Engines do blow up, apparently

Yesterday afternoon we returned to the cute little mountain town of El Chalten after five days / four nights of back packing around Mount Fitz Roy. 

More on that later. 

We were looking forward to a hot shower, a real bed and a meal that was not pasta. Steve decided to take a quick look at his email when we got in. 

You do NOT ever want to get an email from a travel agent that has "I truly regret to inform you" as part of the title. Apparently, our Antarctic ice breaker / cruise ship blew an engine! Our Antarctic voyage, which we have been thinking about for the last six years, was cancelled. 

The last 24 hours we have both been on our iPads constantly. Internet access here is verrrrrrrrrry slow, and on top of that we found out late on a Friday afternoon,which is a holiday in the USA (their Thanksgiving, a holiday devoted to shopping orgies) where many of the booking agents are located. 

Fortunately, we found an amazing trip with a Dutch company. Their booking agent works from home, and we have been in touch with her constantly over the last 24 hours. Our new tour leaves 3 days earlier ( December 5), and is couple of days shorter than the one that we originally booked. We are getting 1/3 off for booking last minute, and we got the VERY last cabin on the boat. The boat travels to the same remote region of the Antarctic that we wanted to see (the Weddell Sea). The one difference:

This ship carries 

A helicopter!

We get to spend three days flying to remote Emperor Penguin breeding grounds in addition to making many other shore landings via zodiacs. 

In the last 24 hours, we booked accommodation here in El Chalten, evaluated 6 potential new cruises, changed our hotel reservations in El Clafate, got our laundry done, booked our new cruise, dealt with a credit card problem, completed our booking documentation, found a hotel in Ushaia, booked a super cool mountain bike trip for tomorrow and spent an hour on the phone trying to change our El Calafate - Ushaia flights (we are certain that will get resolved on Monday). 

Phew. 

We don't get to do the second planned backpack trip south of the Fitz Roy group, but we are thrilled that we are still going to the Antarctic, particularly since everybody else on our ship is likely scrambling to find alternative voyages as well. The original cruise company does not even know when their ship will be back in service, so future trips may be cancelled as well, which will make other last minute trips very hard to come by. The new trip sounds perfect for us - not quite as luxurious as the other boat (no gym!) but very focused on adventure and exploration in an area that very few ships travel to. 

And they have a HELICOPTER!

We figure we should celebrate tonight!

Argentine - Perito Moreno Glacier

Wow. That is what I kept saying. 

We took a bus from El Calafate and then a boat to see the advancing face of the glacier dump into Lake Argentina. 

There are also boardwalks that were constructed to provide a great view of the other side of the glacier. 

There was lots of action with 50 m high search dropping into the water. Spectacular!

Today we are off to El Chalten for views of Fitz Roy and some back packing. 

South America - Buenos Airies

Without any hesitation, the guy reaches into his desk and passes us a brick of cash an inch thick. 

"You should count it if you want" he says in pretty good english. We figure after trading him 10 US bills for this wad, yup, sure, we will definitely count it, even though it will take quite a while!

Argentina is kind of a first world country, but their economy has been totally messed up by their government. They defaulted on their government bonds twice in the last few years, so their currency is in a free fall. Inflation is very high. The official government rate for currency exchanges is 8 pesos to the U.S. $. Yesterday we traded money on the "blue" (not black - EVERYBODY in the country uses the blue market) for 13 pesos to the USD. We went to one of the shopping districts, haggled with a couple of guys, went to a small office in a strip mall, counted out our US cash (which we have been hoarding) and then the guy dumped a brick of money on his desk.  The biggest bill in Argentina is 100 pesos = $8, so when you change a thousand bucks, you get a wad about an inch thick. Hilarious, but it's saving us a ton of money in Argentina! 

Buenos Airies is a beautiful city. We are here in their spring, so there are flowers everywhere, along with many people out running, cycling or doing a kind of cross exercise thing using little plastic cones on the grass. 

Wine is very good and CHEAP! Almost mandatory to have a little champagne with lunch!

Across the street from our hotel is a cemetery that is hundreds of years old. 

Apparently, Evita Peron is buried here, but we could not find her mausoleum. 

It was super cool to arrange to meet our friends John and Shelley for dinner. They had just come back from an Antarctic ski trip. 

We will be hiking and camping for the next three weeks. We collected our sleeping bags and tent from Argentina post yesterday - we were worried about that they would not hold them, since Canada post told us that it would take 6-8 weeks to deliver them, and they arrived in 6 days. Argentine post was supposed to send them back home after holding them for a month (I.e they should have shipped them back to Canada about 5 weeks ago). Fortunately, they are inefficient, so they were still being held at the post office. By the time we took taxis, stood inLine, got tracking numbers, stood in line, paid import duties, stood in line and had our stuff inspected , it only  took us 5 hours to collect them!

