Hiking for Diamonds

So you must all think that Brazil is just about the beach, palm trees, and great rainforests, but it turns out that there is much more once you go inland!

We headed inland from Salvador in the state of Bahia to one of their national parks called "Chapada Diamantina", which is equivalent to their Yellowstone national park. Evidently this place is renowned throughout Brazil as one of the most beautiful places in the country.

We arrived in Lencois (pronounced LEN-SOYS, and it means "sheets" in Portuguese) excited to hike, explore nature, and be a little more active than we have been (aka serious beach bums!).  The area became famous in the late 1800's when they discovered diamonds (yes, a certain someone here was stoked!). We arrived to a cute town full of tourist agencies and posadas.  Fortunately we quickly met some other backpackers who had some great recommendations for local hikes and other things to do.  We spent a few days walking along the limestone rocks on the riverbeds, all while exploring natural waterslides, beautiful natural pools, and many many waterfalls.

Evidently, the town had been experiencing a serious draught, but luckily enough for them we brought the rain!  And lucky for us, it general only poured at night :)  We met some locals who recently opened a wine and cheese shop *yes, please*  and after three bottles in 24 hours we have finally given up on Brazilian wine.. it is just terrible, awful, gross, and sick.  Seriously.  Boxed wine is better!  I give us credit for trying though.
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Oh and before we forget, we also had the most random encounter EVER.  Picture this... its pouring rain, we are camping and thus have no computer, but need to book some last minute flights that night.... every internet cafe is closed ... We are walking by a shop with a man on a computer.. do we dare?  yes, i think its ok to ask to use it for 3 minutes....

So the man graciously allows us to use his computer to book these last minute flights and while Scott chats him up it turns out he is a Baptist priest.  He shows Scott his bible collection while Lisa books the flights and as we thank him and head out the door he stops us, puts his hand on our shoulders, says a prayer and blesses us and the journey we are on.  Needless to say, we left with a smile, feeling touched, and knowing that true kindness does still exist in this world.

Hiking along the riverbed...noice the water is a strange red color from the minerals...

Just a Hop, Skip, and Jump...

Laundry Day!

We even discovered a bear cave....rrrraaaarrrrrrrrrrrr

Fatty Mc Fatty Tree

Cave Walk. Yes, those are stalagtites if you are wondering :)

World's strongest man contest in the cave.  Yup.

It's all about the rock formations

and more rocks

The devil's pool. This one is going to be in a commercial that'll be seen around the world on TV to promote the Olympics!

View from the top of the world! This famous valley, Morro de Pai, is similar to Monument Valley...but tropical and deserty at the same time...strange!

That's it for now...next stop...back to the beach before winter sets in down here...

We heart Patagonia

El Chalten is billed by Argentinians as the "hiking capital of Argentina", so of course we couldn´t resist checking it out. It´s also an internationally famous rock-climbing destination. There´s some crazy sheer cliffs around here! This city, the newest city in Argentina, is one of those no-stoplight towns, that you have to love (or at least when you want to get away from it all for awhile). The best part about it is that there are tons of awesome day hikes to the famous Cerro Torre and Fitz Roy mountains (again...more pics later when the internet is good). What does this mean? No hauling our heavy gear for 5-6 hour hikes each day!! This is huge.

So we bought camping gear in the last town and posted up in El Chalten at an awesome campsite in a beautiful valley, next to a glaciar river, overlooking the mountain range. (this might be when a picture tells a thousand words...hold out until our next stop...) Oh, did I mention that this campsite has barbecues?? That´s what I´m talking about. That´s what´s been missing from our lives, barbecue!

We´ve been here for a week camped out in our little house next to the river doing one day of hiking and then one day of relaxing (generally reading and sitting by the river, trying to solve the world´s problems...ha), trying to figure out our next steps.

Our first hike was a 5 hour out and back to Laguna Torres, the beautiful overlook to Cerro Torre. As we´ve noticed, both the Chileans and Argentinians are not so good about identifing the time and difficulty of their trails. First of all, they rate their trails almost all as "easy", but the times are off by huge amounts. ANYWAY. This hike was great, mostly flat and beautiful the whole way!





Our second hike was a 5 1/2 hour crazy uphill hike to this place called ¨Loma del Pliegue¨ what is the translation you might ask? Dunno...maybe "amazing view of the entire mountain range, glaciars, and lakes". This hike was a 3000 foot climb to this amazing peak overlook. Pics to come!

Some crazy flowers at the top, they´re called "Lady Slippers"

We made it!! Wind was about 40-50 mph up here...didn´t stay long! Cerro Torre and Fitz Roy in the background


Our last adventure here was a bit different you might say. We mixed it up with a boat tour of the Viedma glaciar, ice trekking, and ice climbing. FREAKING AWESOME! This was our first organized tour since we left Antarctica, good and bad as we all know (you can imagine the touristy nature of this trip, rather than the backpacker/independent traveling that we´ve been doing). Anyway. Let´s just say that ice climbing with crampons is freaking amazing. We walked around the glaciar (and even under it!) for a bit, then found a shear wall to climb. It was awesome, what a great day...and change of pace!

Ready for the adventure! Check out the crazy color of Lago Viedma...




Yep, she´s underneath the glacier!!

Whadya think of this hombres??!! Boo-ya!

That´s it for El Chalten, Argentina. The weather has turned a bit...we´ve been told that it´s generally windy, rainy, and sunny all in the same day...and it´s starting out...so it´s time for us to move on! (The weather has been unbelievable here - warm, sunny, and awesome for the past 6 days!).

Tomorrow we take off for another 12 hour bus ride north along the infamous Route 40 (Ruta 40). Hopefully we´ll find better internet for you to have some pictures!

Hope everyone is doing well back home.

Scott and Lisa

Tierra del Fuego

We have spent the last 4 days in Tierra del Fuego which is in Southern Argentina. We have been staying in Ushuaia--- the town itself is nothing to speak of but the beautiful mountains and glaciers are so beautiful. After 3 weeks of being on a boat, we were itching to hike a little... so that is what we have been doing. We went to Tierra del Fuego national park and also hiked to Glaciar Martial. (we will post pictures later on today...). Needless to say after 6 hours of hiking yesterday, we realized we are no where near ready to hike the W trail in Torres del Paine. I also learned that when you are hiking for an extended period of time it is best to empty out your backpack and only bring the neccessities... not 6 bottles of suntan lotion, hand warmers, reading glasses, a notebook, etc etc. my bad!

We plan to head to Punta Arenas, Chile tomorrow which is a little South of the Torres del Paine National Park. If any of you have seen, this park has recently had a major fire and most of the park is still closed- boo! We are hoping that it will open up next week so we can check it out. Otherwise we will be heading back to Argentina to hike in El Calafate.

The food has been pretty amazing here so far... last night we were to an all you can eat Parilla... basically all you can eat grilled lamb. I never thought I liked lamb until spending time down here. mmm. I dont think Scott said a single word during dinner...he is in heaven down here.