Before i start about todays events, i thought i’d mention another thing from the other day. I was Rick-rolled on the bus. technically you can only be rick-rolled by receiving an email, but i believe hearing the words “Never gonna give you up, never gonna let you down…..” at any time constitutes a rick rolling. For those like my parents and grandparents who are unlikely to know what rick rolling is, its when someone sends you a link on the internet, that then plays Rick Astley’s 1987 song “Never gonna give you up”. The youth of today and the internet can be quite silly. I was pleased though that after i sat through that song a spanish/english live version of U2’s Vertigo played.
OK so back to the excitement of today. Lets just say I had no issues waking up at 4:30am. Buenos Aires does not sleep on a Saturday night. The streets were as busy as they were at 8pm the night before. The flight down to El Calafate was quite long and very boring. I did read bits of the in flight magazine in spanish, before cheating and just reading the english translations.
The plane came in for a landing and it was one of the smoothest landings I’ve ever been in. Actually LAN was probably as good as Qantas in terms of in flight meals and service I guess. So the plane lands and someone up the back claps and cheers then the guy next to me claps and another guy in front claps and yells something in spanish. Is it a worrying sign that the passengers were glad to be on the ground? They obviously have never flown on Brindabella Airlines flight FQ004 from Albury to Canberra during a freak storm with ice forming on the wings. Did I mention that plane was a 7 seater? The cabin crew then proudly announced it was 1 degrees……… minus outside. OK my t-shirt is inappropriate right now.
Flamingos
I caught the bus to my new hostel, the Marco Polo Hostel Suites. This place is sheer luxury for $40 a night. Two double beds and an ensuite in my room. The lounge is quite pleasant and I have some great views over the Lago Argentina. I wandered into town for a coffee and a look around. By this stage I had the jacket on and a beanie. I was the only one around with a beanie on…. but it was cold. I was hoping to go to the glacier today, but the hotel told me to not waste money on the trip today. Instead i’m booked on the “Big Ice” tour for tomorrow, which I planned to do anyway. I’ll be living and breathing glacier tomorrow.
I had a really fantastic lunch. Something to do with a chicken and grilling it. I can’t see how they made it taste so good, but they did. It came with potatoes, some seasoned I’ve had to date in Argentina. As I wasn’t going to glacierland today, my alternative was to go see some wetlands and walk down to the edge of the lake. I thought maybe i can glimpse the glacier, but to no avail. What i did glimpse were pink flamingo. i’m buggered if I know why these flamingo were hanging out in Patagonia, rather than sunny Africa. I felt like geek of the week spotting birds in a wetlands, so I walked back to the hostel. I caught a glimpse of the local soccer game. Something was wrong with the picture i was seeing. Kids playing football all not in the same coloured shirts. Nah thats normal, happens in Australia, as does playing on the dirt pitch, like they do up north in the outback. OK so the barbed wired fence keeping spectators of the pitch, could have been from a pregone era of football violence, but even at this local level, the police were in attendance in riot gear. Yes for a local kids game, the Argentineans take football quite seriously.
Flamingo in flight