Goodbye Bariloche Hello Valdez

Hola Hola.... long time no see....
Much has changed since our last post...
Sadly we had to leave Bariloche, we thought that the best way to say goodbye to the city is from a nice restaurant with a fantastic view over all the area. then with tears in our eyes we went to the bus station to take the 13 hours bus to Puerto Madryn to see some penguins, seals & sea lions.

Well... the town itself is pretty ugly, expensive and has the charm of an aluminium factory(where most of its citizens work). it is located in the middle of nowhere. luckily it is the closest place (only 150 km) to Valdez island(where all the animals are) so it isn´t a complete hole. In Israel it will be like saying to someone "the kotel is amazing you should really visit Dimona".

Anyhow...we arrived at the peak of the breeding season and had trouble finding a hotel. finally we took a room without a window in an ugly, rotten & surprisingly expensive hostel that smelled like a public toilet (believe me when i say that there were places much worse). we then rented a car and somehow got ourselves locked out of it. the bad moujo didn´t stop there & we ended our evening by eating some really bad food in a local restaurant!!! i won´t go into details but let me just say that our first day in Madryn was a crappy one....literally....

the next day we drove to Valdes island. although it was a long & dusty way it was 100% worth it because the place itself and the animals were breathtaking! the hole island is a reservation so it was pretty amazing to see those animals in the wild.

The next day we went to a place called ¨punta tomba" which is a reservation with the largest population in the world of the magellantic penguins (over 400,000). At the entrance we were welcomed by Roberto the ranger who apparently met some Israelis before. he warned us "not meashen and pipi inside and lo lagaat la pinguina". the incredible thing is that large part of the reservation is opened to the public & you can just walk between the penguins and their nests. but you can´t touch them because you can change their smell & they wont find a mate. we had a lot of fun!!! now we have like a 100 photos of penguins....


now we are back at west of Argentina at a town named El Bolson. It is a lovely green place with a lot of hikes around the area.

to be continued....
miss u all....
loni & Dina

7 Lakes

Hola Everyone...
We are back in Bariloche after a 3 day trip in the ¨7 lakes¨ area. It was a long drive on a dirt road with a manual gear, so to spare Argentinian lives we decided Alon will drive, as the last time i drove a stick was at my drivers test. We had the best SUV you can ask for- a rental & i spent most of the road clinging to my seat & praying we won´t fly off a clift or have a flat tier. i have no idea how that car made it threw... the road itself was beautiful when i opened my eyes to look & stopped screaming at Loni to drive slower.

there are much more lakes in the "7 lakes" route. each one is more beautiful than the other.
if it was in Israel it was probably called the "7 seas" because some of them are much larger then the Kinneret. here are pictures of the lakes we liked the most.


LAKE MELIQUINA


LAKE LACAR


LAKE HERMOSO


LAKE FALKNER


LAKE TRAFUL



LAKE NAHUEL HUAPI


As you can see we had lots of fun there. We are officially "7 Lakes" graduates!!!




At the second night of our short trip we had stopped in a small town called "Villa La Angostura" and gone to a hike in the forest to see some rare trees that grows only on that Island. we have walked 20Km only to discover that the real reason they are so rare is because they are UGLY and nobody wants to plant them (in our opinion anyway).


We are planning to stay here for 2 more days and then take a "short" 13 hours bus ride to "puerto madryn" to see some penguins, sea lions and whales.


Keep in touch and write us how you are all doing.

Dina & Loni

3 days in Bariloche

Hola Everybody....we r still in Bariloche. There is a lot to do here. we mostly took hikes around the town. Our latest adventure started when we got confused & ended up doing the wrong track as usual... instead of an easy short one we found ourselves on the top of a snowy mountain. I am proud to say that yours truly didn´t wine once!!!!! It took us 4 hours instead of two and an old European lady with a mochila passed us by like the wind but who is complaining... as usually the view was AMAZING!!! Why didn´t the Jewish people get this place instead of some yard in the desert?!

Today we went to national park "LLAO-LLAO" it took us a while to learn how to pronounce it but we got there. It was a lot of fun and again beautiful view as usual! We took the bus back to Bariloche which was a horrible experience. The buses outside the city are very very very old, slow and rare (once in an hour). Apparently they are also magical because they can contain an unlimited amount of people. Whenever you think there isn´t enough room for a fly´s fart, another 6 people climb in. It gets so crowded sometimes that people have to sit on the drivers dashboard.

We have been eating a lot of meat here for the past few days. Alon is in paradise! They don´t seem to have the usual denial about what or who they are eating here. the other day we ate in a known restaurant called "Albertos". At the entrance you are welcomed by a huge poster of the owner holding a cow corps in each hand with a crazy grin on his face. The hole place has a design of a butcher´s shop & the menu´s covers are made of cow skin... i couldn´t swallow but Alon couldn´t be happier. He swore me we would go there again before leaving.

Anyhow, this has been a very long post. sorry. We are going to rent a car and do the "7 lakes" rout sleep the night at San Martin and come back to Bariloche the day after tomorrow.

keep in touch.
Dina & Alon

Bariloche, Argentina

Hola everybody... after 2 short bus rides of 4 hours each(belive me it´s considered short here) we arrived at Bariloche, Argentina at 20:30 yesterday, only to discover that we don´t have any Argentinian money & the nearest ATM is at the center of the town about 5 km away. Luckly we found a nice Israeli couple who took us in their cab. it took us a lot of time to find a place to sleep because the hostels were either booked or looked like army dorms with double beds. Finally we find a hotel with real bathroom and even breakfast and roomservice. Today we realized that because it was dark we walked into a different hotel and missanderstood the reseptionist. the hostel we were looking for is next door. i knew it was to good to be true!!!

The way here threw the "Andim" was breathtaking & Bariloche itself has the most beautiful view i have ever seen!!!! it is near a lake which is surrownded by snowy mountains... AMAZING!!!!!!!!!!!!!

There r a lot of chocolate stores here, some of them r huge supermarkets where u by chocolate by the kilo, & the restraunts r amazing too. so far we love Argentina....

Resting in PUCON

Hello everybody... well aperently when u climb a volcano it´s very important to use sunscream...











The next day after our failing attempt to concure the volcano we decided to take a day of rest.

Alon suggested we take a short & easy walk to a waterfall nearby, unfortunatlly that turned out to be a 25 km hike after which i didn´t think I could ever walk again. Needless to say i´m not listening to Loni "hamaafan" anymore!!!!! The way to the waterfall was very beautiful even more than the waterfall itself.













After that it started to rain all day and we were stuck in a small & cold room without a window for 24 hours. I finished my book!!!! Loni is at chapter 6.... hihihi.....

Anyhow, we decided not to stay at Pucon and took a bus to Bariloche, Argentina.