The Stummmblog

(almost) One Year of Otis part (2)

2011-11-18T14:33:00.001-08:00

If you're reading this before part 1, go to "older posts" first.

Okay, part two here we come. When publishing part one we lost half of the post, not sure how that happened, figure now we'll break it up in two to not clog the great information superhighway. I will try and regain my piece of wit toast and prose butter to churn out another Stumbaugh update. Did you refill your glass? Ching ching!

We were fortunate enough to get down to the East Bay for Adam's surprise 40th birthday day rage. I don't think I'll ever forget the look on his face from the surprise as it was it permaglued for at least 45 minutes. People lined up to hold a giant "Happy Birthday Adam" spelled out in individual letters. Jason, Papa Yoches and I took that opportunity to stand back and drink all the micro-beers and deflower the salsa bowl. What? All the letters were being held:) Otis got to frolic in the grass a bit with his friends. We sprawled all over the park grass, laying atop blankets and watching the clouds.

9/24/11 Adam's Surprise Birthday Party

9/24/11 Jason and Otis at Adam's Surprise Birthday Party

9/24/11 - Jennie and Otis at Adam's Surprise Birthday Party

9/24/11 - Lacie and Otis at Adam's Surprise Birthday Party

9/24/11 - Adam's Surprise Birthday Party

Video of Otis clapping:
http://youtu.be/WymDzt4y45E

Video of Otis in his walker:
http://youtu.be/Ux6csxPMzY4

We drove up to Bend to see Otis' grandparents in their natural habitat. Otis got ample play time with his cousin Devon and Mari. The adults pretty much sat back and watched the baby parade in between eating lush meals. Otis got thorough enjoyment out of chasing down dogs in his walker and yelling alot, mostly to hear his own voice. We normally head up to Oregon for Thanksgiving but can't do that any more with the busy holiday schedule at my job. Super nice to get up there, it was great seeing Bend with nice sunny weather. The girls were scared of going outside so they FORCED Randy and I to play video games and have beers for hours and hours. You have no idea the suffering they put us through.

10/1/11 - Otis and cousin Devon in Bend

10/1/11 - Grandpa Randy and Otis

10/1/11 - Cousin Mari, Gramma Marsha and Otis

10/2/11 - Otis and cousin Devon

10/2/11 - Otis and Devon

10/4/11 - Otis and cousin Devon

10/4/11 - Otis and cousin Mari (she took that spatula from him)

10/4/11 - Otis and Gramma Marsha

10/4/11 - Cousin Mari, Otis and cousin Devon

10/4/11 - Otis and cousin Devon

10/4/11 - Otis, cousin Mari and cousin Devon

10/4/11 - Mari, Currie, Melanie, Otis, Karen and Devon

10/5/11 - Family (leaving Bend)

More Bend Photos here:
http://flic.kr/s/aHsjwVAzWy

10/9/11 - Leroy Serros and Otis

10/9/11 - Rosie Gomez and Otis

The Machpheez and the Strumbolinas hit up the pumpkin patch at the Spring Hill dairy farm in the far western reaches of Petaluma. We arrived around sunset, the vast hills illuminated in the orange and purple rays, the pictures don't do it justice. The kids has a blast running around, slapping pumpkins and eatin' dirt. We all went on a tractor ride which was is harder on the butt than initially perceived. Sabin got a giant "pickle" shaped pumpkin that was both hideous and beautiful.


It puts the lotion in the basket.....

10/14/11 - Pumpkin Patch with the MacPhee's

10/14/11 - Sabina and Otis

Video of Sabina and Otis:
http://youtu.be/t1tJGqLFSQ4

10/14/11 - Yona, Sabina and Otis

10/14/11 - Sabin, Xochitl, Melanie, Otis, Tony, Yona and Sabina

More Pumpkin Patch photos here:
http://flic.kr/s/aHsjwJEB3a

Back in Mid-October we were visited by Adam and Maria for an evening of lush. Maria gave each Melanie and I a muscle melting massage while Adam took turns enchanting us with his good company. I made a big all-vegan indian meal which I haven't done since Melanie's dietary needs did a flaming cartwheel on us some years ago. Had a great evening with some nice wine which usually goes well with my pre-pubescent sense of humor. Adam just got a job as shop teacher after being a well seasoned science guru. Hopefully this photo isn't the last we see of him with all of his fingers:) Really nice to see them as our quality time was limited at his b-day party. Love you guys!

10/15/11 - Otis, Adam and Maria

10/15/11 - Adam and Otis

10/18/11 - Nonni Bev and Otis

Scot, Wifey, Otis and I piled in the car and went to Mendocino for our last camping trip of the year at another OTP event called Food Madness. Another weekend of good friends, tasty food and happy times. Scot and I spent an afternoon tromping through the wet hillsides, through stabby brush and slippery duff to pillage the land of all the mushrooms it had to offer. We had a nice bounty of chantrelles and my belly was full of fungi and butter for the next several days, oh my.

