A nice day for a mate

You can take a gringo out of Argentina, but can you ever really take Argentina out of a gringo?

more chile photos

Dan: Here's another set of pics taken on my way from the south of Chile to Santiago.


Volcan Osorno and Lago Llanquihue from the town of Llanquihue.














Saltos de Petrohue. This may be the bluest river I've ever seen. Not pictured are the 300 tourists also taking pictures.













One of my companions at the top of Volcan Villarica.














Castillo Mancera, one of the Spanish forts around the bay near Valdivia. I love photoshop.














From the Cementerio General in Santiago.




















These girls are just plain cute, don't you think? Maybe a little young for the coy pose though. Vale is my friend Sergio's niece and Kika is her cousin, I think.

















Street art in Santiago. This is the best spray paint stencil I saw, and the placement in the corner between buildings was perfect.

















Outside an office building near La Moneda in Santiago.














Jerky salesman and used clothing vendor in Pudahuel, Santiago suburb.














Intimate clothing for sale on the street in Pudahuel. I had a lot of time to take artsy pictures while killing time, waiting for my perpetually late friend.

chile photos

Here are some pictures taken by either Sergio or me, that I think are cool, from the south of Chile.


I'm not sure why, but there is a lighthouse near the center of Coyhaique, Chile, 50 km from the coast.




















The Hospital in Coyhaique.














The cemetery in Coyhaique. People always thought we were weird for touring cemeteries, but they are peaceful, usually shady and make for some nice pics.












Cascada de la Virgen, between Coyhaique and Puerto Aisen.




















We ran into these fellas walking back from an overnight camping trip near Puerto Aisen.














This one is just across the border, in Argentina. When the truck broke down with 10 passengers, we spent the night in Rio Mayo, national capital of sheep-shearing. Too bad we broke down just a week before their festival. http://ohbrotherwhereami.blogspot.com/2008/01/festival-nacional-de-la-esquila.html


Isla Achao, near Chiloe Island.
















Palafitos, or stilts holding up houses in Castro, Chiloe. I got my shoes muddy for this shot.

the stats

(Hopkins, MN, USA)

I can’t help but notice that our readership, as reflected by the statcounter, has declined precipitously now that both Lou and I are back in the states. What? Do you think that perhaps our lives have suddenly become any less adventurous and exciting? Why just the other day I drove to St. Paul and drank wine with Anne, and to a lesser extent Brian, until at least 1 AM. Today I bleached the kitchen sink. Two days ago I shoveled snow! Doesn’t get much more exciting than that. Well, to tell the truth, the past few days, in addition to trying to get used to each other again, getting out and seeing people, have been occupied largely by cleaning, preparing and moving in to our new place. Most of this time I’ve still felt like a backpacker, in the same clothes I’ve been in all year. But now I’m starting to pull wrinkly wardrobe from storage and help establish a home, a place to sleep for more than a few nights at a time. I think it should be nice to have stuff again. If you want to get a hold of us, we should have our old phone number back on Thursday.

I now we’ve had a loyal readership, ands some who only check in from time to time. We’ve appreciated knowing that people were interested. What amazes me are the random googlers who chance upon our site. I realized recently that through the statcounter software, we can see what search terms led people to our site. Here are some terms from the past few weeks that people were searching for when they came across our site:

Paila de mariscos
Bondiola sadwich traslation
Cartagena chile
dan et lou
what is pulmay
hacer tuto
cortisone shot for the lungs
what to do at night in valdivia
aisen fires
lepra protest
locro is pronounced
el calafate to puerto madryn
estai tenei chileno
go see the doctor in spanish
itchy welts photos
pichanga recipe
chilean gringo site

Cool huh? I think its funny that some poor person who may have been suffering from “itchy welts”, looking for advice, somehow ended up on our website. Whoever you are, anti-histamine pills helped me quite a bit. Good luck with that.

Half a world away

Dan: Ok, technically the distance between Coyhaique, Chile and the north side of Minneapolis, USA is really only a quarter of the way around the world.




This is where I stayed for a few weeks in December and January.
















This is a few blocks from my parents' house, where I was staying a few days ago.

Patagonia vid

Being back and having time and resources with which to do so, Lou made a video montage of our trip to Argentina Patagonia in November and December of 2007. Sweet memories.

plane trip

The first thing I did when I got off the plane in Minneapolis was buy a large coffee at McDonalds and marvel at how large a large coffee is in this land. Since then I've been hanging out at my parents' house, catching up with Lou and catching up on sleep.

Here are some pictures from on the way home.


The desert near Arica, Chile, known as just about the dryest place on Earth.














Somewhere above Colombia, I think.

















I got to reunite with my old buddy Pablo while killing time in Miami International. He used to study in one of my classes in Minnesota. It was great to catch up and speak puro Spanglish. In this picture you can probably tell that we had both been up later than our normal bedtimes.










Black Dog steam plant on the Minnesota River.