There and Back Again

Hipo-Hamster

noreply@blogger.com (ניצן) — Tue, 04 May 2010 19:56:00 +0000

A combination of night buses got me to Esteros del Ibera, a natural reserve comprised of wetlands. There I took a small boat out with a guide to see capybaras and caimans. The two creatures, one chubby cuteness, the other lean maliciousness, coexist there, along with a variety of bird species, in relative peace. The guide claimed the caimans don't eat the adult capybaras, which can be as big as 80 kgs, but do prey on the young.

Capybaras

Caiman

From the reserve I made tracks towards Puerto Iguazu, and Iguazu Falls. The falls are impressive. Really impressive. I mean god constantly flushing a toilet impressive. I visited both the Brazilian and Argentine side of the falls, and both yielded stellar views. Though the area of the falls is supposed to be teeming with wildlife, the only species that kept popping here and there is the raccoon-like coati.

Coati

Iguazu Falls

From the falls, I took the long ride to Buenos Aires, where I spent five days of sight-seeing and just walking about. Byenos Aires proved to be very different than any other city I've seen in South-America, and I liked it a lot.

From BA it was just a matter of 16 plus hours of air travel to find myself back home, where I am right now. So yeah, I 'm back, and looking forward to seeing everyone again. I just wish you could have done something about the weather though. See you all soon!

And for the last time (for this trip...), all the pics are here.

Adios Chile and last few weeks in Argentina

noreply@blogger.com (ניצן) — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 13:31:00 +0000

From Talca I went up north to Santiago, Chile´s capital. Other than taking a walking tour of the city, and watching drunken British folks, I didn{t do much there. I decided to go further north to La Serena, to visit a pinguin colony nearby of the nearly extinct Humboldt Penguins, however the sea was angry that day, like an old man trying to send back soup at a deli. Instead I visited the town museum, where they had a Moai on display.

Moai

From La Serena I continued north to San pedro de Atacama, a dry desert area. There I went stargazing, which was amazing. A French astronomer and his wife, show the sky of the southern hemisphere´s, with great vies of the milky way, and the different constellations. I also got to see Moon Valley, one of those places, which supposedly features a ¨moonish¨ landscape.

Desert

More desert

San Pedro was my last destination in Chile, and I took the bus to Salta, Argentina, through a beautiful road passing through the Andes. From Salta I went visiting Purmamarca, a village around Cerro de los Siete Colores (the hill of seven colors), and Cachi, a pretty village, stopping on the way in Los Cardones national park. Interestingly enough, Cardones, which are the cacti that grace that region of Argentina, are nowhere to be seen in the part of the park that I visited.

Purmamarca and the hill of seven colors

Los Cardones natinal park

Cachi

From Salta I hauled ass to Mendoza, to drink and drive (a bicycle) through the wineries of Maipu. After hitting a few wineries, I was pulled over by a cop, who instead of arresting me for intoxication, mentioned that it´s getting pretty late, and the wineries are beginning to close, so I should head back now. The next day I went to see The highest mountain in the Americas, Mt. Aconcagua. It was pretty high. On the way we also stopped to see Puente del Inca, literally The Inca Bridge. This bridge has nothing really to do with Inca other than being old, just like them. It was actually naturally created by the cohesive force of calcium from the nearby thermal springs.

The south face of Aconcagua

Under Puente del Inca

As always, the rest of the pics are here.

Volcanoes, earthquakes and one mysterious condom

noreply@blogger.com (ניצן) — Sun, 11 Apr 2010 17:52:00 +0000

I arrived in Pucon, which is sort of the Chilean Queenstown. The main attraction is scaling Volcan Villarica, an active volcano which looms over the city. The hike up is done in organized tours, since it requires use of crampons and an ice axe. The view from the top is great, and the slide down in toboggans was a lot of fun. Looking down the colorful crater, there´s no lava to be seen, however the occasional rumbling noise is heard, followed by a big puff of white smelly fumes.

Volcan Villarica, as seen from Pucon

View from the top of Volcan Villarica

The fuming crater of Volcan Villarica

After this excursion I had to take a couple of rest days for my sunburned lips to heal (I did put on lip treatment with 15 spf, I get it was too little, too late). Once that happened, I set off to Huerquehue national park. When the weather cleared up a bit, I could enjoy the park´s lakes, following the Las Lagos trail. In the meantime, I had the slightly weird experience of sleeping alone in a refugio/hostel (even the person in charge left).

