We are in Puerto Natales, southern Chile. Way down south, nearly as far as you can go without getting wet feet or getting a boat to a cold place called Antartica or something like that.
So what have we been up to? The answer is heaps. Due to a flight in the wrong place the first couple of weeks in Brazil, Argentina and Chile flew past at incredible speed. It was like being part of the Amazing Race TV show. Things are starting to slow down a bit now though. We are resting or kicking back as Bec likes to call it after completing the ´Q´. A gruelling ten day trek around Torres del Paine covering a whopping 134km. We must be a little crazy.
So here are a couple of diary entries. The first from Argentina. We went to see a tango show in Buenos Aires.
20th Janauary - BA city tour and the Tango show!
Today we spent the morning trying to figure out how to get cash out of an ATM. Not really a hard task you might imagine, but with our limited Spanish it took a few attempts. So after numerous attempts at various banks we succeeded! Mostly by guess work, using an unknown network and pressing buttons in a random order and hey presto some cash appears.
So armed with a few pesos we booked ourselves in to see a Tango show tonight, but first after lunch we joined a city tour to see a bit more of BA. I guess we would have done this independently, but unfortunately our Amazing Race style if travel doesn´t allow this and it is go go go until we hit El Calafate and crash.
We were proper tourists today each with a name tag so we could be herded like sheep. It was enjoyable though and we got to see lots including a drive by around the city, the central square surrounding by parliment, the cathedral and early colonial stuff. Then to the football stadium of Boca and hence Maradonna and finaly a hippy, arty, dockside part of town with rainbow coloured buildings and Maradonna impersonators. So I feel I have seen a teeny bit of BA, enough to appreciate it. Cities aren´t me, but I see the attraction.
Here is the slight aside for today. Bec and I were talking about famous people from our own countries that would be known worldwide. For sporting people Australia had loads, for Britain we came up with Beckham, Botham and Eddie the Eagle.
Ok, the Tango show. It was almost a Mel Brooks type production. All it needed was a movable glass staircase and a giant swan made of ice gliding along a stream surrounded by emerging human flowers. It did have horses prancing through dry ice, a stage that rotated and even went up and down. Plus there was another part of the stage, which dropped from the ceiling. Not literally, more of a controlled descent. Then there was the dancers, the band, the singer and from my uninformed perspective a mexican style panpipe number all singing and puffing in tune. The show was overall excellent and the tango dancing impressive, how no-one got a kick in the goolies I´ll never know. There were legs and more importantly pointy shoes everywhere, flying in all directions.
The show was housed in an ornate building, we sat on a raised platform overlooking the stage. It was quite glamourous, we even had our best backpacking clothes on for the occaison. They were clean too. On each table was an oversize wine glass filled with rose petals floating on water. See, quite glamourous.
The costumes changes were lightning fast and sparkly and revealing to the extreme. Not that I minded. We got a bit tired when it was just singing and the band over doing it a bit with their accordians, but by this time it was way past our bed time, being 12:30am and weariness had well and truly set in.
The show ended with a fantastic rendition of don´t cry for me Argentina, with flags and glitter everywhere. It must be a nightmare to clear up. So we arrived back at the hostel about 1:00am, hopped into bed a quick as we could for our 5:00am start to the domestic airport.
