moreno glacier and torres del paine

when i grow up i want to be an iceberg. seriously. i have seen some mega super awesome icebergs in the last few days. or a llama. they´re so cool. and pretty. and they walk funny.

ok, first things first. i went to el calafate in argentina. it´s a swinging little town. it looks very european, like a little austrian ski chalet village. except of course everyone speaks spanish. anyway, i spent a few hours (six to be exact) going between chile and argentina ended up in a room in calafate. the next morning we cruised to perito moreno glacier. it´s SO big. 60 meters high and 4.5 kilometers wide, this iceberg covers 642 square kms. we´re talking seriously big. and it calves (drops) ice and i saw it do it heaps. you see the ice fall then you hear the sound of it and it´s like a huge rumble of thunder. amazing.

so in the morning we went for this massive two hour hike that involved scrambling over rocks and through mud... i choose to think of it as expanding my physical repitore to gain visualistic gain, rather than slogging my guts out for a view. both are technically accurate. anyway, it was good.

in the afternoon we took a boat cruise on the lake with the iceberg in it. OH MY GOD! so good! freezing cold with a mega wind chill factor, but so amazing, we were so close to the glacier. and then it calved right in front of the boat. of course my digi cam which had been switched on all day, just happened to be switched off. dammit. but it was cool, take my word for it.

anyway, last night i spent another night in calafate and headed back towards peurto natales today. except i get to the border between argentina and chile (which p.s. is in the middle of NO WHERE!) and swa to the right bus and this guy hands me a form and says here you need to fill this in to get into the national park. so i explain to his very nicely that i am in fact not going to torres del paine but rather back to natales. he says "do you wnat to come anyway? i´ll take you back to natales with the rest of the group tonight". OK! like i´m going to refuse a free tour anywhere let alone to somewhere amazing that i wanted to go but thought i was going to miss.

torres del paine is gorgeous. we saw little icebergs, i got to hold a huge chunk of ice that had calved off it, see a massive waterfall, get close to some llamas(although they´re a slightly different breed and called something else here), see this bird that is like the cousin of the emu, some condors and get really close to a grey fox. such a nice day. there are paths that people trek for days around the lakes and mountains of the park and to the torres themselves (three huge granite pillars) but one day was enough for me. it´s a pretty hardcore kind of place.

anyway, i´m staying one more naight in natales and then flying off to santiago and lima tomorrow from punta arenas (for those of you playing on the map at home). i´m going to try and score a flight to cuzco from lima rather than get the bus. for the simple reason being that i´m stupid and didn´t realise that particular bus takes 30 hours. and it´s 1 hour to fly. so, i´m trying to use my spanglish to navigate a cheap deal tomorrow.

keep your fingers crossed for me kids!

ok, i´m off to eat some empanadas, drink some mate and dream about becoming an iceberg... or a llama.

see you soon guys,
love,
simone xxx

Patagonia...

ok, let me tell you something interesting using my now very fluent and extensive chilean slang spanish. the word patagonia can be broken down into two parts the first being "pata" which is slang for foot, ergo "gonia" must be spanish for biggest damn thing i`ve ever seen in my whole entire life. see, my spanish is flawless.

in fact i´ve been having a go at more and more spanish. people still look at me like am an idiot but at least now they´re smiling endearingly as they do it. so that´s something at least.

anyway, back to patagonia, aka the biggest thing known to man. i´ve landed in puerto natales which is a charming little town. there is literally nothing here. except... this enromous series of snow capped mountains that sweep down into the sea.

pretty neat, huh?

it is breath takingly beautiful here. crazy cold too. not so much when you´re just cruising around, but standing on the pier looking out to the sea and the mountains it is bitter. the problem is not the climate, but the wind! being at the bottom of south america peurto natales gets wind from everywhere except the north and a hell of a lot of the stuff from antarctica, which isn´t that far from here. it´s so beautiful here it makes me wish that i was a better author or a poet laurate so that i could adequetly express this place. if i could write a book about anywhere it would be patagonia. even the people here are something else. take for example rustilon, awn american guy who owns the hostel i´m staying in. not only does he run a hostel, he writes the local forgien language newspaper and is a treasure hunter. i kid you not, a treasure hunter. like he goes down to this place where thousands of shipwreaks happended at the bottom of chile and he is salvaging stuff from there. how random. and more than that, this is a serious business claim down here. how can stuff like that happen in real life? this place is the stuff of movies, and beyond that these people make you believe that things like that are viable. these are the most charsmatic men (there are less women here) i´ve met in my life. they are dreamers and drifters, people with big lives, stories and visions. they are amazing. makes me wonder how i got to be here!