One of the lakes on the Los Lagos hike

I left Pucon, and headed north, to visit the Malalcahuello-Nalcas national reserve (pronounced MA-LAL-KA-WE-YU). I hiked up Crater Navidad, a volcanic crater formed in a powerful eruption in 1988. The surrounding view was that of a volcanic desert, with some basalt ¨peels¨. Once I finished admiring it, O started up the adjacent Volcan Lomquimay, a much more gruelling task, involving a very steep scree slope. At the top of the volcano I found a metal case containing the ¨Lonquimay Conquest Book¨, which I of course duly signed. The crater of Lonquimay was filled with snow, assuring that here a new eruption was not imminent.

The volcanic desert around Crater Navidad

Volcan Lonquimay

The top of Volcan Lonquimay

My next destination was Talca, a major city, from which I could go to visit the Altos del Lircay national reserve. Against my better judgement, I arrived in Talca after dark. As I was walking from the bus terminal to the address Lonely Planed cited for my choice of hostel, I was a bit worried. The town was dark, the area seemed decrepit, and there weren´t many people around. I finally got to the hostel, only to find an abandoned looking building, with cracked walls, and a graffiti saying something about demolition. I decided to try and catch a cab to go to my second choice of hostels, but after waiting for twenty minutes, I realized this is not a good spot to flag down taxis. I spotted a young man passing by, and asked him if he knows where would be a better place to catch a cab. As we were talking, I also explained my predicament, and he noted that on all probability any other hostel that I´ll try will be closed as well. It seems I forgot to check my map of Chile, otherwise I would have noticed my proximity to Concepcion, the epicenter of the last earthquake. That explained everything. When I noted that this means that I have no place to sleep, he agreed, and suggested to host me for the night. At first I was reluctant, but he seemed like a nice guy, plus it was 22:30 and I really didn´t have any other choice. We grabbed a clectivo (SHERUT) to his house, where we had a very nice conversation, which involved him trying his best to speak slowly, and I trying my best to know Spanish. Turns out 200 people died in the earthquake in Talca. That night he was in a club, and the second floor collapsed, killing 5 people, and wounding him. Then, to my surprise, he said that he knows something similar happened in Israel a while back. In the morning, as I woke up, I felt the bed moving under me. It was a small aftershock. Christian, my host, made me breakfast, and put me on a cab to downtown, to arrange my visit to the national reserve.

The reserve was very dusty, and deserted. As I was setting up the tent, I opened its zipper to find a new condom, in its wrapper, in the tent. I have no idea how it got there. The next day I hiked to Laguna del Alto and Enladrillado. The latter is a flat basalt surface, made up of big stones, carved to smooth perfection. The locals are convinced its for alien landings. I reserve judgement. from there it was possible to see Volcan Descabezado Grande, a volcano that appears to have lost it head (descabezado = beheaded), among other peaks. I got back to my tent, and got ready to leave in the morning, for my next destination: Santiago.

Laguna del Altos

Volcan Descabezado, as seen from Eladrillado

As always, all pics are here.

Other Stuff That C Is For

noreply@blogger.com (ניצן) — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 22:14:00 +0000

((This is kinda long, due to the emotional impact certain parts of the post had on me. Sorry))

Okay, first and foremost, I did not have Jabali in Bariloche. After checking everywhere and asking everyone, it seems they ate them all, and there were none left for me. Slightly disappointed, I left for Castro, in the Island of Chiloe. Chiloe is renowned for its old beautiful churches, and delicious seafood, and the unique ambiance. I got to Castro, right in the center of the island, and supposedly the one place that contains all that is so attractive in the island. Having said all this, I should add that all of it didn´t do much for me. Firstly, the restaurant that was recommended to me for seafood wasn´t very good, and the night that I was there they didn´t have the really interesting stuff, such as centolla (king crab). Secondly, getting around the island proved to be slightly problematic, and going to all that effort for seeing one Church at a time seemed a bit too much for me. So I just stayed in Castro for a day and a half, which gave me enough time to check out the old church, and the houses on stilts (palafitos) which the city is famous for.

