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!)