Pucon, Chile

We arrived in Pucon on 7/10/08 after crossing the Chilean border (again! the passports are filling up nicely!). We approached the town in the evening and the dramatic backdrop of the active, smoking Volcano Villarica was amazing (and somewhat daunting given that one of our wedding gift list presents was to climb to the top!). After having climbed another mountain and completed a 25km bike ride in the previous 3 days we were planning on having a rest day before attempting the volcano.

However whilst checking in to the hostel we were persuaded by one of the girls who worked there and a couple of fellow guests to climb the volcano the next morning as the weather forecast was favourable (it´s not possible to go up there if there´s even a suggestion of bad weather). So straight after checking in we went along to the excursion shop to be fitted up with boots, crampons, windproofs and ice picks! We were asked to return at 6.50am the next morning to make our way up to the base of the volcano. The staff reassured us that it was all totally safe, the volcano had it´s last major eruption in 1984 destroying another local town....!

So bleary eyed the following day we were driven up to the base along with our 2 fellow guests and our guide (and also co-owner of the hostel) Gustavo. Four and a half hours of leg burning negotiation of icy slopes later we were standing right on the edge of the crater at the top of the volcano at an altitude of 2874m with amazing views of surrounding lakes and countryside, as well as a few other distant volcanos. The volcano smoke really gets to the back of the throat, not ideal when the air´s starting to get quite thin and you´ve just been climbing for a few hours!





(Jo didn´t tell me I looked like this......)

We sat right next to the crater edge and had probably the most extreme picnic we´ve ever experienced taking in the views and getting our breath and strength back. The best bit was yet to come - we donned these special big shorts (REALLY flattering!) and trotted to the edge of the slope we´d just climbed. With our guide leading the way, we all plonked ourselves down and proceeded to tobogan on our backsides all the way to the bottom of the volcano! Not quite as cool as the some of the locals who make the climb with skis or snowboards on their backs and carve their way down, but damn good fun and the best sledging ever!

We then rewarded ourselves with the next day relaxing next to the lake that the town sits on, basking in the glorious sunshine and nursing some aching bodyparts, and some really odd sunburn (Jo´s nostrils!!). Pucon is beautiful and we´ve loved it here. The hostel has it´s very own 2 month old black labrador puppy called Jaco and it´s been really difficult to resist the temptation to pop him into our backpacks before checking out. Next stop is Valparaiso and Vina Del Mar and then possibly on to Santiago.

Missing you all.

Love from

Jaco, Jo and Al x x x

ps this is a link to a cool video that our guide put together a while back
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ml2w2F5Tdpg

El Calafate - El Chalten - 35 hours on bus - Bariloche

We decided to splash out on a flight for half of our journey from Ushuaia to the next destination El Calafate as it cut out a slightly painful 12 hour bus ride through a tiny portion of Chile (meaning lots of borders, searching bags for fruit and meat and a silly amount of passport stamping!). The flight was with a company called LADE who are a state owned Argentinian airline run by the airforce (as most of you know, I´m partial to a bit of aviation love, so if it gets too boring just skip this paragraph). The plane was a tiny propeller plane with broken seats, the take off down the Beagle Channel into a big headwind coming in off the Atlantic was extremely hairy! The plane kept dropping as it was fighting the wind and Jo and I were holding very tightly on to one another (as the seatbelts were pretty useless too). As things settled though we got some amazing views of Tierra Del Fuego, as well as an inflight drink, so it wasn´t all that bad.

After landing in Rio Gallegos and a short bus ride (only 4 hours this time!) we arrived in El Calafate. From here we visited the awesome Perito Moreno glacier, we were both blown away by it. We stood for ages just watching huge chunks of ice splinter off into the lake below, the sound it makes is unbelievable! We also took a boat ride to the north face of the glacier which gave us a good appreciation of the height of the face (about 55-60m above the level of the lake).

From our cool hostel in Calafate we arranged a 2 day transfer El Chalten for 2 nights to visit the national park where we walked to the base of Mount Fitz Roy. It was a great walk, but unfortunately quite a cloudy and snowy day so we couldn´t see the mountain too clearly. We did see woodpeckers and condors swooping below us though.