10/20/11 - Scot and Otis

10/21/11 - Josh and Otis at Food Madness

10/21/11 - Matt, Otis and Josh at Food Madness

10/21/11 - Leila and Otis at Food Madness

10/21/11 - Sabina and Otis

10/22/11 - Dana, Caden and Otis

10/22/11 - Caden and Otis

10/22/11 - Melissa, Otis and Sabina

Halloween - Xochitl, Sabina, Tony, Otis, Melanie, Susie and Yona

11 months and counting, Nonni is still cranking out magic every tuesday and Otis is her number #1 fan. If people had half the love she has inside, this world would be a better place.

11/8/11 - Nonni Bev and Otis

11/13/11 - Nana Debbie, Tony and Otis

Mobile by Jennie Kulczyk <------bad ass


11/14/11 - Otis is mesmerized by that mobile

And here is a word from our friend and sponsor, Wifey....

Otis has four teeth, two on top, two on the bottom, his top two eye teeth have just about cut through. He's talking lots of nonsense and singing songs without words. He can crawl super fast and isn't quite walking yet, but has taken some steps and can stand up without holding on to anything.

Tiz all for now friends and family. Hope your drink is empty by now, feel free to come over if you want a refill. Many more Stumbaugh family adventures in the near future.

-TOM

p.s. dear bay area, why are you so afraid to drive north?

(almost) One Year of Otis part (1)

2011-11-15T14:13:00.001-08:00

Like, whoa. Been about three months since we've updated this thing. Strange because it feels like not much as happened, but after looking at pictures I guess we have been busy. Grab a drink, get cozy, and lets go back in time three months starting..............now!

We got a brief visit from our old friend Corrie of Santa Cruz Beckmannia fame. She lives on the easty coast, Maine I think, where she has blossomed into a naturopath M.D. Pretty cool having a doctor as a friend! We made her dinner, drank some wine, and stayed up late talking trash.

8/10/11 - Otis and Corrie

The below photo is from Otis' first hike in the woods. Pretty fun, very nice to get outside at this point, climbed a relatively easy 500ft ascent, but who would think about the hiking being more sketchy going downhill with a baby on your back? Well, we didn't. It wasn't sketchy per se, but it was a clear eye opener that one has to take more precarious steps in the woods when holding invaluable cargo. Otis came away scab free and had a glorious time staring at the redwoods.

8/13/11 - Otis and Tony hiking at Armstrong Woods

Had a brief day visiting our good friends at the Space Pharm in Sonoma while they were working on their Burning Man camp. The bus you see below was turned into a giant Pak-Man.

8/14/11 - Blake, Otis and Lacy in the Sno Pak bus

8/14/11 - Otis and Lacy

8/16/11 - Otis and Trevor at Sonoma Farmer's Market

Whaddyooooooolookinat?

Otis' Oregonian Grandparents came for a nice visit in late August and stayed with him overnight so Melanie and I could go enjoy our anniversary. They are always a huge help to us whenever they visit. Marsha talks Melanie down from her Maternal edge and Randy and I get to have beers and meat while putting holes in the house. I tried to offer him a full time job, but he rudely declined the wages of peanuts and bottle caps.

8/21/11 - Otis and Grandpa Randy

8/22/11 - Nana Debbie, Gramma Marsha and Otis

8/22/11 - Gramma Marsha, Nana Debbie, Mama Melanie and Otis

8/22/11 - Grandpa Randy, Gramma Marsha, Nana Debbie and Otis

8/23/11 - Gramma Marsha, Mama Melanie and Otis

8/23/11 - Gramma Marsha, Grandpa Randy and Otis

8/23/11 - Gramma Marsha and Otis

This ain't amateur hour. Do not try this at home. Cooking with baby on your back can cause severe droziness, oil burns, and delicious food with an Everest sized pile of dishes.

8/24/11 - Papa Tony cooking with Otis on his back

Oh yeeeah, front lawn gone, oh yeah. Scot came over and helped me with this huge project. We had to make several store runs for old cardboard boxes to cover the lawn, then we soaked it good and covered it with a layer of sweet smelling compost and redwood mulch. After 3 months, which is now probably, the lawn should be totally dead and beginning to breakup into the soil. We got big plans for the yard, all takes time which we are short on. Not shown in the photo but we now have a great design for several tiers of garden beds with drip irrigation and a tear drop section for a citrus tree. I've been fantasizing about doing a rock wall in the front. There is downward slope going from the back of the yard to street, which begs for that near and dear famous quote from that crazy old man we love in Willits, "Any fool can farm flat land".

