En la Carretera Austral

I didn´t want to leave my fans waiting, so I thought I would stop for a day in the Chilean town of Coyhaique and give you the latest on the greatest (i.e. me). You´re welcome!

First of all, Coyhaique is impossible to pronounce. I think it has some Indian origen, and when you mix that with Spanish, you get Gibberish. This area of central Chilean Patagonia has a lot of gringo tongue twisters, but I don´t mind it because the landscape is spectacular and the people are very kind.

Secondly, I am very excited to announce that I have tickets for Radiohead in Santiago! Effin´ eh! On March 26th I will be headed to the nation´s capital for some good tunes, some culture, and some good friends (see the next paragraph for explanation). Also, I bought two tickets, so I am going to leave an open invitation for any of my friends or family: if you can come visit me in Santiago in March, then I will have a free ticket to the concert for you (Bourland, I am looking in your direction). You know you want to...

And lastly, as I alluded to in the previous paragraph, I made some really good friends in Chile Chico, and ended up following them around for a bit. They were a group of Chilean university students from Santiago, and they were all very cool. I am going to go see Radiohead with one of them, and stay at another´s place while in Santiago. There was even talk of a fiesta-slash-asado (bbq) or a football game. They were very kind, and I look forward to hanging out more in a month. Aren´t we cool:

Well, that pretty much wraps up this session. If any of you have questions or comments, please write them down and save them for next time. Until then, adios!

Prayin´ to the almighty travel god, Ramblon

I am back in Chile. After a gruesome 12 hour bus from El Chaltén to Los Antiguos (gruesome with the exception of a spectacularly colorful sunset) and a border crossing, I am once again in Chile. Last night I camped in Chile Chico, which was actually pretty nice. It is a sleeping little pueblo on the shores of a gorgeous lake, it has a nice park where I hung my hammock and took a siesta, and made some new friends last night (one dude from Montana, two girls from Israel, and a whole crew of very nice Chilean students). However, today I move on. I am going to take the road down the south edge of the lake (Lago Buenos Aires) to a small town on the Carraterra Austral (the main highway). There is supposedly some very nice kayaking along some marble caves on the lake. I´m looking into it.

And, with regards to the volcano in Chaiten that you may or may not have heard errupted this last week, I am not really directly affected by it. It is pretty far north. But, it has shut down the highway, so now I will either have to go back into Argentina or take a ferry around to Puerto Montt in order to get up to the Lakes District. We´ll see, but it shouldn´t be a big deal (?).

Also I would like to provide a quick response to Julio Cortázar´s ¨Hopscotch¨, which I just finished: 550 pages of tedious, 50´s-French-existentialist-wannabe, insubstantial, fart-in-the-wind, pompous nonsense. Absolutely hated it. I would have rather just taken a swift kick in the ass and saved the time. I imagine Cortázar lazily smoking cigarettes atop his ivory tower, periodically tossing the hungry masses bits of moldy bread. I could go on, bit we are both busy people, right?

And lastly, last night I was told that my Spanish was very good by two different Chileans. They are so nice to lie to me. Ha! Hasta luego, chicos!

What It´s all about...

Yesterday was The Day. After 4 days of patient waiting, the clouds finally cleared. I awoke to sunshine, had my maté and medialunas, and hit the trail for what was to be the most spectacular day of hiking I have ever had. I found what I have come for.

Mt Fitz Roy is a particularly fickle mountain. Perched on the Eastern edge of the Southern Patagonian Ice Field and rising 12,000 feet into the cold, cloudy air, the mountain was called El Chaltén by the natives, which translates as (I guess) ¨smoky mountain.¨ Out of the 6 days I have spent here, it was only visible for about 10 hours. I timed it perfectly, and was treated with the most stunningly, breathlessly, speechlessly, god-blessedly beautiful vista I have ever seen. Ever. By far and away the most amazing landscape I have seen, and completely unique on this planet. I have been trying so hard to find a good descriptive word for the mountains here, and the only one I have found that even comes close is redonkulous, and that is made up.



