May 22-27:
We are in waiting areas, cars or airplanes for 21 hours on our trip back to Mexico from Rio, via Sao Paulo and Houston. It’s an overnight flight with little sleep. Normally, the wait in Houston and Cancun immigration can be an hour or more. The swine flu hysteria has clearly grounded travelers’ enthusiasm in North America. The wait is short in Houston and non-existent in Cancun.
In the 17 years we’ve been going to the Mayan Riviera, I’ve never seen the Cancun airport so quiet. We go right through immigration, pick up our bags and have them x-rayed, clear customs and find our driver in 15 minutes. About 45 minutes later we are opening the doors to our condo. We’ve taken as long as three hours to do the same during peak holiday travel. This is the US Memorial Day long weekend and usually very busy.
We experience another scary medical emergency – the second in three days – 30 minutes outside of Cancun. A flight attendant looks to be suffering a serious attack of some sort and she’s lied out on the floor directly beside us while a nurse passenger and a friend is administering oxygen and medical care. Tony tells Alana to look at the Caribbean outside her window as we come in for landing. He fears the worst. Paramedics greet the plane on arrival. The flight attendant returns to consciousness. We are not sure of the outcome.
The first day back is a bit surrealistic with nobody on the beaches or in the restaurants. More than 20,000 are laid off currently. One local hotel offered a week’s stay with all food and booze included for less than $200. Another hotel that has five lobbies and 2000 rooms is down to one lobby. There are signs of desperation for those without any savings. One man was caught be local police with an ATM in the back of his truck, insisting he was taking it home only to do repairs.
The famous and frenetic Fifth Avenue in Playa del Carmen is empty of shoppers this Sunday afternoon. Some restaurants aren’t even bothering to open.
In our building, where there are 17 condos, ours is the only occupied. A couple from Utah, renting in the building beside us, appeared, relieved to see Alana and I as they’ve seen few people during their three-week holiday. We are offered beverages and a plate of nachos and guacamole. Alana looks baffled as she’s served coke in a Super-sized, one-liter Styrofoam container. Tony is not so lucky with his Corona.
Ruth has temporarily returned to Canada for a family commitment booked in advance of the South American trip. Tony and Alana will be by themselves in Mexico and Havana, Cuba for a few weeks.
Alana has become a good translator during the travels. She is demonstrably more comfortable using her Spanish. Tony hasn’t and usually needs help. Alana comes to the rescue again with the air conditioning technician, fearing Daddy is ordering three new units instead of just getting the Freon recharged.
We learned the US has just lifted a travel advisory for Mexico, and it is as if a light switch was turned on. By Day 3 the beach is showing some life. Then we are awoken Sunday night by an American couple arriving late evening and staying above us. Both Tony and Alana like their peace and quiet so they are a bit annoyed by the noise at night and their music in the morning. We want people to come back to Mexico – just not Quinta Maya in Puerto Aventuras!
The Yucatan Peninsula rivals any place in the world for beauty, culture and heritage. It is home to white sand beaches and the turquoise waters of the Caribbean. Mayan Ruins dot the landscape throughout the Yucatan, including Chichen Itza, one of the modern wonders of the world. The Mexican people are far more laid back than their counterparts in other parts of the country. It is classified as sub-tropical, like parts of Brazil but it is much drier here. We are in the middle of a very dry spell with almost no rain since leaving in March.
One of the most overlooked features of the Yucatan is its vast networks of underground caves or cenotes. Cenote is a Mayan word for “abyss”. There are an estimated 7000 cenotes in the region, all interconnected by undergrounds streams and the ocean. Think of them as a type of freshwater-filled limestone sinkhole. Cenote water is often very transparent, as the water comes from rain water infiltrating slowly through the ground, and therefore there is very little suspended particulate matter. Cenotes around the world attract cave divers since many of them are entrances to underlying flooded cave systems, some of which have been explored for lengths of 100 kilometers or more.”
There can also be layer of heavier, salty water that sits near the bottom. The water levels rise and fall with the tide and with rain fall. Many cenotes feature fantastic stalagmites and stalactites.
We spent a day exploring a park just down the road that features several cenotes, among the best known here due to being featured in BBC’s Planet Earth series and also on Discovery Channel. IMAX also used the location to film Journey into Amazing Caves. As a testament to the clarity of the water, in one scene you don’t know the camera is filming underwater until one of the actors suddenly appears in scuba gear.