The Castro church

Palafitos

From Castro I went to Cochamo which is often described as the Chilean Yosemite. In order to get there, I had to get to the godforsaken village of Cochamo, arrange transportation to the trailhead, and hike for 3-4 hours in the rain, in a muddy and slushy trail, crossing several sock drenching streams. When I got there it was too cloudy to really see anything. With nothing better to do, I got to know the local community: climbers, some Americans, some Chileans, all roughly ten thousand times better climbers than I´ll ever be. The main attraction there is the trad routes, but even the sports ones where way out of my league (had I had any equipment to speak of that is). The next day I spent trying, unsuccessfully, to dry myself and my stuff, and waiting for the clouds to clear. In the evening I was notified that tonight we celebrate the end of climbing season, as well as the birthday of the site owner´s lovable 5 year old (the unofficial mascot of the site). The celebrations included a massive sheep asado, as well as a hand puppet show in Spanish, and an improvised musical jam (which included, among other instruments, a dijrido). The kid got his own little climbing wall as a gift. It was pretty awesome (you´ll to take my word for it, as I didn´t have my camera on me).

As the sheep carcases were starting to get chopped, I noticed one of the climbers already had a piece in hand. I asked him how it was, and he gladly passed me the odd looking piece, suggesting I take a huge juicy bite. Only then did I remember noticing the dangling pieces of meat on each of the male sheep. The sly smile on the others´ faces made it clear that I had guessed right. Some of the assadors claimed this was one of the prime pieces. I tried it. It was... soft. The rest of the pieces that I had were more conventional, and delicious.

Asado, an illustration (I´ll spare you the illustration of the part I tried)

The next day, the rain finally abated, I decided to hike up what was said to be the prettiest hike in Cochamo, Arco Iris. Climbing up the muddy steep trail was fun, since it involved several sections of pulling myself over water slick rock faces, using fixed rope lines, over a rather threatening abyss. Fun. I finally got to the top to discover a couple of peaks looming. I assumed, as I saw some rock cairns, that I was supposed to go up to one of them. Therefore, I wasn´t too worried when the cairns disappeared. I just figured I´ll catch the trail again when I´´ll reach the top. After finding my path, which consisted of several ¨shortcuts¨, which to the untrained eye would seem idiotically risky, and dangerously similar to climbing a rock face with no form of security equipment, I made it to the top of the first peak. I saw an alpine lake, Mt. Tronador, and several other peaks. I didn´t see cairns. Somehow, the logical thing seemed to be to climb the other peak. I did that, and again, among the great views, I couldn´t count any cairn. It was getting a bit late, and the thought of getting stranded on a rock shelf overnight didn´t seem that appealing. I tried to find my way down as fast as i could, Which turned out to be pretty slow, since I couldn´t remember the ¨shortcuts¨. I finally made it down to where I last saw the cairns, somehow in one piece. It was really late now, and while it was better to spend the night in the woods than on the rock, I wasn´t too keen on the idea. I half ran, half slid (which means fell on my ass 65 times) down, hoping I can clear the ropes before it gets dark. I finished half rappelling the last section just as sunlight completely disappeared. Now it was just a matter of keeping to the path, using my trusted old head torch. With a lot of luck, I managed somehow to keep to the path (I thing I´m better at it in the dark for some reason), and made it back to the campground. When I arrived I shared my story with the others, who sagely noted that going alone was dangerous. I agreed. They also said that they were there today as well (probably as I was attempting to scale the peaks), saw the peaks and decided it was too far to be part of the route. Now I felt slightly more stupid. To perk me up, they offered some of the huge pot of delicious lentil stew the made. I had four bowls.

Clouds in Cochamo

My ¨path¨

View from the top

My visit to Cochamo ended with a sunny hike back to the village, from where I would try to make my way to Pucon. As always, the other pics can be found here.

Lakes, Beef and Chocolate

noreply@blogger.com (ניצן) — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 16:53:00 +0000

The trek in El Bolson, Around Cerro Hielo Azul, was very nice, with one great highlight: I did a side trip, climbing up to to a peak just opposite the glacier. There, alone on the peak of Barda Negra, I had an amazing panorama of the Comarca Andina. The pics from the trek can be viewed here.

My surroundings on the peak of Barda Negra

After leaving the so called hippie town (i.e. pot head town) of El Bolson, I made it to Bariloche, my current whereabouts. I didn´t do any of the treks I hoped I would here, and am driven out by the impeding bad weather, but I still had a good time.

Gastronomically, I made the obligatory visit to El Boliche de Alberto, which indeed serves a fine biffe the lomo. I had some chocolate at Mamuschca, some ice cream at Jauja and some deer delicacies (as well as a very nice boutique beer) at Familia Weiss. I hope to try Jabali this evening.

and because I feel it´s expected: Jabali before

... and after

As for scenery, I did a very short walk up to Cerro Campanrio, for great views of the Nahuel Huapi lake and a rented a bicycle for the Circuito Chico, a 25-30 km circuit in the park, with some short hikes and viewpoints.