8/27/11 - Our good friend Scot Adam and Tony covered our front lawn with compost and mulch to destroy it

8/27/11 - Scot, Tony, Melanie and Otis went to Wild Flour Bakery and hung out in their incredible garden

We took Scot out to the original Union Hotel in Occidental for a well deserved big lunch of ravioli's and shrimp pasta. Afterwords we headed over to the Wyldflour Bakery to over indulge on the baked goods. We took a walk through their Garden and Scot helped Otis get into some shenanigans involving a few broken wind chimes and several distant picnicking hippies.

8/27/11 - Scot, Otis and Melanie

8/27/11 - Scot and Otis

Because this year was a little early to take Otis to Burning Man, we finally had a free weekend to spend with my Dad at his cabin on lake Pillsbury. Had a really fantastic time relaxing and sitting on the pontoon boat getting some sun. While riding on the boat we saw a bear in distance come down for a drink in the lake. We tried to get closer but he hurried away.

9/2/11 - Tony and Otis at Blue Bird Cafe in Hopland

9/2/11 - Tony, Melanie & Otis on Gregg's pontoon boat at Lake Pillsbury

9/2/11 - Otis and Grandpa Gregg on Lake Pillsbury

9/3/11 - Uncle Gean and Otis on Lake Pillsbury

Video of Otis on the boat:
http://youtu.be/ue5jAUkwnpI

9/3/11 - Grandpa Gregg and Otis

9/4/11 - Melissa and Otis at Melissa's Birthday Party

We spent three nights camping at Camp N' Sons in mid-september for our OTP event "Plunge". Lots of friends, good food, good music, good times. Highlights included spending copious amout of time in the pond, seeing Otis go nuts for being in the woods, ladies fighting over holding Otis, Momma letting me stay out till the sun came up, deep frying leftover bourbon chicken with oh-mak crackers and peanut butter pretzels, having our new friend Doug come play music for us from England. Lowlights included Otis having such a good time he didn't ever want to sleep, dad staying out until the sun came up, and leaving:)

9/10/11 - Papa and Otis at Plunge

9/10/11 - Sadia and Otis at Plunge

9/10/11 - Lacy, Gelsey, Melanie, Lacie and Otis at Plunge

Video of Xander and Otis:
http://youtu.be/1TWeXXS-a98

Had to make this photo extra large so you could read the fine print. He must take after his daddy!

9/10/11 - Otis and Jane at Plunge

9/11/11 - Karynn, Otis and Adam at Plunge

9/11/11 - Karynn and Otis at Plunge

9/11/11 - Otis and Trevor at Plunge

9/11/11 - Tony, Scott and Otis at Plunge

9/11/11 - Otis and Molly at Plunge

9/11/11 - Otis and Doug (our post-Plunge house guest)

Jeran came over and babysat for us one night so we could go out to dinner by ourselves. Love the stink out of that diaper butt baby, but really nice to have a few hours of grownup time with wine and good eatin'.

9/23/11 - Auntie Jeran and Otis

Eight Months...really!?!?!?!

2011-08-09T13:58:00.000-07:00

The past two months, since our last blog post, have been pretty eventful.
- Tony's Dad helped us pick up the hot tub from Camp and Sons. It's currently living in Gregg's warehouse in Cloverdale. We'll be doing some repairs before bringing it to our place.
- Otis now has two teeth, the front bottom.
- We did our first attempt at sleep training. It didn't go very well, we'll be trying again this weekend.
- Otis isn't crawling quite yet. He can scoot backwards and roll from side to side, which means he can get just about wherever he wants around the living room, until he get his legs wedged underneath the couch. He then gets upset because he can't go forward.
- Otis is sitting up on his own pretty well now and just started clapping last night.

On June 26th, Otis and I went to Ashley's (Tony's cousin) baby shower.

Otis and Nana Debbie

Melanie, Otis and Auntie Laurel

Adventures in feeding...

Here's a video of Tony feeding Otis:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MnnYrXJZgXg

Gramma Marsha and Grandpa Randy bought this swing for Otis, he LOVES it!!!!

Otis having a good time on the floor.

On July 8th, we went wine tasting with Jane and Logan.

Otis enjoys looking at the world upside down.

Gotta love a sleeping baby.

I don't remember what we were feeding him here, but he was not impressed.

Here's video of this particular meal:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qDyT-71gUU4

On July 20th, we went over to Nana Debbie's house for a visit.

On July 22nd, we went to the Union Hotel to celebrate Noni Bev's birthday.

Noni Bev and Otis

On July 24th, Otis and I went down to Emeryville for an Out There Project meeting.

Scott, Petey and Otis

Otis and Katie

More good times in the swing...