The first cenote we visit is called the “Church” due to its cathedral-like formation. Hanging from the ceiling are hundreds of thousands active stalactites, which grow at the warp-speed pace of one inch every 100 years. A drip of water at the end of the stalactites tells you they are still forming.
We rappelled, then later zip-lined and snorkeled in the larger Tak Be Ha cenote. This cavern is remarkable for its sheer size, along with diversity of its stalagmites and stalactites.
Outside of the caves, the property is unique as it is situation on Mayan land in the middle of the jungle. There are spider monkeys, quatimundi (raccoon-like creatures we also saw in Brazil), reptiles and several species of birds. Jaguars are known to come to the cenotes to drink fresh water at night.
The park has invented a “skycycle” that takes you over the canopy of the jungle and through three cenotes. Yellowstone Park in US is reported to have acquired the technology for its visitors.

May 18-21:
Name the most beautiful cities in the world and the top names are always Sydney, Hong Kong, Vancouver and Rio de Janeiro. Tony’s pick has always been Vancouver. Not any longer. Rio now gets the nod.
It’s hard to argue against billing. The city of 5-million people is a series of crescent-shaped bays filled with white-sand beaches, surrounded by mountains. The emerald waters of the Atlantic add even more color to the palate.
Our hotel is looking out on to the famous Copacabana beach. The beach runs about 5 kms long and has the cleanest, whitest sand you’ll find anywhere. It is so perfect we all thought we had stepped onto an artificial beach. The city takes care of its pride and joy with constant care. In the morning, machines and workers rake the sand. During the day the workers return to ensure any garbage dropped is quickly picked up. What is amazing is Copacabana isn’t Rio’s best beach! Locals prefer the beaches of Ipanema and Leblom, a short walk from Copacabana.
There is no better view of the city than the top of Sugar Loaf Mountain, reachable by taking two cable cars.
Another outstanding feature of the beaches is the lighting. At dusk giant stadium lights are turned on allowing for a 24-hour playground. There are endless games of soccer, beach volleyball and a strange soccer/volleyball game that features volleyball net and soccer ball but the players can’t touch the ball with their hands. The players are incredible athletes. Tony’s high school friends continue to argue almost 30 years later who was the best athlete in their youths. This game would settle the score.
In Rio you also can find one of the modern Seven Wonders of the World. Christ the Redeemer sits atop Corcovado Mountain, surrounded by the Tijuca National Park, looking over the city of. It was completed in 1931 to commemorate 100 years of Brazil’s independence from Portugal. We’ve now seen three of the Seven Wonders: Chichen Itza in Mexico, Machu Picchu in Peru and The Redeemer. They are all so different to choose a favorite so far. The Redeemer isn’t as grand as the other two but it truly leaves you wondering how they managed to erect at the very top of the mountain the 38 metre Christ with an arm span of 29 metres.
A day later we headed south to the Green Coast. Here are hundreds of tropical islands along a 100 kilometer stretch. The vegetation gives the Atlantic a green hue. We are on a tour boat with a dozen Aussies and Americans. We learn later the Aussies were out all night drinking and had only gotten back to their hotels minutes before the bus arrived. Our first stop is a small bay with a beach where four locals are partying at 11 in the morning. They are already half-cut, and the women are down to their bras. Alana and Tony are first in. Ruth follows with an Aussie gent beside her. Minutes later we hear screaming from the boat. Apparently, Ruth’s Aussie friend seized up on entering the water and was drowning. The two petite American men from St. Louis heard the screams first and by the time the rest of us got in the water from the beach, the Aussie was being pulled ashore, his life saved. The event cast a pall on the rest of the day.
During our last evening we experienced the true religion in Brazil – soccer. Brazil has won more World Cups (5) than any other country in the world and has born some of the most famous players ever – Pele, Romario, Ronaldo.
How important is soccer in Brazil? When the country hosted the World Cup in 1950 in the soccer stadium we visited, more than 200,000 crowded in to watch the final versus Uruguay. In a surprise, Uruguay won the game. Several people suffered heart attacks in the stadium after the defeat and one man even shot himself in the head, not able to face the world or Uruguay fans any longer.
We ditched a scheduled samba show for a Brazilian Cup play-off game between Rio’s Fluminese and archrival Corinthians from Sao Paulo. Ronaldo, in the twilight years of his career, is the striker for the Corinthians. He grew up in the shantytowns of Rio and vowed when in Europe that he would never play for a Sao Paulo team after returning to Brazil. He did the unthinkable.