AFRICA HIGHLIGHTS

Having spent 7 weeks and visiting 8 different countries we feel that we have come to know Africa a bit better and have gained a better appreciation of just how large the African continent is. It is challenging to pick only one highlight from each country but here goes:

KENYA

Jackie: watching a lioness take down a wildebeest in the Massai Mara

Steve: watching giraffes eat and run

ZANZIBAR, TANZANIA

Jackie: scuba diving and seeing sea turtles

Steve: scuba diving and the sheer quantity of fish

RWANDA

Jackie: spending an hour up close and personal with Mountain Gorilla's in Volcanoes National Park

Steve: golden monkeys in Volcanoes National Park

NAMBIA

Jackie: spending by 50th birthday hiking up red sand dunes in the Namib Desert

Steve: watching the drama unfold at water holes

BOTSWANA

For both of us: sitting and watching large groups of elephants vie for water at the small water hole at Elephant Sands.

ZAMBIA:

Jackie:  rafting class 5 rapids on the Zambezi River

Steve: Top Gun helicopter ride racing down the Zambezi rapids

ZIMBABWE: 

For both seeing a rainbow over through Victoria Falls 

SOUTH AFRICA: 

Jackie: tasting champagne at Simsonsig Winery in Stellenbosch

Steve: hiking up Table Mountain in Cape Town

AND because we stayed in some amazing accommodation. Our favourite places to stay.

Jackie: Nyungwe Forest Lodge in Rwanda. The main dining room and bar was so beautifully done in rock and huge windows. The individual sleeping lodges looked very plain and basic from the outside but inside were very new, spacious,  bright, modern, decorated with traditional african art, had huge windows and had a  private deck overlooking the forest.

Steve: Dolmite Camp in Etosha National Park in Namibia because not only was it it a deluxe tent with no view of any other accommodation it came with a private swimming pool with views over the nambian plains. 

PRIVATE SWIMMING POOL....how cool is that!!

Goodbye South Africa, Hello Argentina

We did a little hiking in the Jonkershoek mountains near Stellenbosch. Beautiful terrain. 

Some great waterfalls and some beautiful flowers. 

Sorry, I don't have a clue what these are called! My friend Marj Gibney, who directs the women's choir at church, challenged me to post a picture of my favourite flower on Facebook, which has sharpened my perception of the beauty that surrounds us every day. 

One thing that I have to say about South Africa - it is pretty good value! I feel like most things are 25-50% less than home for items of comparable value. For example, in the photo below, the wine looks expensive, until you realize that the prices are in South African Rand, which are 10:1 to the Canadian Dollar! It's not a cheap country, but it is excellent value. A couple of nights ago we went for a bit of a gourmet blow out. We ate at the best restaurant in town, we both had excellent fresh seafood entrées, we shared a top notch bottle of sparkling wine, we had desert, we shared a cheese plate and we both had after dinner drinks. Total damage, including tip: C$90. Not cheap, but a pretty good deal for what you are getting. The restaurant was called "The Big Easy". I expected that it was a New Orleans style place; turns out it is owned by Ernie Els, a South African golfer and the big easy is his nickname ( clearly we are not spending enough time with Dwaine Korsbrek!). 

Overall, we felt very safe in South Africa. We never planned to rent a car, but we were glad that Cape Town was totally booked, because renting a car meant that we ended up seeing a lot more of the country- and we probably saved a lot of money on accommodation, which is more expensive in the big city. 

We did have a couple of interesting driving experiences. We never could find a decent map, so we were doing a bit of dead reckoning navigation. Hey, we're on vacation- what could happen? At one point, we turned off the main N2 highway onto a major road that was heading towards a rich seaside resort that was supposed to have whale watching. Pretty quickly we found ourselves in the middle of a township - a very poor squatters' settlement. It was Saturday afternoon, and there were tons of kids playing on the streets, people visiting and families having barbecues. The average dwelling was probably 4 m X 6 m and was built of corrugated metal with scraps of wood, cardboard and old tires. If the dwellings had a yard, they would be about the same size as the dwelling. About one home in 20 had a vehicle parked on the yard. We felt safe driving through the township, but we were super careful, drove slow and got back on the highway fairly promptly. One thing that was strange was that Steve would stop the car for people who looked like they were going to cross the street, particularly kids. This confused people totally, as it was unexpected behaviour from a driver. 