there is a baby, she´s about three years old sitting next to me, babbling away at me in spanish. i can´t understand a damn word she´s saying but she is the cutest thing i have ever seen in my whole entire life. she just took her gum out of her mouth and offered it to me. eww and aww, all at once. she just climbed up onto my lap and got me to do up her shoe lace. her parents are sitting right next to me and they´re not worried. so chilled out. i could live here. it´s such a simple way of life.

the people i´ve met have been so interesting and gracious. all i heard aboutt before i came was how dangerous and unhospitable south america was going to be. bollocks. every person i´ve met and seen has been so kind and wonderful. they would give you the shirt off their back if they thought you needed it. i certainly hope that as tourism down here increases (and it will) that this place doesn´t lose its innocence.

now a few little notes:
lisa, the men here are so cute! but not for me. they´re very charismatic and charming. i think patagoina is the place for you. there´s even cows here if you´re thinking of running a bovine cultural exchange program.

tate, on big trip south america if you don´t come here and do torres del paine and the moreno glacier, i will have you killed. like, killed. you´ll love it. stay at this hostel, it´s awesome. best deal in town...
it´s called erratic rock, here´s the details
http://www.hostelworld.com/hosteldetails.php/ErraticRockHostel-PuertoNatales-9120?

to everyone else... thanks for your emails and so on. they´re awesome. i´ll get back to them as i can. off to el carafte this arvo and the moreno glacier tomorrow. ´let you know how it goes.

love you guys,
simone

Santiago and Punta Arenas

hey guys,
so i´m still alive! who´d have thunk it? actually, it´s all going really well. i´m in chile at the moment (obviously) and things haven´t been anywhere near as hard as i thought they would be. i have to admit i was FREAKING out for a little while there, but i stand corrected. the reason it´s been good is because of the people i´ve met. they are so bright, friendly and kind.

i came into santiago yesterday after 20 hours in transit (god i´m an awful human being after that!) and then had to find my way in the center of santiago. managed to get my way onto a bus, no problem and then struck up conversation with the chilean girls in front of me. luckily they both speak some english and we got along really well. sonya and vanessa (the girls) agreed to help me find where to get off the bus, they said they were going where i had to go anyway so they´d come with me. ripper. so we´re chatting and laughing and sonya asks me where i´m planning to stay. so i tell her. and she gets this REALLY worried look on her face and says to me, "show me your list, you´re not staying there, it´s dangerous". i happily obliged. so she and vanessa argue the relative merits of the places and come to the conclusion that i should stay at sonya´s place. anyway, i was a bit worried of inconviencing her at first, but she seemed legit so i agreed. sonya lives with her husband jose and 11 year old daughter. they are the loveliest family i´ve ever met. took me in, fed me chilean food and put me up for the night. the girls and i went out and had some beers in town and then jose organised a realy cheap and safe connection to the airport today. such lovely people. good fun too. but totally safe, so don´t worry!

anyway, next time i stay in santiago i´ll stay with them again.

this morning i headed down to punta arenas... which in the immortal words of paul keating is "the arse end of the world". it seems ok though. i´m using it as a kick off point to go and see the ice glaciers. the flight into here is amazing though. you fly over patagonia which is in essence, bare, hardarse rock with nothing on them except the occasional snow capped mountain. and it is HUGE! the only this you can see for hundreds of kilometers flying in is rock and the shadows of the clouds on them. just amazing. a bit change t o flying out of santiago where you are literally flying about the clouds next to the andes. they are enormous. everything is in south america i think. the lakes too, massive.

anyway, for those of you playing at home my next steps are:
peurto natales
el cafare (argintina)
monegro glacier
and then back again because then i fly back to santiago.