With the exception of the raw wieners served in the concessions, you haven’t lived until you go to a game in Brazil. The giant stadium now has seats, but you wouldn’t know it. Everybody stood on the seats for the entire game, and the deafening roar continued. Children stood on the armrests. Flares were being lit and giant flags waved. All this is unimaginable at a Flames game.
For some unexplainable reason we ended up being seated with the visiting fans, surrounded on three sides by Rio fans. This turned out to be toxic when the Corinthians beat the home team. At the end of the headed out of the seats and our group gathered at Section 30 to wait for the guide. Suddenly, everybody around us was scattering like a gunman was amongst us. I looked behind the pillar to see burly police officers with three-foot billy clubs wailing on a hooligan who was trying to pick a fight with Corinthian fans. Seconds later, police – clearly jacked up on adrenaline – approached our group yelling in Portuguese for our guide. We were directed back to the stands for our safety. About 15 minutes later we headed again for the exits, boarded our waiting bus and left. Along the way we could see police surrounding the stadium, all carrying billy clubs and some with very large German Shepherds by their side.
Our final day in Brazil and South America was spent on Copacabana beach. Beautiful indeed, but we are use to hassle-free beach time in the Mayan Riviera, free from any peddlers. That is not the case in Copacabana. In four hours, we are approached by some 50 venders, selling everything from bikinis to shrimp on skewers to bags made out of only zippers. Time to head back to Mexico.

May 14-17:
From ice to flowing water – lots of flowing water. We left the cold and ice of El Calafate in southern Argentina for the warm tropical climate of Iguazu, the incredible falls straddling the Brazil-Argentina border. We are heading back north for the first time on this South American trip, foreshadowing the end is near.
Iguazu is a Guarani Indian name meaning “big waters.” Movie buffs will know the falls from the great epic film “The Mission.” The waterfall system consists of 275 falls along 2.7 kilometers of the Iguazu River. It is considered one of the “Seven Natural Wonders of the World”.
For Canadians and others who have visited, comparisons with Niagara are inevitable. Upon seeing Iguazu, the United States' First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt reportedly exclaimed "Poor Niagara.” Iguazu is taller than Niagara but Niagara has 50 per cent more water flow. Iguazu is much more accessible with a series of footpaths and trains allowing visitors to stand perched right over the edge of the biggest part of the falls – the Devil’s Throat. At one point a person can stand and be surrounded by 260 degrees of waterfalls. The Devil's Throat has water pouring into it from three sides. As well, Iguazu is split into many relatively small falls, so these can be viewed one portion at a time.
There is no Niagara-like Made of the Mist boat that takes you on water near the falls, but for the adventurous there is a speed boat that goes upstream in the whitewater and actually takes you right under one of the falls. We chose this option and got a good soaking. Tony maintains it was one of the coolest things he’s ever done.
Visitors to Niagara often leave disappointed in the town as it is filled with hotel towers and tacky gift shops. Iguazu Falls are in National Parks of both Brazil and Argentina and have little development. A wide variety of birds, mammals and reptiles fill the parks, including the elusive jaguar and several poisonous snakes.
The one blight on the Argentinean side is a Sheraton in the park. Allegedly it got the nod from a former dictator of the country to build in the park when Argentina hosted the soccer World Cup in the 1970s. Our guide suggested a commission was exchanged for the right to build.
We spent a full day on the Argentinean side viewing the falls and another half-day on the Brazilian side. Never bored.
Outside of the falls, the towns supporting the tourists are interesting but not destinations on their own right. We stayed on the Argentinean side, about two blocks from a beautiful park that sits at the junction of two rivers and three countries. To the left you could see Paraguay, and to the right Brazil.
We re-encountered the brilliant red soil, last seen in the Amazon basin in Peru.

May 11-13:
El Calafate is all about ice. Big pieces of ice. Colorful pieces of ice. Dirty pieces of ice.
Let us explain. The town sits on Lago Argentino, the country’s largest lake, situated near the Andes in the south. Nearby is the Parque Nacional Los Glaciares. Here is the biggest assortment of glaciers outside of Greenland and Antarctica. Canadians know ice already, so Ruth is wondering why the visit. We don’t know ice like this.