This week has been a bit frustrating, very slow paced, full of new and old friends, and cold (mostly due to the fact I camped 5 nights). On Wednesday, I waited at the top of a trail for almost 3 hours to catch a glimpse of Cerro Torre (another infamous mountain in these parts), with no luck at all. I was bummed. But the 9 hours I spent hiking up to Fitz Roy, with its surreal, picturesque, otherwordly sights completely justified everything. It was extremely satisfying, and I am really glad I came here.

My next stop will be Los Antiguos (a small town on the southern shore of Lago Buenos Aires in the middle of Patagonia), and then back over to Chile to see some fairly remote national parks. It´s very open ended, as I like it.

Also, as of today, I have been on vacation for 1 month exactly. Hooray! I am 1/3 of the way ¨there¨, with so much more to see. I am feeling really good!

I´m also feeling a bit quotey today, and since a clear night sky is something to behold down here (the Milky Way is wild),

¨If people sat outside and looked at the stars each night, I´ll bet they´d live a lot differently.¨
-Calvin, from Calvin and Hobbes

PS I´m working on Radiohead tickets in Santiago. Life is rad.

El Chalten: Medialunas, Empanadas, y Nubes

I have only 10 minutes to write this, because internet here is expensive. So I will keep this brief.
I arrived here in El Chalten on Sunday. Situated at the base of the iconic Mt Fitz Roy peak, this is a really small, expensive, and rainy hamlet. One street with lots of puddles.

I would like to say the mountains here are magnificent, but due to the weather, I have yet to see them. Also, I was unable to find a bus north until Saturday, so I will be spending almost a week here.

Now, for the good news, the weather should be clearing up today and tomorrow, so my chances of seeing the only thing there is to see here are increasing! Yeah! Also, camping is free and right outside of town, so I am saving a great deal of money by not hosteling. Yeah! Also, a handful of people I met previously on my trip have ended up here in town, so I know some people. Again, yeah! They have a brewery here that has the best beer I have had yet in South America, the delicious empanadas (meat filled pastries) are ubiquitous and cheap here, and I eat a half dozen medialunas a day (croissants, really). So, I am doing just fine here. I guess I would probably rather get going sooner rather than later, but I am patient and having a good time, so its all good.

Altight, gotta go. The clouds are starting to finally break, so I need to go find this shy bastard of a mountain. You all stay cool, Stefan

(awed silence)

Chile´s Torres del Paine mountains, like Earth´s middle finger, are just disrespectful. Rising 9,000 feet above the glaciated coast of Southern Patagonia, the landscape has no respect at all for human scale, human life, or the law of gravity. As the malevolent monarchs who sit upon the granite throne of Torres del Paine, the almighty Wind and Water rule this place absolutely. Wind is omnipresent and spectacularly powerful, and water owns your existence here.

I had prepared for a 8 or 9 day trip around the park´s larger hiking circuit, but because the mountains are in charge here, our trip was very rudely interrupted. I headed out with a couple of English guys (well, to be specific, one lives in Botswana and the other on the Jersey Islands off the coast of France) I met at the hostel, and our first two days on the trail were absolutely awesome. Sun shine, surreal vistas of the massif, dry gear, and I even had a little beer/hammock time in the sun. As the clouds moved in on the afternoon of day-two, the situation changed rather dramatically...

Now, this wasn´t my first rodeo. I´ve backpacked in the Sierras of California, Wyoming, and the San Juans of Colorado, all of which have the potential for pretty nasty weather all year long. But, as I hiked in Torres del Paine in the middle of their summer, I was absolutely shocked. I have never in my life seen weather like this. As we went over the pass on day 3 (only about 5,000 feet up, so pretty tame by Colorado standards), we were hit with ungodly 90 kmph winds and a foot of snow. I had all my gear and was pretty well prepared for anything, but holy begeezes! On the other side of the pass, it really got sloppy. Rain rain rain. By the end of the trip, they had shut down two passes (stranding a huge number of hikers all over the park), two camps, and a swollen river crossing. The weather changed in a blink of an eye, so we did in fact get some pretty amazing views the whole trip long, but the place was a freakin mess.

