chocolate, Tshirts, rocks, and sustainable houses.

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WHEW!!!

It has been quite the eventful couple of weeks. After arriving in Bariloche, we spent a few days getting to know this town. It is the Breckenridge of Argentina. Very very touristy, but fun. It´s nice to have a lot of English speaking folks who can help us with our Spanish! If chocolate is your thing, come here. We eat chocolate a lot. Seriously. We have sampled the finest chocolates we have ever tasted. Funny enough, we have eaten at just as many ethnic food restaurants as authentic Argentine ones. For example, we have eaten Chinese food, mediterranean, Indian food, and Mexican food. I guess we just aren´t cut out for steak.

After our preliminary introduction to Bariloche, we loaded up our packs and headed up to the Frey. This is a climbing area a 40 minute bus ride, and a four hour hike up to the most beautiful spires you have ever seen! We spent two days there, (it´s all the food we could carry in with all that climbing gear) and then came back to Bariloche to resupply.

We ate more chocolate, and then hoofed it back up to the frey. We climbed a few great routes, varying in length from 1-7 pitches. All were on great rock, with beautiful settings, and classic moves.

Weather forced us down valley for this past week. We decided (after tent leakage problems) to take a week of Spanish classes. ¡Muy Divertido!
We have been brushing up on our prederate imperfect tense, nouns, and have been playing lots of spanish games, including Taboo which is great! Our class is a great size. There are only four estudiantes y una professora.

Also during this week, we have been helping some folks build a straw bale house. Their names are Eric and Erica, and they are fantastic people. Eric worked for Outward Bound in the US, and met his wife Erica here in Bariloche.
This house uses all local wood and there are no nails. Yes, i wrote that correctly. There are no nails in the frame. It is held entirely in place by good wood work and some wood pegs (see the photos). We camped on the land they are building this house on, which is six miles west of town and absolutely beautiful.

This week brings new adventures, but they are solo adventures. Jessica is headed up to Cordoba for the national Folk Music festival, before she flies out on the 28th. Matt will be going back up to the Frey to climb with someone he met for a week or two, then will meet up with another friend from the Estados Unidos.
WE are having trouble getting pictures up. More to come in the visual department next week!


Paz en la tierra,

Mateo y Jessiça

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Comments

[Justingw HMartz]

Good gravy
They might have said no nails but there are secret nails in there. Write moar!