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Published: March 16th 2007
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Today, we spent a full day horse-riding at Fortin Chacabuco at the North-East side of Lago Nahuel Huapi. We were taken by a minibus from our hostel directly to the ranch at about 10:15am. We did not mess about much and were soon on the horses. I volunteered to be first, but I hopped on my lovely horse second. For the life of me, I cannot remember the complicated name of my hourse. I guess like most other horses, it had a mind of its own and did not follow much of what I asked him to do. Well, I must say that the horse at times did seem like it read my mind... like wanting to get ahead of the other hourses 😊.
The day was divided into two. In the first half, we spent about an hour and a half to two hours wondering in one pretty area with views of the mountains and lake Nahuel Huapi. We saw a condor and a deer on our way. I am not sure I saw the deer, really... it was far away and the brown stuff could well be a tree trunk. The scenery was quite pretty. We broke off
for an hour´s lunch at the ranch, where we had BBQ. They treated us to some lean cuts of meat (beef, I guess) as well as chorizo, which to me, tasted nicer than the meat. We had salad and potatoes as side dishes and some nice red wine to complement the delicious meal.
After lunch, we went off on the other side of the ranch for round two of our horse-riding session. My horse was trying to get through between the other horses when one of them bit him!!! I have never seen a horse bite another horse before! This time we rode in the forest for quite a bit and no longer had a view of the lake behind us. We galoped a bit more but not much. I was hoping we´d go faster. Nevermind. Afterall, I was beginning to feel more and more the injuries from the ... rubbing against my calfs. It turned out I was not the only person. One of the guys was wearing shorts and some of the hair of his legs was pulled out from the rubbing of the ... and his girlfriend´s calfs were also red.
Upon our return to
the ranch, there was a round of mate (the local version of tea or coffee that provides people with the caffeine kick) and some fruit cake and pan frite (similar to the Bulgarian "mekitsi" but a miniture version and with no cheese or jam. Apparently, one of the Argentian people argued that they are eaten with sweet stuff, whilst the other was in favour of savoury. We had them plain.)
I was quite tired from the wind, the dust and the riding so I decided to rest for the rest when we returned about 6pm. I checked out my bruises. I have three on the right leg and I can feel another on the left. On the top of that, I feel like I have two other bruses on my butt cheeks. What a great price to pay for the horse-riding. But it was well worth it, I´d say.
I had to finish reading Shadow of the Wind, the book Vic gave me before leaving for London. I either do not read or if I start a book, I have to finish it asap. Talal slept for a few hours. I could not and did not want to,
as not to ruin my night sleep. I spent time thinking of random things that have happened in the past. I remembered how much Vic and I laughed when the two of us were travelling in February and how since she left that has not really been the case.
Just before 9pm, Talal and I went to join a bunch of French people (two of whom we had dinner with the night before) in an Irish pub, not too far away from our hostel. For a change, I had salad with some chiken and no desert. I have realised I can understand girls better than guys, not just in French, but in English and probably any language. Guys tend to waffle and talk way too fast as if they are racing who can talk faster.
We decided to go to a bar or a club. I decided to join the guys for a bit this time. Along the way, we got 6 dogs to follow us! We stopped and talked two French people on the street. I have the feeling that French feel like a family. Even if they do not know each other they seem to behave
as if they have known each other for ages and establish contact very easily. I am not sure if that applies in France as well or just abroad.
Frederic disappeared... we found him eating a pizza... and we joined him. The guys had weird ideas such as throwing popcorn in the air and trying to catch it with their mouths, then pealing off the lables from the beer bottle and sticking them on some of us.
The guys wanted to go to some night club but it was closed, went to a bar, that could easily have been in London... I left them afterwards and headed back to the hostel.
Bonne nuit!
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