On our first day we depart from the hotel toward the park. The first 60 kilometres presents little evidence of what we are to encounter. It is parched, dry land with eagles sitting on the side of the road picking at rabbit remains. Only the tumbleweeds are missing. A few kilometers more we pass through the park gates and the through some wizardry of nature the landscape suddenly changes. The flora erupts into low alpine forest, mixed with beautiful fall colors – all typical of a Patagonia in late fall.
Another few kilometers and we get our first view of the Perito Moreno Glacier. This is one big piece of ice. At its front it is 4 kms wide and 60 metres above lake level at the front and some 350 metres of depth in the central part. The glacier is some 30 kms wide.
This frozen river causes ice cracks and thunderous bursts that make the glacier a beauty in constant movement. We witness the glacier calving several blocks of ice during our two-hour stay. At the front, the ice is formed in a series of raptors that are deep blue in color and is so grand UNESCO was moved to given it a “World Heritage Site” designation. Some of have called it the 8th Wonder of the World.
What is interesting is Perito Moreno is only the 3rd largest glacier in Argentina. A guide attributes its notoriety to being accessible by car from El Calafate, a three-hour flight from Buenos Aires and an hour from our previous stop in Ushuaia. Two other reasons are its interesting formation and movement.
A funny aside is the glacier is named after Italian Perito Moreno, who explored these parts more than 100 years ago. He found Lago Argentino and came within a short canoe from the glacier but never did see it. Instead, Moreno had seen enough of the lake, turned around and went home. His efforts were enough, however, to have the glacier named after him.
Tony’s interest is sufficient enough that he decides on a second day of ice watching. Ruth and Alana need a little faster pace and choose a five-hour horseback ride into the hills surrounding the lake.
Tony sets his alarm for a very early start the next day. He’s chosen an 11-hour excursion that has him setting off in the dark for a 50 km drive to Puerto Bandera, where he’ll board a catamaran and set sail for the northern arm of Lago Argentino. The gem on this trip is to visit the front wall of Upsala glacier from the water. At more than 1000 square kilometers, Upsala is the biggest glacier in the national park and second largest in the country. It is four times the size of Buenos Aires. To get there you sail through an impressive array of icebergs, formed from ice detached by the glacier.
We are warned when we get on the boat that icebergs can jam the inlet to Upsala, preventing access to the wall, and are offered our money back should we not want the risk. There are no takers.
The boat leaves dock for the 90-minute trip on the lake surrounded by the mountains. As if on cue, the sun breaks over the mountains just as we near the first large iceberg. The day is perfect, not a cloud in the sky with calm winds and relatively warm temperatures. A reader can see by the pictures to the right just how blue the ice is. More giant icebergs dot the horizon and Tony is thinking seeing the Upsala wall is not looking likely.
The boat then arrives at a solid wall of ice and Tony is thinking we are at the wall. The guide announces over the loudspeaker in Spanish a number of interesting facts about the glacier and the surroundings. Then the same in English. Then with some disappointment in her voice, she says it will not be possible to access Upsala and points to some ice several kilometers away and says that is our view of the glacier. Tony is in disbelief as he’s sure we are at the glacier with the ice in front of him. The guide explains that when Upsala calves infrequently, but when it does ice kilometers wide falls into the lake. That is why the icebergs in front of us give the appearance they are still attached to the glacier. Most impressive.
The navigation continues towards Canal Spegazzini to see Seco, Helm Sur and Spegazzini glaciers. The latter being the highest in the park, rising 110 metres above the level of Lago Argentino. Because we don’t get to the Upsala wall, the captain treats us to view of the northern wall of Perito Moreno on our way back to the dock.