In addition to the glacier carved valleys, the towering rock spires, the cartoonishly blue-green lakes, and the dramatic peaks, the park hides one thing I had never seen in my life. A real, honest-to-goodness, world class glacier. Stretching from horizon to horizon, miles across a tremendous valley, and hundreds of feet deep, Glacier Grey is the biggest thing I have ever seen in my life. A pulverizing, electric-charged-blue mass buldozing its way down the valley for centuries. I can´t properly qualify it, so I will stop here.

So, in conclusion: 6 days, 5 nights, 110 km, 0 showers, 1 pair of broken sunglasses, 1 bagillion people (think Yellowstone, but with people instead of RVs), 2 closed passes, 100+ kmph winds, 100% wet clothes, and 110% satisfaction.

Like Malcolm (or the scientist lady, I can´t remember) said in Jurassic Park, ¨We all underestimated the power of this place!¨

My next stop is El Chaltén to hike the terrific Fitz Roy Range. So much to do...

I´m a MILLIONAIRE!

I did the math, and with the curret Chilean peso exchange rate of 600 pesos to 1 US dollar, I am a legitimate millionaire! Awesome, right?! But trust me, I won´t change at all. I´ll still be the same ole´ Stefan, and I won´t forget the little people from my previous non-millionaire existence. Some of you might even be rewarded for your loyalty to the tune of, oh I don´t know, $500 pesos! How does that sound?! Pretty good, huh?

Needless to say, I am in Chile. Puerto Natales, to be exact. On the doorstep of Torres del Paine National Park. I am headed in on Sunday for at least a week, so be prepared for another painful period of ill communication. I know. It hurts.

I am finding myself to be much more capable than I was even a week ago. When I arrived in Punta Arenas Thursday night at 8:30, I managed to obtain Chilean money, a bed for the night, groceries, and a bus ticket within a mere hour and half. And, I communicated solely in Spanish! Well, Spanish and a very precise series of grunts and pointing. And today, to my astonishment, I helped translate between a kid from Israel who didn´t speak Spanish and the hostel lady! Unbelievable, really. I probably totally passed on the wrong information, but they both seemed impressed, so whatever!! (Basically, she wanted him and his friends to clean up their crap on the floor)

As my time on the computer has now cost me $615 pesos, I better get going. Catch you on the flip side, dude-miesters!
-Stefan

PS, If you have a Snapfish account (it´s free and easy if you don´t), I think you can check out some of my pics at the following link, so give it a try:
http://www1.snapfish.com/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=264495481/a=10508621_10508621/otsc=SHR/otsi=SALBlink

Further bulletins as events warrant

This is more of a heads-up type post than an entertaining or substantive type post (because my posts are generally always both substantive and entertaining). It is horrifyingly early in the morning here, and my eyes burn for want of sleep. I am leaving the hamlet of Ushuaia this morning for greener pastures: Punta Arenas for one night and then Puerto Natales, both in Chile. Therefore, I will be incommunicado for a couple of days. Scary thought, huh?

I know America will be racked with (more than the usual amount of) anticipation, fear, and a hopeless disorientation until my blog´s glorious return in a couple of days, but in the style of the Christ-figure Obama, know that I will return to save you from your despair!

After re-reading this pre-publish, I have to reflect on the consequences of giving someone like me a soap box...

Yahtzee!

I am an unabashed skeptic. Until something is demonstrated to me, I tend to be internally negative and, admittedly, cynical. When I first started my trip, I really disliked the idea of the ¨international backpacker¨. I wouldn´t have been able to tell you exactly why, but the international traveler seemed to me trite, done-to-death, and it was kind of embarassing to consider myself part of, what I thought to be, the mass of Western priveledged young folk on an international adventure. Now, I´m finding out, as I go along, how this experience can be really good for people, and I am warming up to it.