anyway, get or keep in touch and let me know if you´re reading the blog and how thing are OZ side. most importantly, who won the grand final? i bet a dollar it was sydney.

i´ll get in tough again soon,
love,
simone

Auckland...

damn! wrote a clever, witty post... lost it. dumb bum!

am safe and well in transit through nz. saw the bay of islands as we flew in... SO BEAUTIFUL. am really looking forward to spending some time here in may.

so i'm six hours in, my butt hurts, i'm crampy but i am content and better educated. i've bought some brain food (animal farm - geroge orwell and the great gatsby) to keep me entertained. i read animal farm between sydney and auckland. great read 4 stars. very interesting and thought provoking. next time on oprah's book club i'll give you the other. speaking of i picked up anna kerenina, then put it down because it looked too hard!

anyway, only 12 hours to go... i'll keep you informed.
yours,
simone

p.s. i miss you guys already! :)

Itinerary

23 SEP 05 - DEPART - MELBOURNE/TULLAMARINE

23 SEP 05 - DEPART - SYDNEY/SYDNEY KINGSFORD (Transit)

24SEP 05 - DEPART - SANTIAGO/ARTURO MERINO

24 SEP 05 - ARRIVE - PUNTA ARENAS/PRESIDENTE (Here be iceburgs!)

29 SEP 05 - ARRIVE - SANTIAGO/ARTURO MERINO

29SEP 05 - DEPART - SANTIAGO/ARTURO MERINO

29 SEP 05 - ARRIVE - LIMA (Make my way back overland to...)

17 OCT 05 - DEPART - SANTIAGO/ARTURO MERINO

24 OCT 05 - DEPART - RIO DE JANEIRO/RIO INTE

15DEC 05 - DEPART - LONDON/HEATHROW

22DEC 05 - DEPART - ST PETERSBURG/PULKOVO (Just for a little mini break)

30 DEC 05 - DEPART - LONDON/HEATHROW

31 DEC 05 - ARRIVE - BANGKOK/BANGKOK INTL AR (Andre and I will muck about overland and head to...)

13APR 06 - DEPART - DENPASAR/NGURAH RAI ARP

13APR 06 - DEPART - HONG KONG/HONG KONG INT (date potentially to be changed)

21APR 06 - DEPART - CHRISTCHURCH/CHRISTCHUR

22APR 06 - ARRIVE - MELBOURNE (actual arrival date in melbourne is 15th of May 2006)

The Dark Side...

Ok, i admit it... hand me the Djionaise, I'm about to eat my hat. I, Simone Alexander, staunch anti-blog campaigner, have joined the dark side. I apologise...

So, welcome to my blog, which as the best of IT geeks have informed me is a much more practical and hassle free way to send people information about my big trip. I'm not overly sure that anyone really cares about it, but Andy assures me that much in the style of an outdated Kevin Cosner film "If i write it, they will come". Or something...

Ok, so here's the deal... I'm going OS, and not as my title wittily suggests, for eighty days, but rather for eight months. "Hmm", I hear you say, "that sounds like rather a long time, are you prepared for this?", the answer is undeniably, unequivicobly, no. Absolutely shagging not. I'm heading to South America first up. And do you think I can speak Spanish... ummm... nope. I can say "The room is infested with rats" and "I'm pregnant"... but hopeful one isn't related to the other.... ewww weird rat babies. That's gross, and yet, kinda cool. Nope, the verdict is in... that's gross.

So, South America. Here's what i know so far:
1) it can be both very hot and very cold
2) it's big. Like crazy big.
3) most places speak Spanish. Except for Brazil, which speak Portuguese.
4) under no circumstances will i be indulging in a brazillan wax. I just wanted to get that idea over and out of everyone's brain before it became an issue.

Other than that... i'm not sure what's going to happen. I'll put up another posting with an itinerary and stuff so that you'll know where i'll be, then you'll know as much as i do.

Anyway, let me know if you like the blog. Will you read it? I'm normally a mad journal writer, but I think this blog thing is worth a go.

Catch you on the flip side,
simone

*Disclaimer* The author is in no way to be held responsible for any mistakes (spelling, grammatical, conceptial iadeas or otherwise) contained in this blog. And please don't tease her.. she cries easily.