View from Cerro Campanario

Hotel Llao Llao, on the Circuito Chico

While this took quite a bit of asking and probing around, I managed to arrange to go outdoor climbing here with a couple of guys in Piedras Blancas in Cerro Otto. The routes were very interesting, and required delicate foot work. This was made especially challenging given the strategically positioned holes in my rented climbing shoes. My toes are much tougher than I thought.

The easiest route I did In Piedras blancas. Cute.

All the Bariloche pics can be found here.

Tomorrow morning I will be getting on a bus back to Chile, and more specifically, to Castro in Chiloé. We´ll see how that goes.

El, El, El, Yekhezkel

noreply@blogger.com (ניצן) — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 19:11:00 +0000

El Calafate is my least favourite place in Argentina so far. Maybe it was the cheap and crappy hostel (you get what you pay for) or the gross cazino on the main street, but I really didn´t like it. The surrounding area was very beautiful though.
I took a tour to the famous Perito Moreno Glacier, which proved to be very pretty amd nice, just a bit overcrowded and too long (how many hours can you stand and stare at a glacier?)

I managed to catch a rainbow forming over the glacier :)

I also hiked up Cerro Crystal, a steep windy hike to great panorama of closeby glaciar and snow capped peaks.

View from the top of Cerro Crystal

From El Calafate I took a bus to the awesome El Chalten. From the town I set out walking for 4 days in the nearby north part of Los Glaciares national park. I camped for 2 nights at a cute refugio at Piedra del Frail, from which I hiked up to Paso del Cuardado, a mountain pass surrounded by ice and snow.

The refugio

Just a glimpse of the amazing views from Paso del Cuadrado

I continued to do the extremely popular circuit that features view of Cerro Fitz Roy and Cerro Torro. Weather was perfect and the views were great.

Fit Roy Mountain Range

Cerro Fitz Roy (view from Laguna los Tres)

Cerro Torro (view from Laguna Torre)

Back in El Chalten, I found I could buy a small booklet detailing all the numerous bolted sport climbing routes just a minute walk out of town. I gathered 2 brits and an Israeli rappeling instructor, rented all the necessary equipment and spent a nice day climbing nearby easy routes (we were forced to stick to easy routes, since I was the only one who could lead, and I did not want to take unnecessary risks).

Climbing some easy 5+/6a

BTW, on the first day of my trek I met this guy, Michele Radici, an extreme sports movie director, who filmed the first movie that made Alain Robert be known as the human spider. The people you happen to meet when traveling...

So, El Chalten was really great. From there I took an okay 30 hour bus ride to El Bolson, my current whereabouts, and am planning to go trekking tomorrow around Cerro Hielo Azul. More photos can be found here.

Finally, Pictures

noreply@blogger.com (ניצן) — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 21:12:00 +0000

For now I just uploaded a bunch of them to Facebook, as those of you who are not eternal PhD students (you know who you are), have probably noticed by now. From now on I´ll try to embed some in future posts. Enjoy!

Ache in My Shoulders and Pain in My Butt

noreply@blogger.com (ניצן) — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 23:02:00 +0000

As some of you know, I used to think that my travelling companions are in someway cursed, namely one of them always finds himself in the hospital. I was wrong. The curse is in me: I always find myself in the hospital. I was just lucky enough not to be the patient. Usually.

I started the Torres del Paine Circuit with slight trepidation, as on the way to the first camp I came across 5 people, 2 of which were heading the other direction. I was relieved to find the camp slowly filled up, and that I wasn´t alone on the trek. I did most of it with 2 friendly Germans, Denis and Kai, which were a lot of fun. The trek was very difficult for me, being the first time I trek with a tent on my back. In the first campsite there was a scale, which revealed that I was carrying about 27 kgs on my back, a fact which might explain why I was having such a hard time. Slowly and maybe slightly agonizingly, I managed my way through the trek.
On the last day, as I was waiting for the bus back, I started shivering uncontrollably, until one think led to another and I spontaneously emptied the contents of my stomach. On the bus back this trend continued, with the other tourists doing their best to ignore me. One local angel approached me, gave me some water, a new plastic bag to replace the one I had already thoroughly used, and explained to the wonderful people at my hostel what happened. I asked that they get me a cab to go to the hospital, thinking that I might need a transfusion to avoid dehydration, but they of course insisted on taking me themsleves, waiting with me and confirming everyhing with the nice doctor. It all ended with an extremely painful injection on my left butt cheek and some anti-vomiting pills. I seem to be fine now, and am even going climbing tomorrow (hurray!).
Tomorrow eveining I will probably take the bus back to Argentina to El Calafate, the whereabouts of Perito Moreno. I will try to remain in slightly better physical condtion from here on.

