was very different than Ushuaia. It kind of put me in the mind of Steamboat Springs or some other clean ritz ski town. Trev’s thoughts of riding on a bus with chickens doing shady money exchange down a back alley were quickly ripped away. Everything was clean and expensive and chiky. He stopped looking at the prices on the menus. There was no point at this point. So another note, I never saw the big tree lit up, as I would have to be out in town around 11pm to see it in the dark. The town has a population of about 40,000 people but that number swells to over 300,000 during the busy season. We came mid December before it got busy in January.

At least the food we found here was delicious. If it was going to cost a lot (or maybe we’ve just lived in Brazil for so long we are out of touch with prices), at least this was good. At this particular restaurant we had steaks and they were great. Mason also tried guanaco stew. He said it was good too. Guanaco are wild animals that are related to llamas and alpacas. Yep, that kid will try anything.

Expecting to stay in hostels, we were quite surprised and pleased with our first two hosterias (which we thought would be hostels) as you can tell by Tuck’s face.

There’s no Uber in El Calafate. The app will tell you there is just limited availability but what that means is no, there’s not any available. You’re wasting your time waiting on the app to contact you to a driver.

So we took a taxi from the airport, which turned out to be a blessing, as we got Carlos or “Charlie” as he likes to be called since he is the only Carlos that works for the cab company that speaks English. Trevor got his number in case we needed another ride during our stay.

We spend the first full day chilling in town resting from all the travel. Our hosteria Koi Akin was nice and very clean but it was good ways from town (about a 35 minute walk to downtown). We didn’t have much else to do so we explored by foot. The wind was insane. I felt like it was pushing me along the walkway. The Bahia Redonda Reserve with Mount Calafate in the background was pretty. We had a view of the water from our room even though we weren’t lakefront.

We needed a little after dinner snack after all that walking. Most stores and restaurants took our Amex. The national parks did not, so we had to pay in Argentine pesos.

We sent Charlie a WhatsApp message and requested his services for most of the day the following day to go out to see the Perito Moreno glacier. He had a flat rate that he charged for this service and that worked for us. Due to its size and accessibility, this glacier is one of the major tourist attractions in the area.

We enjoyed watching the glacier waiting to see if we could witness a glacier calving (where a large chunk breaks free and collapses into the water). We were actually able to see several of these. It sounds like distant thunder before it happens but it’s hard to know where to look due to its enormous size. So getting a picture proved difficult. I was able to get a short video, not of it breaking off, but of it rising back to the surface after falling into the water.

The sun was always in my eyes. I don’t think Trev can take our picture from any other angle.

If we had to do it all over again, I would spring for the mini trekking where you can actually walk on the glacier. Tours were much cheaper at the hosterias than they were online. But just seeing the glacier was a very cool experience.

I told the boys this picture looks like they’re standing in front of screen. One day when my phone completely breaks, I’ll break down and buy a new one with a better camera, but for now it is what it is. I think they could have stayed there another hours, listening and waiting to see another calving.

After three days in El Calafate, which is more than enough if you don’t have tours planned or you don’t like shopping (there are plenty of stores), we took a four hour shuttle to the city of El Chaltén.

El Chaltén was more our speed. It was a hikers town. The town has about 1500 residents, everyone else is just there to hike, climb, and camp. Most of the businesses are just food and gear supply stores. The steak was amazing here!

We finally stayed in a legit hostel…kind of. Since we were a fam of four we took up a whole room so no strangers in with us. Just four bunks, four lockers, and a bathroom with only toilet paper. They have sheets, though, so that was nice. No towels but I packed some so no worries. We had three nights in El Chaltén.

The main goal of coming here was to hike to see Fitz Roy mountain, more recognizable as the logo for the Patagonia brand of clothing. To get the best view of Fitz Roy we hiked the Lagunas de los Tres or the Three Lagoon trail.

This famous day hike is known for its beauty and for its challenging steep 1.5+km rocky climb to the glacier lake at the top. It has an elevation gain of about 2600 feet. The trail is a 20 kilometer (12+ mile) or so out and back hike. We walked from our hostel in town and it took us about 12 hours to cover the 23 kilometers to get back.

