South of the Equator
January 2009
Photo provided by Rick Hain
¡Saludos!
January is like July south of the equator. And it has come and gone along with our summer vacations and our 42nd Aniversario.
On the 8th we hopped a plane (only 2 hours late) and flew down to Bariloche. Then we rented a car and drove back up north along the Nahuel Haupi...that's a lake...to Villa La Angostura (this is a resort village), where we rented a cabin. Then we submitted ourselves in a 10 day session of intense therapy - getting up late, looking at the sky (mostly blue and other pleasing colors), looking at the lake (mostly blue and other pleasing colors), looking at the forest (mostly green and other pleasing colors - despite the nationwide drought), and looking at the surrounding mountains (mostly mountain colors...all pleasing). Other exercises we participated in were long unhurried breakfasts with a view of el lago, long and unhurried almuerzos (lunches) and cenas (dinners) at our favorite restaurants in town, long and unhurried mates or tea with factura (pastries) in the late afternoons. This is really cool because you can do it simultaneously with your regular therapy...you know, watching the sky, the lake, the trees, and the mountains.
And then we had special sessions taking long walks in the woods, going for dips in the heated pool, picking wild flowers, taking 600 pics on the CoolPix, and tooling around in the VW Gol to find places to sit and sketch with pastels and graphite.
As you can imagine we were in pretty bad shape after all this torture. To recover we took the same scenic route back down to the booming city of San Carlos de Bariloche for a week of resting up. We daringly drove right downtown and checked ourselves in at the Panamericano Patagonia. Since for us this was a proven procedure (we'd been there before) to heal ourselves from the terrible ordeal of the previous days at La Angostura, we more than welcomed our chance to sit in front our 9th story picture window (because the town sits on the side of a steep lakeside hill, that is the equivalent of being about 20 stories up)...and continue that part of the therapy that we did like. You know...getting up late, looking at the sky (mostly blue and other pleasing colors), looking at the lake (mostly blue and other pleasing colors), and looking at the surrounding mountains (mostly mountain colors...all pleasing)- all from the same window!
We dumped the car so we couldn't drive out of town to watch the forest. It goes without saying that the hotel has all the standard distracciones: indoor pool, outdoor sunroom, sauna, gymn, cheel-aut rrum, greeeaaattt desayunos and a better staff. Dory liked this part of our treatment being in Bariloche because she got to walk around and into all the stops and stores, while I was always behind her whispering, "la crisis, la crisis!" And of course, we had another week of desayunos, almuerzos and cenas, mixed in with more unhurried mates or tea with factura (pastries) in the late afternoons in front of our picture window perch.
On the 20th as you can imagine we tuned in CNN and saw the inauguration of Presidente Obama. It brought back many memories of the early sixties.
Finally, our conscience (aka: budget), caught up with us and feeling mucho mejor, on the 25th we took the 2 hour flight back to BA. Sadly, the only things we have to show for our perseverance are the extra kilos that Aerolineas tried to charge for us! --not our baggage--, along with Dory's tan and my controlled burn. Anyway as Bilbo, Frodo, Sam, Merry and Pippin said: "We're back!"