Patagonia: the beginning

noreply@blogger.com (ניצן) — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 00:50:00 +0000

Hi all,
Sorry I haven´t been in touch, it´s been kind of crazy since I got here.
On Monday, last week, I got to Ushuaia after 36 hours of travel. I hiked a bit in the Tierra del Fuego National Park, which was nicer than I had initially thought. I first went on a hike to the top Cerro Guanaco, a hike that proved unsuccesful. The weather at the bottom was rainy and windy, and turned to billowing snow at the top. Roughly 200 meters from the top it was impossible to find the trail, plus visibilty was nearing zero, so I had to turn back. The next day the weather was good and I walked through the rest of the easy trails in the park.
I moved on to Punta Arenas, where I managed to get lost for an hour and a half in a natural reserve, make it to my bus in time somehow, and catch the flu. I made to Puerto Natales, stepping out of the bus with fever, a huge backpack and an even bigger headache. Luckily it was raining, so no one could see the tears streaming down my face. I made it to a nearby hostel which welcomed me in, and sank into a blissful coma with the help of Decsamol Cold (night).
Since then I´ve mostly recooperated, and am going tomorrow on the Torres del Paine circuit, a classic 8 day trek.
I apologize for the lack of images, but my new shiny camera refuses to play along without its integral software, which I naturally did not think to bring along. My advice: use google images. The results are much better than what I could produce, not even having photoshoop handy.
I hope to update some more after the trek, so see you in a week or so.

At Last, Choquequirao

noreply@blogger.com (ניצן) — Sat, 13 Oct 2007 21:45:00 +0000

The morning after the horseback tour I actually set out on the trek. Naturally, the Australian couple who were allegedly sick, turned out to be an American couple who wasn´t even in Cuzco yet at the time we were originally supposed to go. This was well expected, and therefore not a big deal for me. The trek is considered hard by local standard, but this is mainly due to the fact that most trek around the area are quite easy. It featured a very long downhill descent followed by a very long uphill climb, in order to get to the site, and then backtracking the same path.

I was a bit unsure of how impressive the site will be, after having visited Machu Picchu, but I wasn´t disappointed in the least. Though the site is not completely excavated (yet?), it is very easy to fill in the blanks, and to see that it is HUGE.

This is just a small portion of it:

Some of the site is quite unusual when compared to other Inca ruins, like the big two storey houses, and the images combined in some terraces (other Inca architecture is very "clean"):

And up close:

Another surprise that the agency thought I might enjoy, was the fact that the American couple had planned to do the trek in 5 days, while I was planning on only 4. This meant that the campsite for the 3rd day was kind of far from the finish point, and consequently, I had to start the walking the next day at 4am, and made it to my destination after 6 straight hours of walking half of the downhill and all of the uphill. At least I arrived back in Cuzco quite early.

((I just realised this stupid computer won´t let me space the paragraphs, which explains why the previous post seems quite compressed as well. Maybe I´ll be able to fix it on a different occasion.))

Fun With Horses

noreply@blogger.com (ניצן) — Sat, 13 Oct 2007 00:27:00 +0000

Agencies in Peru are notorious for being less than accurate when giving the details of the activity, and I am used to that by now. That is why I found it a little hard to believe when the agency called me the evening before I was supposed to go on the trek, and told me that It´s being postponed by one day, because the Australian couple, whom the agency claimed I was to go on the trek with, are sick. "Well, how do you know they will get better in time for the day after tomorrow?" I naively asked. "Oh, don´t worry they CONFIRMED for the next day.", was the reply.

The next night I went to bed with the sound knowledge that I am to wake up in about 6 hours to go trekking. I was wrong. The night man from reception woke me up at around midnight, and told me I have a phone call from my supposed guide for tomorrow. I answered the phone, and through my veil of sleepiness, and a little bit of drunkenness (every night in Cuzco included beer), I understood that the guide is now sick, and that the trek is postponed by one more day. This time I was offered some compensation in the form of a Sacred Valley tour for the next morning. Having no better option, since it was very hard to find an agency for the trek, I accepted and went back to sleep.