Here's a video of Otis in his swing, with Noni Bev:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AKXBGrRI7VU

I signed Otis and I up for four weeks (Tuesdays and Thursdays) of swim classes, the first one was July 19th. Xochitl and Sabina go too. Otis is the youngest one in the class. Ages range from Otis (now 8 months) to three years. We four are the newbies. The rest of the children in the class have been going for awhile. On July 26th, before Tony and Logan headed off to Man Camp, Tony went to swim class with us. Otis has a blast in the water. I wonder if it's helpful that he was born in the water.

Here's a video of Tony and Otis in swim class:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=no5PHWyQb3k

On July 28th, Tony and Logan headed off to Man Camp for three days. I was solely responsible for Otis for three full days. I'm alone with Otis a lot, so I didn't think it would be that big of a deal, but it was. Those were three very challenging days, especially because Otis' second tooth was starting to cut through and he was much fussier than normal.

Logan and Otis

Otis jumps like a mad man in this thing.

You can see his first tooth in this picture

Xochitl, Sabina, Melanie and Otis

Otis sitting...

We can only use the bumbo for meals now, with the tray attached. Otis has figured out how to arch his back and twist out of it. It's been a little on the dangerous side a couple of times.

On August 6th, Otis and I went over to Gerry and Laurel's house to celebrate Alice's 2nd birthday.

Nana Debbie and Otis

Uncle Gerry and Otis

Otis and Grandpa Gregg

Otis and Cousin Alice

On August 7th, Tony, Otis and I went over to Lacie's house to celebrate her birthday.

Gelsey and Xander, Melissa and Dylan, Melanie and Otis

Auntie Lacie, Otis and Melanie

Summer has been jam packed with good times so far with many more on the horizon. Tony and I celebrate our seven year wedding anniversary on August 21st and Plunge the weekend of September 10th.

~much love from the Stumbaughs

Six Months!

2011-06-21T20:54:00.000-07:00

Happy Summer everybody! We're over six months under way on
this parental roller-coaster in the theme park called Life. Not really
sure if "roller coaster" is the correct term as this baby thing is pretty
darn easy. What? So you change some diapers, get a sore back,
ruin a few pairs of clothes with baby spit up, no biggie. I'll sum up
the stuff that you, yes you, could have already guessed being an
observant contributor/participant to the evolutionary process of the
human species.

Otis has:
Been growing up really fast
A cute laugh that makes you feel all squishy inside
Done some crying, but not too much and doesn't keep it up
Taken comfort in the "All Mighty Boob"
Starting eating solids. Mostly brown rice cereal with holy milk
Been getting stopped in public places for ogling
Had scared parents after being approached by questionable

geriatrics joking about taking Otis home
Love and support from his wide group of friends and family
Sucked on a few pinkies soaked in beer/wine

That's the gist. If you want to know more specifics on Stumbantics,
read on. If you're really just glancing at this blog and are really here
just to look at photos, now would be a good time to skip the text and
get to the meat.
(Mom's not included, of course)

Blake and Otis

Grant and Otis

Whitney and Otis

We had a good visit from the Andersons not long before big Anderbro Whitney took off on his spirit quest to sheer a gang of rampaging alpacas in deep quadrants of the Great Pacific Northwest. He will be missed. Fortunately he was able to rub baby Otis for good luck and he should be living a long life. We had brunch with the whole clan, Trevor made something, can't remember what but there was hollandaise and it was tasty. Mimosas and full bellies made for a good time.

Otis and Grandpa Gregg

Otis and Auntie Gianna

Cousin Alice, Auntie Talia, Otis and Auntie Gianna

Otis and Uncle Gerry

Otis, Tia Borracha, Cousin Sabina and Cousin Yona

Nonni Bev and Otis

Auntie Talia and Otis (Easter)

Jane and Otis

Otis seems pretty motivated to crawl. You put him on his stomach and he starts kicking like a Merman out of water. Check the intensity. GAME FACE!

Papa Tony, Mama Melanie, Otis, Cousin Lee, Cousin Alice, Aunt Laurel and Uncle Gerry

Owls are cool...

Otis w/future body guard Dylan Yoches

Otis @ OODE (Memorial Day Weekend)

Otis and Katie

We headed up to Oregon for Memorial Day, our annual jaunt to OODE. We traveled with the Macphee's and pulled a rented tow trailer. Those suckers sure are doozy to back up into places. The Macphee's left their kids at home and our road trip had all the usual characteristics, beef jerky, inNout, funny smells in the car, crying babies, Oregonian highway pedestrians, and lot's of trash talking. It took a few days to acclimate to camping with a baby. Sure didn't help that it was real wet and cold. Otis had the time of his short six month life though. He loved the sound of the rain hitting the tent, never got tired of multiple eager hands wanting to fawn over the warm baby.