Next stop was Bariloche in the Argentinian lake district. Annoyingly Ruta 40 (made famous by Che Guevara) that connects El Calafate to Bariloche is still closed due to snow, so it was back down to Rio Gallegos, then back up the east coast and cut across to Bariloche - a record 35 hour bus ride for us! As mentioned before though the buses in Argentina are first class however this was maybe a tad on the long side and the stale ham and cheese sandwiches didn´t really make up for it. Bariloche was beautiful though and on the first day there we hiked to the top of Cerro Otto (big mountain behind the town) which gave us great views of the town and the Nahuel Huapi lake that it sits on. The following day we took a bus out to one end of the lake to do part of the Circo Chiquito cycling circuit around the lake. Somewhat naively we thought that a ride around a lake would be fairly flat and given that it was only 25km we thought we´d cruise it. Unfortunately it also sits pretty close to the Andes so we set off for a leg burning, 4 hour bike ride up some pretty big inclines! Managed to find a completely secluded lake side beach for lunch though that made it all worthwhile! Think the guy in the hire shop found our John Wayne walking impressions most amusing after we´d returned the bikes!

We´ve now come across to Chile, to a small town called Pucon with an amazing backdrop of Volcano Villarica. The weather is improving and we were particularly pleased to hear that it´s been raining in London! We´ll blog again soon.

Hope everyone´s well.

Lots of love.

Al and Jo xxx

Fin del Mundo

We have arrived in the most southern city in the world, Ushuaia, on the island of Tierra Del Fuego. Suddenly (well as sudden as 31 hours on a bus can be) the landscape has changed from baron flatland to snowcapped mountains. We thought we´d better start getting some practice in for the Inca Trail and also wanted an excuse to use our new thermal underwear, so on our first day we decided to hike up to Glacier Martial. Unfortunately there was no glacier to be seen and we had to negotiate steep climbs in one foot of snow. The views from the top however were stunning as was the bar of chocolate we´d packed in case of emergencies!

We had an unexpected surprise when we got here as we found out that we were still in time for some skiing and snowboarding. After some deliberation (around 5 seconds) discussing the possibility of broken limbs at the beginning of a 7 month holiday, we trotted down to the hire shop and got ourselves kitted up for a day on the slopes. The resort was quite small but conditions were good and after an excellent day we both came off the slopes unscathed and exhilerated!

The next day, with aching legs, we took a stroll out to the National Park of Tierra Del Fuego. We had a walk around a beautiful lake that took us right up to the border with Chile, the sun was shining so no need for the thermals!

Today we took a boat along the Beagle Channel stopping at Island H (cleverly named as the island is H-shaped) to see Rock Cormorants, King Cormorants and Seals. We also saw where the native Yamana people used to cook and eat their food, noticeable by all the discarded whale and bird bones. Somehow they managed to cope without thermal underwear, instead smearing themselves in whale fat but we´re sticking with thermals for now!!

Flying north tomorrow, unfortunately Antarctica is beyond our budget. Aiming to get to El Calafate where hopefully we will have a slightly more fruitful glacier experience.

Hope you are all well

Lots of love

Jo and Al xxxx

Penguins, Whales, Wales and Cake

We left BA on Friday 19th September and headed down to Puerto Madryn, Patagonia by bus. The buses here rule (think National Express Rapide from the mid 80´s...... fortunately it´s nothing like that), we opted for first class tickets (it is our honeymoon after all) where the seats actually turn into proper flat beds, which is essential in such a massive country where travelling anywhere takes ages.


As we neared the outskirts of Puerto Madryn at midday on the Saturday (1300km´s from BA approx) we could just about see the sea between the houses, and I was totally convinced that I´d seen a whale just off the coast. Jo was telling me to be not so ridiculous and my mind cast back to when I was about 12 on holiday with my Mum, Dad and brother in Tenerife. My Mum was convinced she´d seen a dolphin from our apartment balcony so ushered us all down to the rocks to scour the sea for about an hour, no dolphin to be seen. Anyway, after checking in to our hostel we took a stroll down to the seafront to be completely floored by the sight of loads of whales about 500 yards off the beach! We walked down the pier to get a closer look and it was truly incredible. Each year loads of Southern Right Whales come to this huge gulf as it´s quite protected, an awesome sight.

We arranged to do a boat trip to get a closer look at the whales from nearby Peninsula Valdes which is a big protected national park area. We managed to get fairly close to some whales and they were huge. We also saw some elephant seals, one of whom who had just given birth, on the beach. We were sure we could hear David Attenborough´s voice as we were witnessing all of this. We had a cool guide called Daniel who was a cross between an old, overweight Rafa Nadal and the late Steve Irwin, unfortunately I didn´t get a picture so you´ll have to use your imagination for that one.