In the morning I was picked up by Some locals in a cab. They explained to me that I have to wait at a certain place while they go get the other 2 girls who are doing the tour. When the two girls arrived, we had to go up a short trail and wait. I asked them what were we waiting for. For some reason the question surprised them, and they said "why, for the horses.". "Horses? What horses?", as it turned out, I was about to embark on one of the most touristic ventures I have ever taken upon myself. The girls spotted my surprise, and asked if I have never ridden a horse before. I reassured them that I had lots of riding experience on the family camel back in Israel. In actuality it turned out to be lots of fun, even though it`s one of those things I would never think of booking for myself.

2 Down, 5 to Go

noreply@blogger.com (ניצן) — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 23:46:00 +0000

I finally did it. With Machu Picchu down, I´m 2 out of 7 now.

To get to the site, I set off on a 5 day trek, called "the Salkantay". Salkantay is a sacred mountain, which is visited quite up close on the trek, and is definitely a highlight in my view, even after many other mountain views around Huaraz.

Another highlight of trek, and actually a bigger one at that, was the great group of people I got to meet (Gil, there was a Swedish couple, so we played "Plump" :)):

Their company, and the fact that I had more beer on the that trek than in my entire stay here (damn, I sucked at that drinking game), really made it a great experience.

Finally, Machu Picchu itself, was amazingly cool:

After coming back from the trek (the rest of the pics can be downloaded here), I visited Inca ruins around Cuzco, in a place called Pisac:

I also booked another trek for the next day to Choquequirao, another Inca city, like Machu Picchu, that its excavation and clearing is still a working progress. While there is no real idea as to the function of Machu Picchu, it is thought that Choquequirao was part of the last place of resistance for the Quechua people, led by Manco Inca, against the Spanish conquistadors. Unfortunately things did not go smoothly.

Sticky Powder

noreply@blogger.com (ניצן) — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 23:14:00 +0000

That would be the best way to describe sandboarding in snowboarding terms. I don’t have any pics of myself in action, mainly due to the fact that I didn’t want Doron’s camera stuffed full of sand, But in all honesty, it’s not that impressive - like slow snowboarding, without any real ability to turn (it causes to much speed lost).

To get to the dunes you ride a sand buggy - now that’s an adrenaline rush. The driver was a bit overzealous, and if it wasn’t for sand constantly flying into my eyes, I probably would have shut them voluntarily.

Another phenomena that was unique for Ica, in my trip that is, is the fact that I found the fabled Israeli hordes. Half of them were under the influence of the latest developments in DIY chemistry, the other half were just slightly annoying:

(An Israeli couple looking at some sand dunes in complete awe)
Guy: "I’ve never seen anything like this!"
Girl: "Welcome to South America MAMY, Where things you’ve never seen before exist!"

Just goes to show that the whole development of the sandy parts of Rishon was a fatal blow to the potential sandboarding tourism boom in Israel.

To top things off, I was even offered, for the first time ever abroad, drugs in Hebrew ("Yarok O Lavan?").

I left after one day. Destination: Cuzco.

Gastronomical Update

noreply@blogger.com (ניצן) — Fri, 28 Sep 2007 00:10:00 +0000

I haven’t posted in a while, and will probably won’t have time tonight to update regarding what I’ve been doing, but I would like to do a quick culinary review of my trip to Peru:

Name: Pisco Sour

Type: Alcoholic beverage

Short description: Peru’s National cocktail (or Chile’s if you ask a Chilean). made of Pisco (Peruvian grape brandy), lime juice, some egg white and crushed ice. In short, a chick drink.

Visual impression: Like lemonade with a big head of white foam.

Taste (and smell, if relevant): Lemon juice with a bit (just a bit) of alcohol.

Grade out of 10: 5

Name: Cuy

Type: Meat dish

Short description: Roasted guinea pig. Served on festive occasions and every Peruvian’s favorite.

Sample pic (for illustration purposes alone):

Guinea Pig

Cuy

Visual impression: Like a chicken with a rat’s head.

Taste (and smell, if relevant): The skin is crispy and very good. There isn’t much meat, but whatever I managed to find was kind of like quail (meaning like chicken but more tender and more greasy).

Grade out of 10: 8.5

Name: Ceviche

Type: Sea food dish.

Short description: Raw fish and/or shellfish marinated (and thus "cooked") in some lemon juice. It is possible, and not very hard, to find this dish in Israel, but it is considered something of a national dish in Peru.

Visual impression: As expected.

Taste (and smell, if relevant): Hey, It’s lightly cooked seafood - how can you go wrong (well except from adding loads of coriander)?

Grade out of 10: 9 (would have been a 10 if it wasn’t for the Peruvian affection for coriander).

Name: Chicha (aka "Pure Evil")

Type: Alcoholic beverage.