Later at the Joburg airport, we had a long and interesting discussion with a university professor while we were waiting to board our flight. She was a specialist in urban poverty and at risk children. She told us that we were safe driving through the township, but that conditions could change in an instant. She also provided us with a very depressing view on the lack of progress in South Africa - in her words, apartheid still exists, but now it is class based (I.e rich versus poor) instead of race based. 

We got VERY lucky with our flights to South America. Because our around the world flights are on points, some of the timing is less than ideal. We were supposed to leave Joburg at midnight and then have a 16 hour layover in Sao Paolo before our flight to Buenos Airies. Instead, the first flight was delayed 9 hours, and South African airlines put us up at a nice hotel. After a relaxing sleep in a real bed ( instead of sleeping on the plane!) and a comfortable 11 hour flight, we had only a 6 hour layover in Sao Paolo. 

Today's big adventure: finding our camping gear!  Here is one last shot of Africa - this was the guy slicing the neck off a bottle of champagne with a sword - you can just about see the cork flying off!

South Africa Wine Tasting

Stellenbosch is a University Town in the middle of wine country. We booked a "Vinehopper Trip"

which is a hop on hop off tour to 6 different wineries. We were joined by a young couple from Germany. 

 One of the wineries we visited, Beyerskloof, which specialized in Pinotage. We learned that Pinotage is not a blend, but is a cross with Pinot and Hermitage grapes. It was introduced in South Africa because the Pinot Noir grapes could not grow in the summer heat which can reach temperatures as high as 52-56C. Pinot Noir grape crossed with the hearty Hermitage grape created a grape that could survive the heat. Pinotage has become a signature wine for South Africa. 

Our favourite winery was Simonsig. The name was familiar to us as it was one of  the champagnes that we drank on my birthday. We both enjoyed tasting their selection of champagnes so much that they kept offering us extra tastings. One of the "things" they do for a group is to open a bottle of champagne with a sword. Normally they need a group of 10 before they do this, but they liked the story of our trip, so decided to do it with a smaller group. 

One of the trainees tried it but didn't make a clean cut the first time, so tried a second time and was successful. And yes...... It was another "extra tasting". Thankfully, we only had time for one more winery. By the end of the tour, we had only visited 4/6 wineries were both feeling  plenty happy with the day.  

Africa - South Africa

Africa - Cars, Hotels and Restaurants 

I have said many times that part of turning 50 is realizing that you are no longer 25. When we were on our honeymoon, I remember landing in countries and not even knowing what language they spoke there! Hey, we would find a hotel, jump on a bus and everything would be just fine. 

For the Africa part of our trip, we figured that things needed to be a bit more organized. We were concerned about security, and all of the game lodges need to be booked in advance, so everywhere we went there would be some dude waiting for us at the airport with my last name written on a piece of cardboard. Except for Namibia, where we drove ourselves, and South Africa. 

For South Africa, we figured that we could just wing it. We booked two nights at the Hilton in Cape Town and decided to figure out the rest after we landed. 

We go in late on Sunday night, and went for a walk along Cape Town's beautiful water front on Monday morning. We got some tourist info, and decide on what we wanted to do for the rest of our time - Table Moutain, Cape of Good Hope, wine tasting and shark cage diving. Easy. Now we just needed someplace to stay. 

Impossible. 

EVERY hotel in Cape Town was booked. I had prebooked the Hilton for $90 a night. We could stay one more night there for $400, but it was booked solid after that. I found. "4 star" hotel in the Internet, but when I tried to book it, it turned out to be a backpackers lodge and we would be staying in a room with 6 other guys! It turns out that the Volvo Around the World Sailing race was in town a along with a convention. The nearest hotel room was 40 km away. 

Ok, plan B. Car rental! Also not that easy, because for safety reasons we insist on driving an automatic.  I can drive on the wrong side of the road, I can drive a standard, I can't do both! We managed to find a local agency with one automatic. 

Tuesday morning we hiked up the iconic Table Mountain. It is a beautiful site. I am happy to say that nobody passed us going up or down - although the latter is true only because I strategically waited a minute for the two 18 year old Italians to leave the top before us! They ran the entire way - we saw them later from our taxi. Ah, to have young knees again!

Renting the car turned out to be very serendipitous. We drove through he beach suburbs of Cape Town - they are gorgeous! I really felt like we were in California or Sydney. Further down the coast, the rugged terrain reminded both of us of Nova Scotia. 