I was told (by my husband) that it was a flat trail except for the 1km climb at up to the lake. So I went along. What that little-liar-liar-pants-on-fire failed to mention was that it started with an uphill climb. It was beautiful but my hips were not ready for that right off the bat. Not even a quarter of a mile in and you could look down and see all of El Chalten. Beautiful.

Flat. My foot! Beautiful but not flat.

Look how far up we were already.

Fitz Roy was majestic. We concluded that must be where the Grinch lives.

It’s hard to see in this picture but the blue area on the right hand side of the photo behind the green mountain is actually a glacier; Piedras Blancas. It’s trademark blue is undeniable in person.

The trail does eventually flatten out in the middle. I love hiking and being out in the trees. I miss that here in Brazil. It’s just different. I love just taking my time strolling among nature. I’m usually in the back due to this fact. I tend to walk fast but not while hiking. I like to breathe in the smell of the trees. Different forest smell and feel different from others even in the States.

Just a little info in case you want to hike this trail. Like most hikes, it is a “you hike it in; you hike it out” park. Your trash stays with you. I was pleasantly surprised to find that the trail actually has four bathroom locations. There is a pit latrine at the Fitz Roy viewing area. You’ll need your our own toilet paper and a stomach with a strong tolerance for smell but its better than going out in the woods and you don’t have to hike your dirty tp out with you. I always bring tp and a plastic ziplock bag just in case. There’s an actual porta potty type structure at the two campgrounds and another pit latrine at the base of the steep climb.

This is the only pictures we have of the steep climb (pic on the left). To give you an idea, of perspective, the two white looking streaks are rivers at the base of the climb where one of the campgrounds is located. But there is no way you will be able to see the campers. From the ground the people on the trail are barely discernible towards the top. The added challenge isn’t just the steepness but it’s also the rocky surface you have to navigate. Many people slip and fall. We saw it and experienced it. Not “fall off the mountain” kind of fall but the kind where you slip and next thing you know you’ve slid down a few feet and are on your bottom. A very easy way to turn an ankle or break a leg. At this point of the hike, I was so mad. It just didn’t seem worth the risk of getting hurt just to get to see the lake. Trevor and Mason had been swapping the hiking bag back and forth all day. Tuck had the snack backpack and I had the camelback. At this point we were exhausted. None of us were in hiking shape. I looked at Tuck and told him I was going up to the top but I couldn’t stop. If I stopped I wouldn’t be able to continue. We left Trevor and Mason while they were stopping to rest. The backpack was full of clothes. It was in the 30s with a real feel of 20s (according to Accuweather) but you get so hot hiking we were constantly removing and replacing layers.

The picture on the right is of one of the false tops. Three times Tuck and I thought we were about to the top just to get to the top to find there was further to go. By the third time Tuck said we were almost there, I believed him. I looked up and couldn’t see anymore trail but I also didn’t see the lake or Fitz Roy. Another false summit! We realized it when we went around some large rocks and our hearts almost sank, as we saw the plateau and our next ascent. This is the point where I told Tucker I hated his father. I was so tired and mentally exhausted from worrying about one of us getting seriously injured. But we kept on going. And finally we mad it to the top.

It was beautiful and amazing. Swoon worthy even, with Fitz Roy looking so close now with the snow and the glacier lake. But I wouldn’t do that hike again unless I was in better shape.

We basically collapsed at the top. We had told ourselves we would treat ourselves to the sandwiches we had bought that morning for reaching the top. It then dawned on us that Trevor and Mason had the sandwiches in the big backpack. We only had some cookies and trail mix, uggh. We finally saw Mason. He did not have the pack. Uggh. It was cold at the top so I zipped up my jacket. Mason was taking off layers. I told myself that if Trevor didn’t’ make it to the top I was going to stab him. Yes, I was that mad. But he did eventually make it to the top. Mason had took off without the pack and never looked back. When Tuck said he saw Dad and the pack (yay sandwiches), it hit Mason, that he had left Trev without anyone to swap the pack with. He took off like a light to go help Trev. I was dying laughing at him. I think poor ol’ Trev was just dying.