Auntie Lacie, Otis and Tia Xochitl

Otis and Kim

Otis and Josh

somebody call cps quick!

shaken, not stirred.

Otis and Ann

Otis and Grandpa Randy

Lucky us, Grandpa Randy and Grandma Marsha drove over from Bend and stayed at a nearby hotel and took a few turns watching Otis so we could get some time to ourselves. On Saturday they even kept Otis overnight! I'd like to tell you that we had a crazy night dancing under the stars and drinking schnapps out of diapers. I'd like to tell you that. Melanie was asleep by 10pm and I wasn't far behind. Man oh man, if I could describe the sleep we got that night you wouldn't soon forget it! Ahhhhh, but I can't, so I won't.


Otis and Grandma Marsha

Otis, Promise and Melanie

oompa-lumpa Otis

farting on grown-ups is cute

Have we talked yet about the great comfort Otis gets when grabbing his feet? Witness his happy place. Years down the road I will know how to get a grown-up Otis to calm down. "Just hold on to your bare feet son, it will all be okay."

Otis and Ann G.

Otis and Danyelle

Robert, Charley, Otis, Melanie and Danyelle

Charley and Otis

We had a nice visit from our good friends Charley "The Brain" and Theresa "The Body." Our Santa Cruzian's turned Nueva Yorican's who traded in their trail guides for subway maps, their baba ganoush for thin crust pizza, their friendly attitudes for curse words and hand gestures, there wasn't a beat skipped in good conversation and overall affection for each other. It's nice to have affirmation in knowing your relationship with people does not change even though you've mutated. Our time was brief but full of cheap thrills and good times. They still laugh when I make 8 year old boy jokes.

Theresa and Otis

Otis and Jonny Darby

We got a brief meal with the critically acclaimed international superstar Jonathon Darby. I tried to get him to autograph my dirty socks but he wouldn't do it. Even through my feet's disappointment, still lovely to see this fine specimen and happy he got to meet our son Otis. Though he's probably painting a mural on a 200ft yacht in warm Tahitian sun, or trading art scraps for a tribal chief's harem in the deep Sahara desert, Jonathon Darby and the rest of the Darby family are in our thoughts.

First and Second Solids!

Otis' New Clock from Uncle Bryan and Aunt Ronda

Auntie Cathie and Otis

Lisa, Melanie, Lacie, Maria and Otis

The dear Aunt Cathie left this morning on her flight back to Seattle. Always sad to see her go and wishing, again, that Seattle was only 30 minutes away or that somebody could figure out that freggin star trek teleportation thing. Don't some of you work for Google? What's up? I am ready for the global takeover just as long you let me transport through my cellphone. Anyhow, Cathie was a saint and spent much quality time with the baby which allowed Melanie's anxieties and stress drift away in the soil of our backyard garden. The garden beds are now weeded, composted, and soiled for some veggie good times. The jungle forming under the crab apple tree has been clear cut by the deadly hands of Cathie, leaving a divine barren landscape, ripe for repopulating with flowers and greenary bits.

Chillin' with Auntie Cathie

You've made it to the end, congrats! That's about everything for now. Big life changing plans this weekend as Grandpa Gregg is helping us pick up one of the wood burning hot tubs from Camp N Sons. The future looks chock-full of relaxed muscles and raisin toes.

-The Stumbaugh Gang

The Four Postcards

2011-04-18T17:55:00.000-07:00

By request, here are the four postcards we sent out.

The photos were taken on January 30th by Patrice Speed.

Enjoy!

4 Months of Parenting Under Our Belts

2011-04-13T12:47:00.000-07:00

The last month has been very eventful. I feel like we're finding our groove and from what I've heard from other parents, that means things will be changing shortly. Otis is sleeping better, we get four to five hour stretches at the beginning of the night, followed by another two to three hour stretch and sometimes a little more depending on the morning, the awake times in between the sleeping are much shorter now, usually ten to fifteen minutes rather than an hour. I've been feeling so much better than I was for the first couple of months as my sleep deprivation is lessening. Otis is much more alert and active. He spends time playing with toys on his own, grabbing and putting things in his mouth. He's been drooling a lot, so could be teething soon, according to our doctor. He hasn't rolled over yet, but I think it's going to happen very soon. He's able to get his head and chest off the ground and sticks his butt in the air. Seems like he just needs to figure out what happens next. Otis' four month well baby doctor appointment was yesterday morning, he had his third round of vaccinations. He did great! He weighs fourteen pounds, two ounces and is twenty four and a half inches long. Our doctor says he's exactly where he's supposed to be. I love the rolls on his thighs!!!! Otis laughs a lot now and is talking like crazy, he gets frustrated and lets me know all about it. He's also really into standing. Bev (Otis' Nonni, Tony's Grandma) still comes over every Tuesday to spend time with Otis and help me around the house, she is a HUGE blessing!!!!!