The next day we visited Punta Tombo which is home to the largest colony of Magellanic Penguins (approx 175,000) outside of Antartica, once again accompanied by Rafa/Steve. Incredible to see so many penguins, and some walk half a mile inshore to make their nests!

Later in the day we went to Gaiman which was established by some Welsh settlers in the late 1800´s (they still speak and teach the language there). We had tea and cakes in a Welsh tea house which felt pretty surreal, we were served by a lady who spoke Spanish with a slight Welsh accent which made the experience even more strange!

After a few days there, we´ve now just arrived in Ushuaia in Tierro del Fuego after a mammoth 31 hour bus extravaganza (now imagine THAT on a National Express Rapide bus). We´ll update again soon with more news.

Hope all´s well back home.

Lots of love.

Mr and Mrs Mason x

Managed to finally add some pics!

Here are some more random pics.

Jo and I sporting our trendy travel cushions on the plane..... not sure why we didn´t get upgraded....


The cool metal flower in a park near La Recoleta....


Street tango at the San Telmo antique market....

Boca Juniors 1 - Independiente 1

Yesterday we went to see Boca Juniors vs Independiente, the second biggest BA local derby after Boca vs River Plate. Totally amazing! We thought we´d got ourselves into the seated area but arrived at the stadium with our fixer, Paula along with a group of other nervous tourists from all over the world to realise we were standing on the terraces with the Boca fans! The atmosphere was awesome, the game was fairly average quality but the best thing to see was the ref pushing all of the players quite aggressively! Two Independiente players were sent off for abusing the linesmen, and after each player was sent off, all the Independiente players started attacking the linesmen, having to be dragged away by the riot police before the game could restart. Total mayhem. You could actually feel the stadium swaying underneath your feet when all the fans were jumping around! By some small miracle, having all been split up into various parts of the terrace we all managed to reconvene to head home on our cool old school bus that had obviously been ´borrowed´for the weekend. Tried to upload some pics, but having some technical difficulties.

Plan for the rest of the week:
Finish spanish lessons with Paloma our cool tutor
Find Jo a coat (somewhat hilariously Jo and I arrived here with no coats or waterproofs - still getting to grips with this whole travelling thing, have realised shorts and tshirts might not be sufficient for climbing glaciers)
Continue chilling in BA - really starting to love this city

Then we´re going to head down to Puerto Madryn on Friday by bus to look at the penguins and whales. It´s a hard life....

Adios!

Buenos Aires - Steak and Spa!

After a painful 13 hour flight, we´ve arrived in Buenos Aires! Our attempts at getting an upgrade on the grounds of being honeymooners were futile as the flight was jam packed. We have already seen the Iguazu Falls though, from 37000 feet! The pilot did some nice banking right over them to allow all to get a good view. We are still planning to get a closer look later on in our trip.

So, Emma and Mags had planned a little surprise for our arrival which I had a little prior knowledge of having been asked by Emma to push back the dates of our first 2 nights accomodation. Emma and Mags gave me a blank sealed envelope the night before we left and told me not to open it until we had met our transfer at BA airport. I wasn´t allowed to tell Jo anything, although Jo being Jo she´d already sussed something was up. The penny dropped when we came out in to the arrivals lounge to be greeted by a very smart gentleman holding a leather bound sign for Mr and Mrs Mason. We were then shown to a very nice big Merc with blacked out windows. We opened the envelope to learn that Emma, David, Mags and Matt had treated us to 2 nights at a luxurious spa hotel in the Puerto Madero district of BA. We got to this awesome hotel to be shown to our hotel room complete with rose petals in the hall and on the bed and a bottle of champagne!!! The following day we strolled into BA centre to get the lay of the land, and returned to the hotel for some serious spa and steak action.

Today we had a fairly large shock to the system transferring to our first BA hostel experience, which is a perfectly okay place but not quite a spa hotel! We can´t seem to find the telly in the room, and massages from the staff are not forthcoming. Anyway, we´ve arranged for a weeks worth of Spanish lessons starting tomorrow and will probably then head out west to seek some rural relaxation. BA is excellent but the countryside is calling.

We´ll post some photos once we´ve sorted the cabling out.

Lots of love.

The Masons. x