A few more picts

Exploring the coast, Quintay, Chile

Succulent gardens galore!

Canyon de Atule, near San Rafeal, Argentina

a hippie dream come true

check out this deal. Azucena the farm ´director´, í´ll call her, decided one afternoon she wants to pick up trees people are trashing around town. cool. that means we get to ride around in a cart behind the car and jump out and pick stuff up and go on a little field trip. we pick up some fig branches, a big stump, and then she decides she wants a pine that the el zonda, wind, had blown over a few weeks before in a park on the side of the road. after 30 minutes, and 5 people get this bad boy into the back cart behind the car and ride down the highway blowing up a storm of dust. we dug a hell of a hole and couldn´t quite get it up. kinda a crazy hippie idea one must say. we managed to prop it up, and finally the next day it stood. though the true test will be when el zonda comes again.

here it stands. a salvaged pine. other than this the super important news is that we dug some asecias, ditches for water to come through, hauled a ton of firewood, beth got sick for a couple days. and we are feeling pretty good being farmers.
we also had some blow out bonfires. it was "super necessary" according to our farm director for a huge fire to burn a stump so the car with the cart could turn. so we piled a bunch of crap we had scrapped from working on the chicken tractors and chinchilla house and had this fogata. we also ate some sweet paella. big news on the farm. the stump was burnt.

so we spilt from argentina, took a nice bus over the andes. and we´re in chile, on the coast. it´s warmer here and we are enjoying a small break being clean for a couple days and eating lots of fruit and some fish.
next we go south, to fundo los lagartos. not before first stopping in valparaiso to check out some neruda history and weird houses.

Saludos from the Andes!

hot springs in Cacheta...lots of bbq, wine, hot water mixed with amazing views of the Andes!
planting!

A house with a living roof for Chinchillas! They are so cute!
siesta time
planting pomegranite and pecan trees
look at the chicken tractor we made! its for chickens who are on the loose outside of their main pen.


We have been having a great time doing all sorts of tasks. No fires this week. Just planting, building with local materials cool structures for animals, hauling dirt, making live roofs, finding firewood, baking bread, and eating soooo well! We forgot to mention that our hosts used to own a vegetarian restaurant in Mendoza and everything they cook is delicious! Last weekend we went to a hotsprings in Cachueta, closer to the Andes outside of Mendoza. We expect to be here another week. Then we´ll head to Chile and a check out a few places near Santiago before we see our next farm in that area.

¨La Zonda¨

So, we made it to our first WWOOF farm. Its called Rincon Madre Tierra, and is located outside of Mendoza, Argentina. It is a fairly large area, is run by a friendly and knowlegable local Argentine family, and right now the volunteers are Chris and I, plus two other wonderful volunteers, from Buenos Aires and California respectively. We are throughly enjoying our time so far, and expect to be here for at least another week and a half to two weeks.

The farm has horses, a bull, about 40 chickens, dogs, cats, a greenhouse, irrigated fields with fruit trees/vegetable plots, buildings being built with local materials including living roofs. Also, there´s a river nearby and the Andes are in the background, along with a neighboring WWOOF farm as well as other nearby vineyards. We live in a cabin with two other volunteers, where we eat really good food, work hard throughout the day together with the family. We have a variety of tasks, including clearing out the irrigation channels, constructing buildings, caring for the animals, planting vegetable seeds, preparing beds, planting trees/roses, baking bread, cooking meals, and lifting really heavy things (well, át least for me, Beth).

The first day we arrived, we showed up in the morning, and before we could barely put down our bags, they put us to work, which we really appreciated. There is so much to be done to get ready for the upcoming season (its early spring here). So we worked until the winds started blowing so hard, we had to stop. Then, we were informed that the ¨Zonda¨ was here, which basicly means that a fierce wind (cold air from the Andes mixed with humid air from the ocean) had arrived, and had caused a wildfire to start inching toward the farm....it was quite a bit of excitement. So we packed our bags along with things from the family´s house, grabbed shovels, and approached the fire to try to put it out. But it was really large and growing, so we had to give up. Luckily, it put itself out, so the farm didn´t burn down. We had no idea we´d also be volunteer firefighters! So anyways, we´re happy here. That´s it for now.

The forest fire, moving closer

Efforts from neighbors to put it out with about three buckets of water, three shovels, and maybe 10 people top, including 4 WWOOFers, who dont know much about putting out fires

Our fellow WWOOFer, Liz, in the hot seat

La Zonda, or the wind that raises hell

The smoke blowing onto the farm from the fire

Looks like a scary movie!

The neighboring WWOOF farm, a mother daughter operation, both from the US

Chickens on the farm

Lunch out of a barrel!

Lunchtime on the farm (yes, I´m using a twig to stir the stew!)

Mate Mishaps

Dear Reader, Allow us a moment to reflect on a cultural phenomenon of this querida Argentina.

The ritual of mate. Mate for those who don´t know is a type of tea, to be sipped communaly, all through the day here in Argentina. Your protaganists attempting to try out the local culture began their search days after arrival for the necessary goods: a mate gourd (to drink mate out of), a bombilla (the straw that you drink from to filter the herb), and the prized thermos to keep hot water to pour over and over in your gourd.

We purchased our gourd and bombilla from a seemingly nice artisan in Buenos Aires, and in our days of park sitting in rosario needed to complete our kit with a thermos. Upon looking all over town for a store which sells the Thermos, we noticed, that a) not a damn person in Argentina can understand our spanish b) termo is indeed the word or way to ask for a thermos 3) hardware stores sell thermoses 4) thermoses break really easily...

after an hour of searching and succesfully purchasing a thermos, Chris began to play it as a drum and completely shattered the inside. boo hoo. 35 pesos down the drain. We then purchased another, ´the best´ the man in hardware store said, and drank our precious mate in the park. Upon arriving at the hostel we were informed that our thermos sucked, and that if you buy a plastic thermos you are a sucker because they break constantly. So much for being accustomed to local tradition. In any case, we enjoyed our mate with a river view. Fun. In other mate mishaps, it was discovered our gourd, which is black, leaks dye when water touches it. So many thing have become partially blue in our hostel.

Yeap, we are bumbling tourists.

So we are excited to be going to our first farm south of Mendoza this evening. Its in a town called Tunuyan and the farm is named Madre Tierra.

Eco reserve in Buenos Aires. We loved it! These are other photos from our walk downtown and also of the presidential house and the Plaza de Mayo.

Can we add a few words?

Cheap wine, lots of Italian (Gnochi, pizza, pasta), MEAT, dogs with sweaters, really skinney hip women with go-go boots.

Also, we´re still getting to know the eating schedule. Like, we have breakfast, then lunch around 1pm, then everything closes until around 8pm. Then people eat dinner around 9-12. So, we´re getting used to that.

Okay, that´s it for now! We just arrived in Rosario, and we loved the scene by the river, lots of sweets, dancing, BMXing, and generally a swell place to spend a night. More tomorrrow.

Our new home (well, at least until tomorrow)

Downtown Buenos Aires: notice the winter light...it definately feels that way. Quite a change from the heat in Tucson. Its around 40ish degrees during the day and around freezing at night! That makes for nice times with hot chocolate, mate, and pastries!

Chris with a Quilmes during our picnic lunch in front of the art museum. We also had potato pie and salad.

Beth at the Recoleta cemetary. We saw Evita´s grave along with many cats who live there.

View from our attic pad of the city

Japanese gardens in Palermo

We had a day layover at a resort outside of DC, so during the day, we ate hot dogs (well Chris anyway), visited the American Indian Museum, and walked down the mall.