May 8-10: We’ve arrived at the end of the world – and lived to talk about it! The end of the world as we know it is Ushuaia, in Patagonia, Argentina. It is the last stop before Antarctica and the last stop on the Pan-American Highway, 17,894 kms from the start of the highway in Alaska. Ushuaia is on an island, Tierra del Fuego. While man has been here for 10,000 years, most of the time there were only hundreds of half-naked Yamana natives. Missionaries started to become active only in the late 1800s. When the Magellan strait started to be viewed as an important bioceanic passage, the Argentinean government saw it as necessary to establish a population as a way to claim sovereignty in a long dispute with Chile. Borrowing the idea from the French in Algeria and the English in Australia, Former president Julio Argentino Roca decided there was no better way than create a penal colony in the region and send the worst criminals – one step from the death penalty – south, as far from Buenos Aires as possible. Criminals started arriving in 1896 and Ushuaia was born. What was once a densely forested region, it has few trees today. A railway was built and the prisoners helped cut virtually all trees down. Today the train is for tourism only and runs to the National Park. On a cold morning, with fresh snow, we embark on the train ride through the Rio Pipo Valley, towards Mount Susana. Along the way we pass a “tree cemetery”, with thousands of stumps looking like natural tombstones poking up through the snow. Little imagination is needed to see the gaunt faces of prisoners who cut the trees down, freezing to death in the elements. The prison is now a museum and is filled with fascinating history. Once in the National Park we load a tour bus and drive deeper into the southwestern reaches of Argentina. We learn that locals see few Canadians here, perhaps because it is so similar to Canada. We are surrounded by snow-capped Andes, the brothers and sisters of the Rockies. It is only here that the Andes run north and south, and east and west. There are plenty of fresh lakes and streams. And, it is cold. This morning it is -8 C. It will now stay cold forever. The reality here is that it never does warm up due to the cold currents all around and the fact it borders the Beagle Channel. The average temperature in the summer is only 10 C. There is the odd freakish day, like the record 28 C day a few years ago, when locals suffered as cars and homes are not equipped with air conditioning. Our hotel is up on the mountain, only a 20-minute walk from the small ski hill used by locals. Our view is majestic, overlooking the city and the Beagle Channel. A day earlier we tour the Channel by boat and witness hundreds of birds, along with sea lions and fur seals. During the summer months, penguins come north from Antarctica. The last penguins we’ve seen were in Galapagos. We don’t see any on this day. Our hotel is full with Russians. An oddity we’re sure. It turns out the 100-strong Moscow Symphony Orchestra is here for a festival. Tony threatens to find one of the flutists to give Alana some tips. She has left her flute in Mexico and recoils in horror at the thought of blowing the wrong note in front of such esteemed musicians. We get a sample of a trumpeter’s prowess on the boat, when he pulls his horn out of plastic bag and gives an impromptu concert to surprised passengers. Despite the severe climate, the city is growing rapidly and in a much disorganized fashion. The government a few decades ago, decided to encourage population growth and development by creating a tax-free zone. Thousands of people rushed to the frontier to take advantage, even though few services or housing were available for them. Even today there is still a shortage of housing and Peruvians and Bolivians here illegally have built what amounts to squatter settlements on the side of a mountain, complete with plasma TVs and new cars. Ushuaia attracts young Argentineans from Buenos Aires because of opportunity and higher-paying jobs. Tourists from around the world will continue to come here to see the “End of the World”. It is also the launching pad for trips to Antarctica. Argentineans come for the snow and skiing, along with national ski teams from 14 countries, including Canada. Besides our skiiers, Canada has made two other contributions to the regions -- neither we should be proud of. Due to the tremendous population growth, residents scoured the world for affordable and quick housing. It appears our country is known for its pre-fab housing. Dotting neighborhoods here are Made-in-Canada homes. None are interesting or attractive. Our Canadian beaver is also wrecking havoc on the landscape. Locals introduced the beaver about 50 years ago, hoping to strike it rich on the fur trade. Argintineans never took to beaver pelts, instead favoring more expensive fur like mink. Beavers don't have predators here so they are everywhere, and large, and build funny dams. The average beaver here is twice the size of those in Canada. As well, because they don't have predators, the dams are very shallow. The beaver has gotten lazy.

May 7:
Buenos Aires is a large city. About 3.5-million reside in the immediate area, but the population doubles during working hours and people flood the city for business. Despite its size, the city is full of enormous and wonderful parks. They provide an escape from a hectic life. The biggest parks are in the neighborhood of Palmermo. We need an escape from the Brazilian Consulate this morning. After we finish our trip to the country in a few weeks, I will explain why. We taxi to the park and immediately head to the world-renowned rose gardens. Again, remember we are in the southern hemisphere and it is deep into fall here. Yet, the rose gardens are in full bloom – a most amazing sight. There are acres and acres of roses in several different colors with an army of workers tending to their every need. A short distance away is the “Haponese” Gardens. Again these Japanese Gardens are most extraordinary. Hundreds of carp fill the ponds, centering the gardens.