After everyone got some rest and some food in them to calm the hangry feeling, we were in better spirits, although, I was refraining from taking my stabbing thought back until we made it down safely.

While we were chilling, admiring the view, a fox just came walking right beside us. It was so cool. Tuck and Trevor made their way down to the lake and played with some of the snow. I was afraid if I went down, I wouldn’t have the energy left to make it back up and then back down the mountain.

But we did make it down without injury. At that point, we all had a good laugh until we realized we still had miles of trail to hike to get back to the hostel.

This hike really had a lot going for it, trees, wide open valleys, rivers, changing terrain, beautiful vistas. It was amazing.

We hiked back a little different section taking us by the other campground to this beautiful lake; Laguna Capri.

We made it back to town but we were all too tired to go out to eat so we just ate some snacks in the room. The good thing is, with the long sunlight hours, it makes it easy to fit that hike in in a day. A little FYI, the national parks are not cheap if you’re not a Argentine but they do have a deal where if you return to the same national park within three days, you get in for half price so that was good.

The next day we rested. If we had had another day we would have went on some smaller hikes but we needed to catch the shuttle back to El Calafate the next day.

Back in El Calafate we walked down from our hostel, America del Sur, to grab some lunch and snacks. Then we repacked out bags and got ready for the flight home the next day. We had a good time just hanging out with each other and I read a book. Who knew I was a reader.

We saw lots of guanaco on the shuttle to and from the cities. Can you believe Mason ate such a sweet looking animal?

The flights back proved to be a challenge. First off, in El Calafate (which is the name of a berry similar to a blueberry for which the town is named) the line was so long for check in and they didn’t have kiosks. We were cutting it close. Evidently, we weren’t the only ones. They called people out of line if their flight was the one leaving soon. We finally get to the counter and handed the lady our passports. I made a comment about it being busy and it was met with silence. Oops. So much for friendly chit-chat. The lady was looking at our passports and then just got up and left and went to the lady who was helping the people with the departing flight. That lady gave our lady the wait sign with a gesture of her hand. So we stood there for almost 20 minutes, having absolutely no idea what the problem was. After the supervisor lady was done and able to help our lady, our lady came over to me and told me my visa for Brazil was expired and what I had to say about that. Well, one, I had already been on three flights and gone through customs and, two, I had our current Brazilian IDs. I showed her those and we were free to go. If she had only asked we could have saved a lot of time. So we finally make it to our gate with about 10 minutes to spare just for Mason to have his name called back to the gate counter. He was informed that he had something in his luggage that couldn’t be checked. Battery bank. The lady had asked us at the counter and Trev said no. I repeated the ladies question in case Trev didn’t hear her because I knew we did as I had used it. He said he didn’t have one. I though he just didn’t want to go through our luggage to find it so I kept my mouth shut after he said no. Turns out he had completely forgotten that he had even brought it. So he and Mason went briskly walking back to the counter to retrieve the battery bank and then back through security and back to the gate just in time for us to board. Good grief.

I knew our connection in Buenos Aires was tight but I felt ok because I had seen the International connection area on our way to Ushuaia. Well, when we arrived, the connection corridor was shut off and we had to do the whole out-of-the-airport-back-through-security-and-customs-thing again. Luckily, we were already checked in so we could skip that line. We arrived at the gate to find that our flight was delayed. The upside was that we had enough time to eat at Outback before boarding our flight. None of our flights served meals so we were excited about having a real meal. Roberto and Danny picked us up from the airport and we crashed when we got home that night.

The next day we did eight loads of laundry (my washer is tiny) and unpacked. The day after we went grocery shopping for Christmas dinner. Christmas Eve I worked on cooking the desserts and other items I could make ahead for dinner tomorrow. Christmas morning came with little fanfare with no presents to open. We had a pretty chill morning. I made cinnamon rolls, as is our tradition, and we finished our daily Christmas advent. That evening Roberto and Anna and their kids came over for dinner. The day after Christmas, I took down all the decorations and Trev helped me pack them up. Sunday we rested. Today I worked on getting the blogged caught up. I’m ready for a vacation now. Ha!