long term travel

In a recent conversation with my new found friend on the road, Robbie, we discussed the nature of long term backpacking. He explained that “what we see in one week is often a person's trip of a lifetime, but we are fortunate to continue to have many trips of a lifetime during the journey.” Due to the fast paced nature of the past four weeks I have not paid much attention to the documentation of my experiences on the road, but I have definitely had a handful of trips of a lifetime.

If I am going to make any attempt to catch up I will have to take the lazy approach with bullet points. The past few weeks have included the following:

-Mapuche Farm: Camping at a Native American Mapuche farm with Chris and Robbie. In order to reach the farm we had to ring a bell on a tree for the Mapuche member to climb in a row boat and retrieve us from the shore of a lake. On the other side of the lake cows, sheep, roosters, chickens and horses roamed freely

-Camping in a Taxi Drivers yard: During a boisterous festival in the small town of Junin there was nowhere to sleep, not even vacancy in the campground. A kind man driving a cab allowed Chris, Robbie and me to set our tents up in his yard and spend the night.

-Fly Fishing: I grew an appreciation for fly fishing while spending a few weeks in the Lake District with avid fly fishers, Chris and Robbie.

-Iguazu Falls: In the northeast corner of Argentina the impressive waterfalls known as Iguazu draw in crowds of visitors from around the world. It is easy to spend a full day in the National Park which is what Chris, Simon (Chris’s friend from home) and I did. While viewing the “Devils Throat” the spray is so powerful that it is impossible to stay dry.

Carnaval: On a very big whim coming from Iguazu, we stopped over in a sleepy town called San Ignacio. The town came alive on Saturday evening with hundreds of beautiful women adorned in elaborate costumes, mostly lacking coverage in areas with curves. Chris and Simon died and gone to heaven as steams of women passed by prancing in their thongs. We were fully immersed in Carnaval without any warning.

Bikes and Wine: Arriving in Mendoza means entering wine country. No visit is complete without biking around the various vineyards. Mr. Hugo provided our small group of wine enthusiasts with bikes and copious amounts of wine. A beautiful sunny day riding along roads covered in tree canopies and surrounded by mountains: it was practically a perfect day.

Wine Festival: We conveniently planned to spend time in Mendoza during their annual wine festival. The streets were filled with Argentines while floats from the parade with people throwing grapes passed by.

Mount Aconcagua: It was essential to pay a visit to the worlds highest mountain in the western hemisphere. Chris, our new friend named Guy, and I camped a few days in a small Andean town to get a closer look at the massive mountain.

The next few weeks will be spent in the Northwest region of Argentina to begin a new chapter of the journey…