Valdez Peninsula

For the past 4 days my family, including my grandparents and uncle's family, have been staying at a hotel called Las Restingas on the Valdez Peninsula in Argentina. This image gives you an idea where it is.

We stayed there for Christmas and had a delicious meal.

My grandfather at Christmas Dinner.

During those days we saw more penguins, elephant seals and sea lions at wildlife reserves around the peninsula, for we staying in the only town there. We also went to the beach, though the only one who braved the cold waters was my dad. Here is some pictures of the wildlife we saw.

Penguins!

The Valdez Peninsula is the only continental place where the elephant seals live. They spend 6 months at sea before they come to rest at the Valdez or islands in the North/South poles. These guys just lay around all day and were so chubby they couldn't move 3 feet to the water!

 

A fat elephant seal taking a nap.

Though they might look like elephant seals, these guys are sea lions. Here are some differences between the two. 1. Sea Lions have fur and elephant seals don't. 2.Sea Lions are much better equipped for land with there feet like flippers, while elephant seals can't move a foot on land. 3. Elephant seals mostly live at sea, while sea lions spend a lot of time on land. 4. Elephant seals have much more blubber and fat.

A big sea lion on the point where there was a colony

Penguins!!!

Before these few weeks, I thought penguins only lived in Antarctica.  I couldn't have been more wrong.  Today my family and I went down to Punta Tombo on the coast of Patagonia.  This is where a whole flock of Magellanic penguins go for months September through March. Then they go to southern Brazil for summer (or winter in Argentina) to lay eggs.  Punta Tombo is a big area where the Penguins come in Argentina.  It is the biggest out of 63 places in Patagonia.  At Punta Tombo, you can walk on a pathway that goes beside all the penguins nests and allows people to see them up close. Penguins are my favorite animals and I was psyched to mingle with them.  We took tons of pictures and here are some of them.

From Malin's Point of View...

Loving being tourists

I am still a little stunned by what we’ve gotten ourselves into.  We are taking it one day at a time ("Today we figured out how to make coffee.  Yea!").   Here’s my list of observations so far:

1. I wondered what I would do all day. Ha! Simply subsisting here will be plenty.
2. Our Spanish could not be worse. 
3. This part of Argentina is dry as a bone.  We will need all the Chapstick and moisturizer we can find (thank you running ladies!).
4. Trelew is a lot less Italy, a lot more Mexico than we anticipated. Yet we suspect it contains secrets hidden behind run-down exteriors and mystical Spanish signs (e.g. tennis? swimming pool?).
5. Everything new that we try – visiting the bakery, driving a rental car, buying gas, locating a map, finding the beach – requires a small amount of bravado.  The kids watch us carefully. Setting an example makes us all braver. 
6. It’s fun to be a tourist (the penguin colony today was awesome).
7. Our house is simple, but has most of what we need (except a lot of sunlight).  But we suspect the heavy shutters protect against sun and wind, so we'll be thankful for them over the next few months.
8. Will says we haven’t experienced real wind yet, but we got a taste on our first day.  Wow!
9. The countryside around Trelew looks just like rural Wyoming:  flat, dry, sage brush-like plants, barbed wire fences, sheep and cattle.  And then some really weird animals like guanaco (small llamas), tinaimo and emu (birds). 



The penguin colony at Punta Tombo



Sea animals and land animals together = weird 



Taylor's new binoculars (for Christmas!)

Sports Field

           Yesterday me and my female family members (mom and Abby) were going to a "park" to eat lunch.  We had planned it all by looking on a map. Well on the map the field was green, but as we were walking down the road that it is on we saw soccer nets.  Well of course Abby and I were psyched out at the site of a soccer field.  But when we got out on to the field there was no grass all dirt.  It turns out that in Patagonia it is so hard to maintain grass that the soccer (futbal) fields are all dirt.  So that meant we could not eat our lunch.  So then we went to the town square for lunch.  My mom and sister both were eating "Tuna" sandwiches , well that "Tuna" tasted like cat food to both my mom and sister.  I don't like Tuna anyway so I got away with eating a hard boiled egg. now of coarse mom says there was a huge cat food aisle in the market place and she may have misread it...

Different in Argentina

Here in Argentina things are very different! Here is a list of things I noticed.

• The yolks in eggs are ginormous
• The fridges are freezing(our liquids are frozen solid every night
• Some of the faucets turn a different direction
• The tuna tastes like cat food:(
•  They have different stores for each of their foods(butcher, fresh food market, bakery)
• They eat dinner at about 10pm
• The time when everyone is out-and-about is 8pm
• They have a "siesta" or silent/napping hour after lunch, which is when all the stores are closed
• They use military time

Argentina

Buenos Aires across the water

My brother and I at a park in Buenos Aires

Buenos Aires outside the airport window

Our first grocery shopping trip

Asado, Argentinian meat that is coked on an open fire.  We had it at where my dad will now be working and it is all pork, beef, lamb and sausage.

Asado on the open flame

Trelew

  We have just gotten of our last plane trip from Buenos Aires to Trelew, Argentina.

Our first was from Boston  to Miami (3 hrs.) and than our longest, Miami to Buenos Aires (9 hrs.). Buenos Aires to Trelew was about two and a half hours. So if you do the math it adds up to 14.5 hours, yeah, that's a pretty long time in the air.

It is pretty weird when you are the only people in the town who are speaking English but we manage to be understood by people (usually).  We are living in a small house in down town Trelew.  Trelew is about as big as Portland, Oregan but in the middle of a desert.
    The food here is pretty much just MEAT! In Argentina they call it Asado. It is lamb meat.

Snow!

I was just telling my friends a few days ago; "I really want it to actually snow, like a foot, before I leave." Well, wah-la! My wish comes true!  Thank you Jack Frost for sending us folks in Durham a White Christmas!

Mmmmmm! Snow is yummy!

Last Day of Work

My office has never looked like this.  Ever.  Last day of work for 6 months!

Friday Night Fun!

Friday night, I was all down because I thought all my friends were going to my other friends house without me.  My dad decided we should go out to dinner, and guess what!? My friends threw a surprise party for my leaving, not an afternoon without me!!!!  We went to Flatbread pizza and to a movie...funnest night of my life! Here is a picture.

My friends and I at Flatbread!

Where is Trelew?

View Larger Map

10 More Days!

Today, December 7th, I realized that I only have 10 more days left before we leave for Argentina!  I also realized that these were the last days I was going to see my friends.  Thank you to all those friends who changed my life for the better! Here is a poster I made to remember you guys!

T Minus Fifteen Days

Current state of The List

In the next two weeks, we still need to pack our things for six months, finish up things at both our jobs, collect school work for the kids, cancel our phones, prepare three different rental leases, get our house ready to sell, and buy a new house.  But Will observed yesterday that "at least now when we check something off the list, we aren't adding other things to the list."  So we're making progress.  Ha ha ha (deranged laugh).

snow!!!!!!!

 this is what happens when you make a snowman these days

Today it snowed for the second time this year.  It might be last snow I see this year(supposing it does not snow in Argentina).  There is not much but enough to cover my neighbors roof(it is flat). It is about 25 degrees outside and pretty foggy.  Our yard outside looks pretty lonely and gloomy when only our couple of bushes are alive and when branches and sticks are every where(my mom and sister raked all the leaves). Sadly the snow will probably melt away.