Later in the day we really escape the city. We leave downtown for the residential areas of San Isidro and El Tigre to the north. Wealthy residents live in San Isidro, some in gated communities, choosing the safety and cleaner environment the suburbs offer over the city centre. We have lunch in one gated community, at a private boating club, near the river that has several canals, natural and manmade, featuring waterfront homes complete with docks for yachts and sailboats. There are also tennis and rowing clubs, along with a golf club. It is patterned from communities in south Florida, and is similar as well to our Mexican home, Puerto Aventuras. Again we are served a massive lunch. Alana’s steak is six-inches in diameter and about two inches thick. She cannot eat it all. Surprisingly, the food at the club is very inexpensive. Our three-course meal with wine is less than CDN $30…in total…for the three of us.
A little further north is El Tigre. Here is a 21,000 sq. km. delta made up of more than 5000 waterways, the branches of three rivers. About 3000 residents dot the waterways that are connected only by boat. There are hundreds more homes for Argentineans who use the vacation properties to escape the heat in the summer. It is self-contained with super markets, schools and hospitals. Only 30 kms from the city centre, El Tigre is still largely undeveloped. We take an hour-long guided boat ride to explore just a fraction of the area.

May 3-6:

We would be remiss in not acknowledging the good weather that has followed us so far throughout South America. It is late fall down here, after all. We celebrated the beginning of what is our November (May in the northern hemisphere) with 27 C weather in Mendoza and arrived to temperatures in the low 20s in Buenos Aires. All the locals have commented on the unusual weather. One of our guides even swam in the Atlantic a few weeks back, unheard of a decade ago. We are not complaining and fear writing this will jinx a good thing. Touring is made much easier with mild, dry weather. Our good fortune may run because of sheer geography. Later in the week we head to the southern tip of Argentina, the last stop on the continent before Antarctica. Forecasts show temperatures near zero and maybe even some snow.
Here we are in Buenos Aires, the “Paris of South America.” Tonight we hit a tango club. The last few days have been a dance through this fantastic city. Today we visited the actual birthplace of the tango. It is a community in BA called San Telmo, one of the oldest areas. For the uninitiated, tango was a dance performed by prostitutes originally in the 19th Century. High society types initially snubbed the activity due to the early participants. It now helps define the city – for the poor and the rich. Tango clubs flourish.
Bordering San Telmo is La Boca, which is a rough area housing many of the recent immigrants to the city. The community does feature Carminito Street, a little Italy of sorts where immigrants from the European country first arrived more than 100 years ago. During the day Carminito is alive with restaurants, bars and shops. Tango is also on public display. At night it closes and tourists are advised not to even make the trip in a taxi. We all found it delightful.
Puerto Madero is BA’s second port after La Boca. Its old warehouses have now been converted to restaurants and apartments. New highrises shine down a few blocks away, making this one of the most expensive place to live with apartments costing about USD $6500 sq/metre. BA is filled with expensive real estate, despite the sketchy political and economic history of the country. The Palermo and Recoleta areas are also highly desirable.
Recoleta features a must-see in BA. The cemetery off the central plaza is like a town of dead people. Excuse my description but it features acres of the most extraordinary mausoleums you’ll see in the world. I understand only Paris and Milan have something that might resemble the Cementerio de la Recoleta.
You look down the “streets” of the cemetery and it looks like one of the finest streets of Rome or Paris in miniature. On each side are the mausoleums, all individually designed and built – usually in Europe – and outfitted with fine marble, travertine, wood, iron and concrete. The sculptures, murals and stained glass are extraordinary.
There is still active trade of the mausoleums. You can buy one for between $30,000 and $1-million. The selling family will unearth the coffins and cremate them, making room for the new family to move in as they die off.
It is here that the infamous Evita lies, among many other famous residents.
Can we write any further without mentioning food?
We sat down yesterday for lunch in Puerto Madero. Even before we ordered, a selection of breads was laid before us, along with six types of appetizers. The portions here are massive and too much even for the biggest eaters. Tony’s ribe-eye steak looked like a pound of beef on the plain white plate. They brought Alana a whole chicken and Ruth’s pescado looked the size of a small tuna. It was our only meal of the day as we had no room in our stomachs for dinner.
Portions aside, the food is astounding, along with the vino.
Meat was on the menu again today with a visit to ranch north of the city to experience life as a “gaucho”, the famed Argentine cowboys of the Pampas. We enjoyed a barbecue of beef, chicken, chorizo and blood sausage. We found the Pampas to look much like Olds or Crossfield. We spent some time riding horses and watching tango. Tony skepticism about the trip proved out. He would have preferred more time in the city. Alana loved being on a horse and it got her excited about the summer and her horse camp in the Rockies with friend Hayley.
