We left Tats to rest at the Lavender farm, and headed off into town to get a few groceries and check out the OCEAN!!! (click any photo to enlarge)
The boys found a trampoline jumpy sort of thing that they just HAD to try out, and then we met Jeanette and Dany at the supermarket. After dinner, our hosts surprised us with a home-made birthday apple crumble! Dany and Patricia, our hosts here in Patagonia, are Argentineans who have left the hustle and bustle of Buenos Aires and made the Patagonian steppe their home. Proud owners of the world’s southernmost lavender (and olive!) farm for the past five years, Dany and Patricia have built a mini-paradise amidst the wonders of nature to be found here. Three small co-joined cabins allow visitors to come and experience a yoga and nature retreat here near Puerto Madryn, or to glean an insight into how lavender is harvested twice a year. The painfully slow internet, available only in the main building (where breakfast is also served) is made up for by the incredible oasis of plants and animals right outside the windows. The boys discovered several enormous and colourful insects, as well as grapes and a variety of prickly plants, some fluffy grey birds (road runners? Grouse?), several birds of prey and some small rodents. All animals but the three family dogs, however, were too quick for my slugglish photography skills, and only these lazy, sleepy heads were willing to be caught on camera. Our host has agreed to become our driver for tomorrow, and take us to Punta Tombo, famous for its penguin colony, followed by tea at the Welsh village of Gaiman. Then, on Friday, we will spend the day with a local driver, who will take us to Punta Ninfas, where the elephant seals hang out.
Unlike our trip to Iguazu, during which we splurged for first class bus tickets with Crucero del Norte (highly recommended, btw, and still pretty cheap!), the journey to Patagonia found us in two rows of “Ejectivo” (second class) seats on a slightly, er, a-hem “older” bus… the seats did not recline fully, the washroom was disgusting at best, and the “pillows” were more like thin sheets of Styrofoam. The biggest problem, however, was that there were several large, centrally-shared TV screens. Try putting two 9-year-old boys to bed while some sort of gory monster movie is playing three feet ahead of them! Even without sound (of which there were short, random bursts, despite the fact that one needed to plug headphones into a special jack to properly hear the full movie), the visuals were riveting, and not in a good way. My frequent attempts at redirection failed; I was convinced that their consumption of this crap would lead to bad dreams, which inevitably meant I, too, would not get much sleep this night; but one cannot reasonably force a person to close his eyes! Eventually, sleepiness won out over on-screen action, and the boys drifted off, giving me some time to myself to properly mourn the loss of my vest* -- which I had stupidly left on a chair at the bus terminal in Buenos Aires -- while waiting for dinner; the latter was served in typical Argentinean fashion, at 10:30 p.m. Jeanette had plugged in and was watching the monster sci-fi horror flick, and Tats -- whose ticket we had purchased at the last minute due to the prior week’s health uncertainties -- was far away from us, tucked into a window seat at the back of the bus with two large canisters of tea and a big, warm blanket. This left me to enjoy the twilight view out the window, in the foreground fields of green and gold and the occasional herd of cattle, in the distant background, the mountains. What a change from the concrete jungle of Buenos Aires, I mused as I stared out onto a crimson sunset, and wondered what tomorrow morning’s landscape, in Puerto Madryn, would hold. The blankets, at least, were decent, and after consuming what non-animal and marginally edible foodstuffs I could locate on my plate and relinquishing the rest of my tray, I wrapped myself in said blanket, and drifted off to sleep The next morning, we celebrated Jeanette’s birthday on the bus. The boys had made her a card, and we had brought along some balloons, silly glasses and a few small gifts. It was not much longer now until Puerto Madryn, and the landscape outside reflected the change from Buenos Aires and even the surrounding countryside. We were definitely in the desert now, and the dry Patagonian steppe stretched for miles around us. The last 20 minutes of a 20-hour bus ride are definitely the most challenging, and we were all eager to get off the bus once we had arrived safely in Puerto Madryn!