Visiting with Nonni Bev

Chewing on EVERYTHING he can get into his mouth!

The weekend of March 12th Otis went on his first road trip. Heather, Roxie, Otis and I drove down to San Luis Obispo for Shannon's 40th birthday celebration. Otis did great on the drive down. The drive back wasn't as good. We were only in SLO for about seventeen hours and then back in the car for another eight hours. I think it was just too much car for Otis at one time.

While in SLO we stayed at Cole's house with the Yoches', Otis and Dylan were able to spend some time together...

Jeni Fujita was in California from New York and stopped by for a visit on March 14th.

Jeni and Otis

Post Bath Time

March 30th was absolutely gorgeous, Tony came home from work and told me to get myself ready and pack up Otis for his first beach outing. We drove out to Bodega Bay and had a wonderful time!!!!

Greg, Karen and Devon (who's ten months old) arrived for a visit on April 2nd. It was lovely having their company and getting to see Otis and Devon together was absolutely precious.

Cousin Devon and Otis

Cousin Devon, Otis and Auntie Karen

Click on the link below for a video that was taken last Friday (April 8th). Debbie came over to hang out with Otis, while Tony and I went out to dinner and then to a surprise birthday celebration for Xochitl.

Otis & Nana (Debbie) Stumbaugh

Otis went to his first party last Sunday, April 10th. The Sunset season opener at Stafford Lake. A beautiful day spent with friends

Otis and Lacy

Otis and Xochitl

These last two photos are of Tony when he was a baby, just to see how much Otis looks like his Dad!

Three Months of Otis

2011-03-05T12:39:00.001-08:00

Just about 3 months into the parenthood roller coaster now, our ride has been surprisingly mellow. Well, aside from the lack of sleep and everything, but that has gotten much better. The last few nights in particular Otis has slept up to 6 hours at a time. Thank god/buddah/satan/whotheflipever as the extra rest has been much needed.

Otis has started to smile, and the act is a gift that gives a feeling of happiness that cannot be matched. His smiling has added to the destruction of productivity around the house, we are luckily we have enough time to eat and use the bathroom. Sometimes we even get to shower! His laugh has started to form, previously it was like a kitten soundlessly choking in the desert, now its more like something between an elephant squeezing a rubber horn and a drunk hyena who is beginning to squeeze out a cackle.

Our dear friend Patrice visited us a few weeks ago to assist in our belated holiday photo shoot. We're still in the editing phase and excited to show off the final results, coming soon to a mailbox near you. Patrice took over 300 photos and gave us a couple of teaser shots to share with the extended family.

It's incredible and strange to notice to slow and steady growth of an infant. You get really caught up in the daily activities, changing diapers, cooking food, going to work, changing diapers, cleaning up baby projectiles, doing dishes etc. that the daily growth and changes happening can go unoticed. All of a sudden clothes aren't fitting right, an extra layer of baby fat has emerged from the chin and the legs get round and beefy.

The past week has been a little rough as Otis got his first bout of sickness. He has since gotten both Melanie and I sick and we've been pretty messed up ever since. It's quite sad when your baby is crying because he is confused about being so sick. The hardest part being that there is nobody to take care us, normally when Melanie is sick I can take care of her and vice versa. Who takes care of the family when every member is feeling like a dumpster truck filled with manure?

We've had another wave of great visitors! Crisco and Nicole, Brandon and Annie, and Caryn. It's been nice to see so many friends make the trek up here to meet the Dirty Diaper Prince. Otis seems to enjoy the social atmosphere and tends to be calm when alot of other people are talking wild. Plus the wine we drink helps him sleep:)

My Grandma has been coming by every Tuesday while I'm away at work to help Melanie out. We've been getting spoiled as she brings food with her every time and has done a number on weeds growing in our front yard.

I know it must be common for parents to think they have the best/cutest baby in the world, but we think we win!

We're looking forward to spring time, the hills are calling and I'm anxious to take Otis into the woods for some good hikes. I've basically missed/missing the mushroom season this year due to Otis being born, it's worth it though! Every time I see chantrelles at work I miss the Santa Cruz mountains. But sometimes we just miss Santa Cruz in general. I'm definitely missing my old friends at Beckmann's, relationships through work that special aren't easily attained. Even though we've been in the north bay for two years now, we are still in the process of planting our roots, making new connections, and extending our community.