Short description: A Peruvian beer (home brew) made from corn fermented in human spit. In all fairness, it should be noted that the locals claim that in nowadays Chicha goes under a more standard fermentation process. It should also be noted that after trying it, I don´t believe them.

Visual impression: murky rust water, with a big head of foam.

Taste (and smell, if relevant): Before taking a sip I took a whiff. Bad idea. It smells like stomach acid. The taste is like expired beer, or maybe an extremely sour alcoholic apple cider.

Grade out of 10: -1576

Name: Chicha Morada

Type: Sometimes beverage, sometimes dessert jello.

Short description: Strong purple colored drink or jello. Served at room temperature.

Visual impression: See "short description".

Taste (and smell, if relevant): Sweet and fruity. Reminiscent of quince marmalade.

Grade out of 10: 7

Name: Alpaca Steak

Type: Meat dish.

Short description: Well, it’s alpaca meat.

Visual impression: Looks just like any other beef steak.

Taste (and smell, if relevant): Tastes just like any other beef steak.

Grade out of 10: 10 (Like any beef steak)

Next time (in about 5 days) I`ll finally have time to tell about Cuzco (my current whereabouts).

The Way Inn Lodge, and the Way Out of Huaraz (Sniff, Sniff)

noreply@blogger.com (ניצן) — Mon, 17 Sep 2007 20:29:00 +0000

Upon finishing the trek, I went for a day of rock climbing at Chancos, a short drive from Huaraz, and even did a bit of outdoor lead climbing for the first time. It was fun.

The next day, Ashley (the welsh from the Santa Cruz trek) and I moved to a new hostel, about 13 km out of Huaraz, in the mountains, called "The Way Inn Lodge".

The place was great, just great vistas and outdoor activity out of the city. I found some partners for some outdoor bouldering (lots of fun, accompanied by bleeding toes and fingers):

((Is that an extremely cool chalk bag or what?))

And did some great day walks:

I spent about 5 days there, hiking, climbing, getting bitten by sandflies and sunburning my upper lip (I have a bit of a Baron Harkonnen look going now), but the time has come to (very sadly) move on. I´m taking the night bus to Lima tonight, and from there a 5 hour bus to Ica, the best place in Peru for sandboarding and earthquakes.

BTW no. 1:
A file containing all the pics (both for this post and the Santa Cruz one) can be downloaded here.

BTW no. 2:
I fixed the poll and you´re all invited to get me to drink peruvian spit beer.

Laid Back Trekking

noreply@blogger.com (ניצן) — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 17:58:00 +0000

With Steve on his way, I wasted no time getting back to the great outdoors, and headed off to do the 4 day Santa Cruz trek.

Again, I did the trek through an agency. Since this trek is much more popular than the Huayhuash, our group consisted of 8(!) people. The large number f people on the group made me a bit worried, but in hindsight these people where the main reason I enjoyed the trek so much, even though we suffered bad visibililty for some of the highlights. The group was made up of a German couple, a Dutch couple, a French guy and a Taiwnanese girl (also a couple), a Welsh guy, and myself. There were all very nice and funny (especially fabrice, the frenchman, who kept making fun of the brit).

As I said, visibility wasn´t very good, and we didn´t even get to see Alpamayo, a mountain that was declared by UNESCO as "the world´s most beautiful mountain". I did however see a cloud that kind of looked like Givat Hamorè.

Is Someone Trying to Tell Me Something?

noreply@blogger.com (ניצן) — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 17:32:00 +0000

After Steve had his fit, which was very scary, I managed to get him to our hostel, with the help of our guide, Heimer. Once there, I explained to Steve again what happened, for the tenth time, as he was extremely confused. I had encountered in the past a person suffering from exhaustion and dehydration getting a seizure, so i figured Steve just had to try and take it easy. We took long long showers, relaxed a bit and decided to try and find something to eat (about 7 hours had passed since we had lunch, which consisted mainly of crackers).

I chose a chinese place (lots of them in Peru), and had an Okay meal. Steve managed to eat some soup, and was working on finishing his glass of water, when it happened again. Steve went into a fit of convulsions, and I had to hold him down, while trying to control the situation (a type of control which was comprised of an assortment of curse words, mostly in arabic, and a lot of shouting at the few people who happened to be there to get someone who can help).

Before long, the locals stopped a taxi for us, and Steve regained enough composure to be taken to the hospital. The hospital staff spoke almost no English, so I utilized the many hours I spent as a child watching Panto on TV. Finally an English speaking doctor came, and Steve and I managed to explain what happened.

