| Feb 5, 2006 - THE HALF-WAY POINT!
| Thats right, here I am. It is the 5th of the month once again, and I am exactly 4 months into my trip. The mid way mark. I have done and seen half of everything that I am to do and see, and have that same amount waiting for me in the months ahead. I am not so sure how I feel about that, but I felt that a special entry was necessary. Especially because lately I have been moving pretty slowly with this site, so I wanted to get down a bit more information as well.
As of now, I have only just reached Argentina according to this site. In reality the holiday season and nearly all of my Patagonia adventure has passed, and with it many more amazing experiences. It is due to these experiences and packed schedule that I have not been updating much to begin with, so I want to put in the reminder that many more submissions are going to come preceeding these latest update entries, and until the one directly before this is about Puerto Natales, I am not caught up. And actually, I still need to get down those initial entries about Cuenca, the town I lived and studied in in Ecuador when I first landed here, but I'll get to that later.
On February 5th (because even now is a few days later than that), I was a dirty, smelly, and grizzly man. Why? Well, because of the way we decided to approach Patagonia. For the most part the 6 of us were staying in tents, even in the major towns and cities, as a way to save money. This limited our showering and clothe-changing opportunities. Also, there were many days hiking, which just added to the overall funk. On February 4th, I left Torres del Paine National Park (Chile) after 7 days of trekkig that totalled about 90 miles. At that point, I had had one shower in the past 19 days, which was also the last time I shaved, and had slept in a bed only twice in the past 24 days. From there things looked to change once again, as we finally started to wrap up our Patagonia experience with a trip down to Ushuaia, Argentina, the supposed "end of the world", and then officially close the Patagona chapter with a flight to Buenos Aires on the 9th of February.
And that is more or less where I am at now. I am half way through my trip, and I have travelled just about the length of the continent, at least as much as I am going to, down to the end. However, my plans have now changed so that I will be spending Carnaval in Salvador Brazil, which is about the same latitude as Lima, Peru. This means that the same distance I just took 3 months to get through, I need to cover in just under 2 weeks! We'll see how all that works out. Also, there is a free Rolling Stones concert on the beaches of Copacabana in Rio de Janero on the 18th of February. It would be a mad push to really get there on time, but I may try. The guys I am with have a 4-day apartment rented there for real cheap, so it is still possible. It is expected to be the largest concert in history, with a predicted 2 million people attending. While I am not so into the music, and do not actually love swarming in large crowds in the heat, the ability to say I was at the biggest concert ever is appealing. I'll make up my mind on the go. But to give you an idea of bus times this is all going to take: Buenos Aires to Rio is about 40 hours. Then from Rio to Salvador is another 26. I can break this up by going Buenos Aires to Montevideo in 8 hours, then another 20 to the island of Florianopolis, then another 17 or so to Rio. Then maybe fly from Rio to Salvador if the price isn't too different. As of right now, everything is a possibility.
I cannot believe I have already completed half of everyting that I am to do here, but equally mind-boggling is that I have the exact same amount of excitement, adventure, confusion, and planning ahead of me. 4 months have passed very fast, yet so much has happened as well. I am curious and anxious to see what lies ahead. As I sit here, I have plans and know my route just to the end of March, at which point I will need to start thinking about how to sculpt my route back to Quito for my return flight. Will I be travelling alone, or still with this great group of guys I will have been travelling with for almost 3 months by that point and have become very good friends with? Will I choose to go north through Brazil and ride the Amazon River back, or dip down and revisit Argentina and Bolivia again and some of the spots I missed on my rush to Carnaval? Or will new ideas arise such as a jaunt through Paraguay and the much less visited and touristy parts of this continent? Do I have another flight in my future to get to places I wouldn't otherwise have time for such as Venezuela and/or Columbia? Will things stay mostly problem-free and smooth sailing as they have so far, or are there unforseen bumps in the road that lies ahead?
These are my thoughts as I approach the second 50% of my travels, and I am filled with wonder as to how I will reach the answers to these questions as much as I am intrigued by the outcomes themselves. |
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