We stayed at a cute boutique hotel on the cape peninsula. The front desk clerk was amazed that we got such a cheap rate, since apparently we secured their last room. Mentioning that it was our 25th wedding anniversary secured an ocean view table for breakfast the next day. 

That evening, we had decided to be "good" (well, Steve was pushing to be good) but Jackie decided that since we bagged Table Mountain ( hey, the true summit, not just the top of the cable car!) we could be "bad" and she asked if she could order a glass of wine. The answer: NO. The restaurant we chose for dinner had only been open a week, and had not yet secured their liquor license, so they could not sell us a glass of wine. BUT, they could give it away for free! So they kept plying us with free ( and very good!) wine all night. There was a two for one entrée special on, so a plate of yellow fin tuna, a platter with shrimp, fish, calamari, mussels and fish cakes along with this amazing triple chocolate desert came to $19. Jackie left a 50% tip!

The next day we started with penguins!! These are African penguins, although they used to be called Jackass penguins because of their braying calls. I'll try to post a video on facebook later. They are hilarious!

Then off to Cape Point and the Cape of Good Hope, the most south western point in Africa and the location of the meeting of the Indian and Atlantic oceans. 

Next to Hermanas, a super cute tourist town where we saw whales as close a 50 meters offshore. We were supposed to go shark cage diving today, but the ocean is too rough so our trip was cancelled. Shark cage diving is not as scary as it sounds - it is actually shark cage snorkelling. The operators through some bait into the ocean, and since the great white sharks are surface feeders you can watch them from the safety of a cage that is bolted onto the side of the boat. Oh well, next time!

Livingstone, ZAMBIA, AFRICA

Livingstone is the closest Zambian city to Victoria Falls. Victoria Falls is an UNESCO Site and one of the 7 Natural Wonders of the World. It is shared by Zambia and Zimbabwe with the border running through the middle of the 1.7 km length of the falls. The falls on the Zambian side were not much to look at as Zambia has diverted 40% of its water from the Zambezi River  to hydro electricity and this is the dry season so there is less volume.

 In complete contrast, the  portion of the Falls on the Zimbabwe side are spectacular. 

Jackie visited the Falls 32 years ago while on a trip visiting her Aunt Trish and Uncle Roger who were both working in Lusaka, Zambia. Here is a picture of her at the same spot that she had a photo taken on the previous trip. 

What Zambia lacks in volume on it's side of the Falls, it makes up for in Adventure Activities. One of the activities is to visit the "Devils Pool" which is an Infinity Pool. That is, a pool of water that flows off the edge of a cliff. The Devil's Pool is on the edge of the Falls and offers breathtaking views down the 100m drop of the Falls.

We didn't have time to partake in this, but did see a group enjoying their dip and view of the drop.

We did have time for a helicopter flight in a six seater helicopter. Ivan it was an Eurocopter EHS103). 

We both had seats in the front. 

Jackie scored with the window seat this time. 

The trip started with us dropping into a gorge of Zambezi River to just 12m  or 40 feet above rapids 20-25 which we planned to raft the next day.  

Speeding through the gorge and banking around the serpent corners with tall rock walls extending above us felt like being in a flying scene from Top Gun. It was absolutely exhilarating!!!  We saw the falls from both the Zimbabwe and Zambian sides and although they were interesting from the air, we both would have preferred repeated laps through the gorge.

From our view of the falls from the air, neither of us thought that the rafting the rapids was going to be very exciting. We were wrong. 

We ran 25 sets of rapids including 3 sets of class 5 rapids. We flipped our raft on two different sections of class 5 rapids. Both times We were hanging on to the raft one minute and the minute sucking in mouthfuls of the Zambezi River as we waited to pop back up to the surface. Lifejackets and helmets were compulsory. We watched a video of the trip which gave us a visual of what happened each time we capsized. On the second capsize, our raft guide was the first one thrown out of the raft. Then as the raft began to flip over, one person after another let go and was tossed in to the river.. Jackie was the last one left hanging onto the raft and came off just before it landed upside down on the river. Then there was the crocodile siting. Most of the group was back in the raft when the guide pointed to a crocodile about 5m from the raft.  

Jackie, who was still in the water, sprinted  to the raft and frantically called out to Steve and the others on the raft to "get me out, get me out"!! The group, had a good laugh after the guide said that the smaller crocodiles were vegetarian. Still......crocodiles were one of the hazards mentioned in the waiver!!  There was one class 6 section named "Commercial Suicide" that we walked around. We watched one of our guides ride the class 6 rapids and make it. The second raft went down empty and flipped part way down. Zambia a place for adrenaline junkies and those willing to part with plenty of cash for their adrenaline fix.