It's been an amazing vacation so far, made even more so by the fact that I've been almost completely disconnected from all things technological for longer than I can remember. The use of Interent cafes and wireless access got me through my 36-hour layover in the Miami airport (a.k.a. "hell"), and there were certainly other things on my mind as I struggled to carry myself up to a 4,200 metre summit on the Inca trail last week. But, as of this morning, I'm back online - so I plan to post a few new entries.
I've been in Buenos Aires since Friday, and am starting to settle into my apartment for the month. The apartment is located in my favorite neighbourhood of the city, right between 'Palermo Hollywood' and 'Las Canitas'. Both of these places are ground zero for the 'good food, good wine' culture of the city. The apartment itself isn't bad - a nice pool on the grounds, I have a cool balcony that runs the length of one side. There also appears to be some way to rig up a hammock, but I have yet to try to put the pieces together.
My steak count sits at one, so far. For my first night I met with a colleague of mine from Canada who opted to pass through Buenos Aires on his way back from South Africa for a client. He's been here about 40 times and bascially stopped in this time to enjoy a couple of great steak dinners. I ordered an incredible 'ojo de bife' - basically a choice, 'eye' of beef cut. Very lean and impossibly tender. ahh, some things haven't changed here.
My spanish is continuously improving and it's becoming increasingly motivating. I'm still a long way from speaking or understanding fluently, but my comfort level and ability to hold a basic conversation and interact in most situations is improving daily. I had my first spanish lesson today. My class consists of a young couple from Brazil, and me. The brazilians seem to be doing quite well, but they're definitely helped by the similarities between spanish and portuguese. I'll be taking classes four hours daily, and it looks like today I've got about 2 hours of homework to have done for tomorrow. Who says vacations are just for relaxing, eh?
My trip in Peru was absolutely incredible. I don't know what I expected from the Inca Trail, but, it was both more beautiful and more challenging than I had comprehended. I'm going to post a few pictures here now. I was very lucky in that the team of nine other climbers and our guides ended up to be just a fantastic group of people. I ended the trip with about four new nicknames based on my Indiana Jones hat and being a Canadian. The team is planning on keeping in touch and I seem to have tentative invitations to visit Australia, Switzerland, Poland and Greece. Of course, I've extended the same information with respect to Canada.
Well, It's 9:46pm so I have to start thinking about supper now. Not sure what's on the menu tonight - I'm all set up with groceries now, but I'm not quite able to pass up the chance to eat at another great argentine place for about $8 tonight. Life is good.
Hope all is well with everyone. My apartment has a comfy couch. Visitors are more than welcome!