We're also starting to plan projects for the house in the summer season. The biggest of the projects is getting a new roof. We're also going to be giving our master bath a makeover, the supplies are purchased, now it's just about timing with getting it done. Also Whitney Anderson has got me convinced that we can paint the outside of our house, we'll see if we can pull that out off as well. Apparently all we need is a keg of beer, some pizza, and the volunteers will come. Sounds fun either way! We've also been doing some OODE prep, taking our baby to Oregon for a camping trip is going to be a big new experience. Usually the car is packed to the gills with our own junk (and hooch), not exactly sure how we're going to manage getting all of it in our car along with Otis' big back of tricks.

Thats all for now folks, lots of love from the Stumbaugh's, more good times to come!

-TMO

The First Six Weeks of Otis

2011-01-19T20:56:00.000-08:00

These past six weeks have flown by with the holidays and my birthday coming this weekend, it's all been a crazy blur. Tony was able to take the first week of Otis' (outside of the womb) life off work. My mom stayed with us for a few days following Tony's return to work, which was a huge help. Life is challenging and extremely rewarding. Otis is starting to smile while awake, it's the most incredible smile!

Having a newborn is tough, I really had no idea how tough. The past six weeks have been the most difficult and most beautiful times. My nights consist of a couple hour stretches of sleep with an hour to two hours of awake time (changing Otis, feeding Otis, burping Otis, getting Otis to go back to sleep). Some nights are more difficult than others and just when I think he's on some kind of "schedule," he proves me wrong. I've had a few nights and mornings when crying is the only thing I can do. I absolutely love Otis and he's still the most beautiful creature I've laid my eyes on.

As of today, Otis weighs 8lbs. 13oz., almost two pounds over his birth weight. Not sure how long he is, but he's definitely grown!!!!

Here are some highlights from the past six weeks...

Week 1 (December 8-14)


Just a minute or two after Otis was born

Grandma Marsha & Otis

Nonni Bev & Otis

Gramma Debbie & Otis

Cousin Yona & Otis

Uncle Randy & Otis


Grandpa Randy, Grandma Marsha & Otis

Otis' First Restaurant Outing

Otis' First Sponge Bath

Otis' Little Feet

Lacy & Otis

Week 2 (December 15-21)

Baby Manicure

Week 3 (December 22-28)

Gelsey, Xander, Melissa, Dylan, Melanie & Otis

Tony, Melanie, Nonni Bev & Otis

Auntie Nancy & Otis

Melanie, Nonni Bev and Otis

Week 4 (December 29-January 4)

Babs & Otis

Week 5 (January 5-11)


Grandpa Randy, Grandma Marsha & Otis

Scot & Otis

Nonni Bev & Otis

Week 6 (January 12-18)

Auntie Molly & Otis

Auntie Xochitl & Otis

Baby Pictures of Otis' Parents

Baby Melanie

Baby Tony - We're in the process of hunting down an earlier one

Babytastic!

2010-12-09T09:49:00.000-08:00

Well, it (which we don't have to call it an "it" anymore) has arrived! Otis Stone Stumbaugh was born on December 8th at 11:03pm. 6lbs 15oz 20 inch long baby burrito of fun!

Melanie's water broke at 3:30am and started having contractions about 30 minutes later. Poppa Stumbaugh did about two hours of "sleep monitoring" before ringing the fire alarm and called the necessary necessaries later in the AM. Melanie's folks were on the road from Oregon what seemed like within the hour:) The midwife told us to hang out and not call until we hit the 511, which meant the contractions would be less than 5 minutes apart, lasted more than one minute, and for one hour.

We spent the day laboring at the house, practicing deep breathing and hypobirthing techniques. Melanie had a hard time eating, she went the entire day with only some yogurt, a bite of spelt toast, a few bites of plain white rice and a cashew bar. Melanie made a multi-hour long birthing playlist with super droning ambient music that helped the relaxed mood.

I called the midwife around 3pm as the contractions starting getting more frequent and intense. She told us to hang in there, to run a bath and try and slow them down and hopefully Melanie could get a nap in, as it would be a marathon day with much needed rest. By this point I had to help her walk around the house and kept her propped up for vertical contractions. The bath was comforting and Melanie tried to sleep with little success.

Our midwife had suggested that post-bath we try having her labor while switching between sitting upright and walking. This way more pressure is put on the cervix and assists in speeding up the process. After an hour of this exhausting exercise the contractions got really intense, we decided it was time to go over to the birthing center.

The head midwife Roseanne told us it would be 30 minutes before she could get there. Melanie's contractions had intensified so much that we were a little worried that our baby would be born in the birthing center parking lot on the hood of our car. Luckily that didn't happen though:) Roseanne arrived and after examining Melanie she said everything was looking fine and she was 8cm dilated, the baby was gonna be here soon! Xochitl arrived with some provisions and called the grandparents to meet at the birthing center. Xochitl ended up being a life saver as the nurse was going to be late and Roseanne needed an extra pair of hands to assist getting things prepped for delivery.