Dany, the co-owner of the lavender farm where we were staying, was there to greet us and pick us up; he and his partner Patricia are already proving to be gracious hosts… The internet here is a bit slow and sketchy, but stay tuned for more photos soon! * In case anyone feels sorry for me and is wondering what to get for my birthday (March 30!!!), feel freel -- they don't seem to have the maroon colour anymore. :( But any brilliantly warm and super lightweight vest I will be truly thankful for -- women's size large, please, lol! It's time to head south, to Patagonia. This trip is the primary reason we chose Argentina, and the reason my surrogate mother joined us for a few weeks at this time of year -- we heard there were PENGUINS to be seen in Jan/Feb! We've been planning our journey to Patagonia for months, and it's been quite an ordeal in the last few weeks: Firstly, Tats -- who arrived on the 5th -- is sick with pnuemonia (and FINALLY, after some scary days, is responding to the antibiotics prescribed at the hospital). Secondly, the rains here in BsAs have been torrential and relentless, and we wondered if we could even get out of the city due to flooding. Finally, finding five seats near one another on the same bus was more of a challenge than anticipated. (And actually, we only bought four, beacause we weren't even sure if we would all be going, what with Tats so sick and all.) But if this post is published, that means that Tats is feeling well enough to travel Tuesday, and we are about to head out the door with our bags and our passports and a few extra pesos to the bus terminal in hopes of finding one more seat... and we'll soon be on our way.) We're hopeful for some internet access while down south, but in case not, stay tuned penguin pictures after the 16th, when we return! Today I had the opportunity to facilitate some workshops for student teachers at Ensena por Argentina, at their summer institute in Villa Soldati. Eager to see "real" parts of the city beyond the safety and relative beauty of the Palermo and touristy neighbourhoods in BsAs, I set out by subte this morning for the 1.5-hour trek to Nstra. Sra. de Famtima, the complex of school buildings where the NGO's summer institute was being held. It was my first time on the E line, a considerably older subway line than the more familiar D we usually take. The yellow subway cars were fairly spacious, but the wear and tear was evident. No advertisements were posted in the cars, and I did not see any musicians/performers or sales people; not sure if this was just an unusual time of day to be traveling, though. Once the train arrived at the end of the line, I had to transfer yet again, this time to the "Pre-metro", a type of streetcar trolley. The area this took me into showed me a landscape that was visibly different from the comforts of Palermo I have grown used to, though the same obsession with security was evident in the glass shards that topped the walls of courtyards, preventing anyone from climbing over the top! Stay tuned for the next blog post... a pretty neat school project in Villa Soldati!
In thinking about our recent traumatic experience with the Delta flight from Atlanta to BsAs, I tried to adopt the Thelma Jarvis approach, and think, "What's good about this situation?" I decided I would take the opportunity to model a real-life letter writing situation, and encourage the boys to write a letter of complaint to Delta. I, too, wrote a letter to Delta. It's not been sent yet, since their online complaint form is "currently not working", big surprise. In the meantime, I post my own letter below, and the boys will soon be posting their letters on their respective blogs. Jan 25, 2014 To Whom it May Concern; I am writing to follow up with how Delta handled the diversion of Flight 101 from Atlanta, scheduled to land at EZE (Buenos Aires) on Jan 21, 2014. As you are aware, you left approximately 300 passengers stranded without luggage, food or any sort of communication plan at Montevideo Airport that day. I was traveling with my 9 year old twin sons, and they, too, will be writing and sending you emails about this. (An authentic situation like this makes for a great writing opportunity for emerging writers!) My focus today is not the decision to divert itself (I am sure you and the FAA are conducting an extensive investigation into the details surrounding the decision to plan an approach into the existing meteorological conditions in the first place, as well as the pilots’ decision to divert to an airport in another country rather than an alternate within Argentina), but rather, how your company handled (or rather, failed to handle!) the follow-up to the safe landing in Uruguay. I’m not sure whether being a licensed pilot is an advantage or a disadvantage in times of commercial aviation stress… behold the thunder cloud we flew through on approach to Buenos Aires: I knew something was up because I could see and feel the plane turning base, then final, then in the overshoot. Twice! Both times were rather turbulent, and I knew from the weather report and from looking outside that thundershowers were in effect in BsAs. The severe up drafts and downdrafts were evident in my stomach!
When the plane climbed again, well beyond circuit altitude, I knew exactly what the pilots were doing: Gaining altitude while they made a decision about what to do next. Clearly, landing in a thunderstorm wasn’t going to work. To make matters worse, the right wing had sustained some structural damage in a spurt of windshear we encountered, so landing in “normal” weather was going to be challenging enough for these poor people who had already been flying all night (Atlanta to BsAs is a 10-hour overnight haul). Passengers gripped their seats and waited for what would come next; some pulled out their cel phones and made "just in case" videos. Some time ago, I learned a little secret for getting decent airline food: Order Asian Vegetarian. While I had already known about ordering special meals, the “straight” Vegetarian I had ordered on previous flights had always been a bit of a disappointment, with rubbery tofu and skimpy, vegan-type, often tasteless accoutrements.
Then someone told me about the “Asian Vegetarian” option. I decided to give it a try on this flight back to Buenos Aires, and I was not disappointed! While my fellow passengers awaited their rubbery chicken or worse-than-frozen dinner pasta options, the boys and I got our meals. (Special order meals are delivered first, another bonus to this little trick!) My main course, a steamy helping of seasoned basmati rice with two tasty curries (an aloo and a paneer), was accompanied by a side of fresh fruit (real fresh fruit, not the “fruit salad swamp” one usually gets with airplane meals!) and a crisp carrot and pepper salad. I was very impressed, and wolfed down my meal with gusto! This is a little secret I am glad I learned, and I’ll certainly avail myself of this option again on future travels. All of a sudden, our five weeks in Canada have come to an end, and we're on our way back to Argentina! Granted, we're currently still sitting in the airport in Toronto, waiting patiently for a delayed flight to Atlanta, where we'll connect to our BsAs flight... but the promise of warm sun, helados and penguins lies ahead! We're looking forward to getting back into our home school routine, and are eager to resume our active field trip schedule. We're also anticipating the arrival of several visitors on this leg of the trip! |
About Vera...Canadian, vegetarian, PPL, certified teacher and mother of twins, home schooling for the year, in Argentina!
Visit me online at www.verateschow.ca Archives
May 2014
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