We took a second trip to San Telmo, this one at night, to enjoy a tango show and dinner at El Querandi, which has been entertaining customers since 1920. The tango is provocative indeed, and despite the late hour kept our interest.

April 26-May 2:
Swine flu caught up to us this morning as we were set to depart Santiago, Chile for Mendoza, Argentina. The Argentinean government suddenly decided all international flights have to be routed first to Buenos Aries then on to other destinations in Argentina. We were looking forward to a short, early morning, one-hour flight to Mendoza and instead arrived at the airport to discover we wouldn’t get to Mendoza until midnight – 17 hours later. Who knows what would have been in store for us in Buenos Aries.
We made the executive decision to hire a driver for a six-hour van ride across the Andes to Mendoza. Ironically, there was little checking of foreigners’ health’s at the border. We were handed medical forms to complete a few kilometers from the border but nobody asked for them at immigration into Argentina. Workers who took our bags for searching seemed more interested in getting a propina (tip) to return our bags a few steps to the van.
The drive into the mountains didn’t disappoint. The countryside between Santiago and Mendoza is similar to the Okanagan. There are mucho vineyards and fruit trees. The Andes provide a spectacular backdrop. At one point we can see the magnificent Aconcagua – the highest mountain in the Americas. Only the Himalayas have higher mountains. It rises 7000 metres above sea.
Mendoza is famous for its fine wines and produces over 70 per cent of the country’s wine. The wine tradition in Argentina originated in the 16th century with the arrival of the first grapevine stakes brought by the merchant classes that travelled the world selling their goods. Still, it was really not until three hundred years later that wine production really became an important aspect of Mendoza’s economy.
Mendoza is also characterized by a sophisticated aqueduct system introduced by the pre-Incas. Water is brought to this desert climate from the Andes. Unfortunately, a large earthquake devastated the old city in 1812. Yet in the rebuild the city built a series of large parks with impressive plazas and sculptures. The plazas today also serve as a safe ground in case of earthquakes, where citizens can flee in case of crumbling buildings.
We are in Argentina for 18 days and will visit the country’s regions to the north, south, east and west. At one point will be in Ushuaia, the southernmost city in the world.
Our stay earlier in Chile lasted four days and during this time we toured Santiago, the capital with six-million people, and the coastal cities of Vine del Mar and Valparaiso.
Santiago sits in a bowl surrounded by mountains. There is little airflow so the pollution is bad, ranked as one of the top ten worst in the world. It also sits on a fault line so tremors and earthquakes are frequent. Much of the construction is new due to a history of earthquakes. It has everything a big city offers, and is close to the country’s wine regions.
Vina del Mar and Valparaiso are 90 minutes west on the Pacific Ocean. People escape Santiago’s heat and pollution in the summer for the coast. The towns rise up from the water in the many hills that make up the towns. The homes, hotels and condos sit precariously on the hills.
Valparaiso is often described as the bohemian and cultural capital of Chile and was one of the famed Chilean poet Pablo Neruda’s favorite places. We tour the Nobel Prize winner’s home here. It is very eclectic. A communist, Neruda died shortly after Pinochet’s military coup. Vina is a contrast, a luxurious beach resort town where both Chileans and foreigners vacation in the summer.
For such important places we find it funny that in both towns, many large dogs run free with no owners around to pick up after them.
Usually, Tony says he can live almost anywhere he visits. Not Santiago, not the coast. He is unimpressed, except for the food and wine. They are good, but relatively expensive for South America.
Perhaps foreshadowing this experience in Chile was the flight from La Paz to Santiago. The plane stopped in the middle of the desert in the town of Iquique and we had to spend an hour clearing customs and our bags were searched. It seemed like a strange exercise. We also learn later the country spends about 10 times the amount on the military they do on education. Perhaps this layover is giving surplus soldiers something to do.
The fact the military is so large is likely due to having lived under the Pinochet dictatorship for nearly two decades, ending in 1990. The public still lives in the shadow of that difficult time. We see many “Pinoshit” graffiti slogans in our travels. Tour guides have been instructed not to dwell on Chilean politics as they are uncertain of the political leanings of customers. One thing for sure is the period under the dictator was not good for culture, architecture or life in general.
With apologies to our friends who might enjoy coming here to ski during Canada’s summer months, Chile can be avoided on future South American trips.