Over the last couple of days, I´ve met a lot of really decent people. And I think, maybe it´s not that I´ve met particularly good people. Maybe (just maybe!) people are actually just good? At least, I realize the value that comes from getting to know people from all around our ridiculous little floating sphere. Listening to folks from severly divergent backgrounds become good friends (based on nothing other than the human condition) really just gives you the warm and fuzzies. It´s unfortunate that, when people become groups of people, they become less friendly...

Okay, plus, tonight I was invited to play a game with some Argentine folks. I requested that they only speak in Spanish (for my linguistic benefit), and it turns out they have a game that is pretty much exactly the same as our Yahtzee! Needless to say, I tore it up and whooped their asses! 2 games to none! Booyah!, or should I say, Yahtzee!

re: Read my reads

In an effort to keep my fans abreast of my endeavours, I submit to you the following reaction to Chilean-born Roberto Bolaño´s 1998 breakout tome, ¨The Savage Detectives¨.

Hearalded as a fresh and rejuvinating force in Latin American literature, Bolaño is posthumously considered among the elite of the turn of the century world authors (he died in 2003), even though he was a self proclaimed poet, not a novelist.

When I finished this book a couple of days ago and set it down, I was uncharacteristically ambivalent. That is to say, I wasn´t sure exactly how I felt about it. I´ve thought about this some, and I don´t believe this to be a good thing. The story was beautifully written (and translated, of course), the characters where fully fleshed out, the subjects covered are as varied as life has to offer, and Bolaño masterfully captures voices for innumerable characters, which is always something I´ve thought would be difficult to do even competently. I also like how, in the style of Easton Ellis and Eggers, Bolaño´s books are semi-autobiographical with recurring characters. It´s a fun contemporary flourish. Lastly, this book offers a sometimes startling and chrytalline look into the life of a person wholly immersed in the art of poetry. In this sense, ¨The Savage Detectives¨is rather unique. I´ve never read anything before that so wholly captures the poetic experience, with all of it´s dramatic pitfalls and nebulous ideals. And I think this is the point at which my personal tastes diverge.

In my opinion, ¨The Savage Detectives¨is poetry masked as a novel. I personally find peotry to be overly wrought, insubstantial or faux-substantial, and something of a fool´s errand (this last qualification I´m sure would be widely contested, but this is my blog!!). This book follows that lead. For 650 pages, the story dances around any kind of actual progression and almost seems non-commital(which is an adjective I have never used to describe a book before!). Any kind of meaning is, at best, allusive and the plot meanders along at a snail´s pace. And though I generally love literature with a macabre tone, this book was dark and horrifying in an unsatisfactory way. Furthermore, I love a book with an open ending that challenges the reader and allows for multiple interpretations... but come on! The ending of this book is like reading an e.e. cummings poem: not worth it!!

In any event, NY Times judged this book to be one of the 10 best of its year, so I guess I am just wrong. However, as anybody that knows me will substantiate, just because I know I am wrong doesn´t mean I won´t defend an opinion.

If you have any interest in following along with me, today I picked up Julio Cortázar´s ¨Hopscotch¨. Though he was born and died in Europe, he was raised in Argentina and is considered among the country´s best.

In other news, I am still enjoying my stay in Ushuaia. I purchased a bus ticket today that leaves for Puerto Natales on Thursday, so I have a couple more days, which is fine by me. Last night I met a couple of Argentines, a guy from Holland, and a large group of Israelis (who, by the way, are ubiquitous in South America) and we had dinner and went to the bar for a bit. Good times, though every smokes cigarettes, unfortunately. I forgot how much cigarettes in bars really suck. I smelled like booty-doo this morning. It was a fun, and best of all, I actually followed and participated in my first Spanish conversation last night! Hooray! I contributed less to the conversation than a Bill O´Reilly guest, but that´s not important.

I´ll close today´s sermon with a quote taken from the Infrarealist Manifesto (Infrarealism is the poetic movement Roberto Bolaño founded in Mexico). I like it, and it is at least germane:
¨And the person will have to walk a thousand kilometers, but the road will swallow him up at last.¨