Steve Stayed at the hospital for 2 days, while I made some errands, and mostly visited with him. After 2 days, Steve was discharged, and traveled to Lima for further testing (more details are on his blog, see the link in the second post).

This would be a good time to mention that so far, every major travelling experience for has involved a travelling companion being admitted to a hospital. Is this supposed to be some kind of message for me? If so, it´s probably in Spanish, and that`s why I don`t understand it.

Soroche and Seizures - Welcome to Huaraz!

noreply@blogger.com (ניצן) — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 16:05:00 +0000

What I didn`t mention on my previous post was that before I slept like a baby, I had a short chat with Steve, an american guy who was planning on doing the famous 10 day Huayhuash trek.

We ended up going to the same hostel in Huaraz (the hostel I had planned on was closed when we arrived), and spent a few days of acclimatizing with some day trips:

Laguna Churup (meaning "silence" in Quechua)

Lake Villakocha(?)

The original plan had been to find more people, in order to lower costs, but the city was quite backpacker free at the time, possibly due to the earthquake that may have scared people off (even though it was no where near Huaraz). So, as it turned out, it was just Steve, a guide named Heimer, our donkey driver Eddilberto, and myself. The trek was beautiful - following are some choice pics (if you´re interested, you can find all the pics I took on the trek and day walks on a 40 Mb file downloadable from here. Just choose one of the servers, usually Rapidshare is the easiest, and follow the instructions).

A massive glacier:

Going up to one of the passes:

One of the many alpine lakes in the region:

Can you spot the Viscacha?

Here it is:

Once again, same as in Nepal, I had to deal with AMS, aka altitude sickness, aka Soroche, which
meant frequent headaches. There was a period of 2 days I was a bit overcome with AMS, practically crawling from campsite to campsite, and spending 14 hours a day sleeping. This had my guide a bit worried. He had encouraged us along the trek to drink mate de coca (coca leaf herbal tea), which the Peruvians believe is very good in treating Soroche, and was quite clueless as to what else can be done.

When we met another guide at one of the passes, I overheard the short consultation, and even with my (virtually non existent) Spanish managed to extract the following dialog (roughly translated):

Heimer: "The Israeli has bad Soroche."

Other guide: "Did you give him mate de coca"?

Heimer: "Yes, of course I did!"

Other guide: "Oh. Too bad."

How reassuring.

Anyway, as concerned as he was, Heimer didn´t think that avoiding taking lunch breaks at 5000 meters high mountain passes might help a bit as well. At least I survived.

The really unusual part of this experience, and the main reason I didn´t really have time for updates, came 5 minutes after we got off the bus back in Huaraz. Steve took about 10 steps and suddenly collapsed in a fit of convulsions. Thank god the good people of Peru helped out, and except for a very confused American I didn´t have to handle any other immediate threats. Or so I thought.

Yes, I´m still alive

noreply@blogger.com (ניצן) — Fri, 07 Sep 2007 01:31:00 +0000

This is the first real update of what´s been going on with me since I got to Lima, about 2-3 weeks ago. I didn´t like Lima at all, partly because of the ominous descriptions of crime in the big city Lonely Planet is busting with, and partly because it just didn´t seem tht interesting. The few things I managed to accomplish in my the short time I spent there were:

- Eating in a popular ceviche restaurant (the dish was nice, even though they bombarded it with coriander).

- Coming to grips with the fact that everybody in Peru (possibly in all of South America) has better spanish than me, even that dumbass Israeli who took a piss in the river which his guide was using to wash food and dishes (we´ll get to that in a later post). It turns out that: a. "Buenos dias" is not enough. b. Even though spanish and french seem similar to me, nobody understands me when I use a not so eloquent mixture of french babble and english.

- Lonely Planet tells of a place called "Plaza San Martin", which features a statue of Madre Patria, the symbolic mother of Peru. The thing that drew my attention to it, is the story behind the culpture: itturns out that the spanish had given specific orders to give the statue a crown of flames (llama in spanish), so the the local peruvian artist supposedly placed a small figure of a llama on its head. To my giant disappointment the top of the statue´s head isn`t visible from street level. Oh well.

- The hostel I stayed in had a DVD player, and so I finally saw "Pirates of the Caribean 3" (boring), "Borat" (fucking funny as hell) and fragments of "Hostel 2" (don´t even ask).
During those 2 days I also managed the rather simple task of buying an overnight bus ticket to Huaraz, the alleged trekking capital of Peru, which was a bit expensive but well worth it - I slept like a baby.