At this point Melanie was doing so good given the feeling of discomfort. She kept breathing deep and looked as if in another world. Roseanne filled the birthing tub, or "hippie bird bath", with luke-warm water. I think we got in the tub around 10:30pm, I know I liked it:)

The families had arrived in the waiting room and Xotchitl brought them updates on our situation. Melanie was fully dilated at this point and was ready to pop. The whole process was pretty surreal, watching the top of my baby's head appear and disappear into the void was way better than anything I've seen on the Discovery Channel. Melanie was still keep cool and collected, a few contractions seemed to get the best of her but only briefly. One last guttural yelp and the entire head came popping out. Seeing his head sitting under water got me a little nervous. I knew it was fine but the fresh parental instinct to stop my baby from drowning was hard to control. Soon after the shoulder came out, that white gravy covered baby was flopping in his mama's arms.

We got cleaned up and let the Grandparents w/Mr. Macphee come in. The Grandma's "oooed" and "awwwed" while taking prohibited flash photography. My Dad told a story of when I pooped in a shoe. Sabin got me a much needed cup of coffee as my own general fatigue was catching up with me. Melanie was taking her victory lap, her energy revitalized and alert, hard to believe she just had a baby looking so good like that.

After lot's of paperwork and mini-baby tutorials with the nurse, we got home around 3am we think. Otis is doing great, making cute little squirrel noises and sleeping like a baby, yup, pun intended.

Much thanks for all the love and support from our families, our super-mega-fantastic friends, and special thanks to the Macphee's for being solid during this whole process.

Love,

Tony Melanie and Otis Stumbaugh

aka Tometis or Melantotis or Otilonie

The Final Stretch

2010-11-18T16:24:00.000-08:00

As of today, our baby is considered full term, (thirty seven weeks). Which means if the baby were to arrive today, he/she would be just fine. I'm still feeling really good, a little more tired. Doing simple chores around the house make me need to take breaks after a short period of time. I'm still getting a lot of sleep at night, with minimal interruption. I'm taking advantage of it while I can!

With Xochitl's help, the baby's room is painted. My parents were here last weekend, they were a huge help in getting projects done around the house, including getting the baby's room ready. I'm feeling much better prepared for our baby's arrival. There are very few items left on the list of what we'll need for the first six weeks.
Tony and I have been attending hypnobirthing classes, we have one more next Tuesday. Tony is my birth companion, so it will be up to him to give me hypnosis prompts while I'm in labor. Our hypnobirthing instructor has been amazing and she is very patient with us as we're sometimes not the best students when it comes to homework.

Last weekend a group of about twenty women gathered at our house for my Mother Blessing. Coordinated by Lacie, with help from Jane, it was a lovely night! All the women brought a bead for me. All of the beads are being strung together for me to bring with me to the birth center when I go into labor. This will provide me with support from many wonderful women on our baby's birthing day!

Last month a group of about eighty of our friends and family members gathered in Howarth Park in Santa Rosa for our baby's welcome hootenanny party. Complete with an Aztec Blessing Ceremony (thanks to Nena and Freddy Sanchez) and performances by Jenny Robinson, Jeni Fujita (with George Cochrane) and two dj sets by Sig and Xochitl. A truly magnificent day with yummy food in abundance!

Tony and I are settling in nicely to our new house, it's been just over a month and a half. Still feels a little bit like a dream as we both keep talking about just how much we LOVE it! We still have some projects to complete and decorating to do, but for the most part we're settled in.

Probably won't be posting another blog update until after our baby arrives. So until then...

love,
~melanie (and Tony).

New Jobs, New House, New Trimester

2010-09-20T12:11:00.000-07:00

Last Thursday, I entered the third trimester and I believe my belly has increased by almost double since then. My belly is big enough now that I can give the baby light squeezes, which I do on a regular basis. I always thought being able to feel a baby moving inside would be creepy and alien, but it's way cooler than I anticipated, I find it reassuring and fascinating.

I've been asked by multiple people if we're registered anywhere for our baby needs. The registry is listed in our baby hootenanny invite, but maybe it's just too buried. Anyway, here it is:

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/gp/registry/baby/1V48M35QFLS3B
AND
Deposit A Gift: http://stumbaughbaby.mydagsite.com/
If you're wanting information about our welcome baby party on October 17th, it can be found on the Deposit A Gift site, under "Event Details" or in the last post on our blog.

Speaking of our registry....
Someone(s) bought our baby their infant car seat and had it sent to our apartment. We have no idea who it came from. Thank you very much to whoever sent it, please let us know who you are so we can properly thank you.

Last Thursday we also signed official loan docs. Our mortgage broker says we're set for funding tomorrow or Wednesday. We'll be getting the keys to our new house on Wednesday or Thursday. I'll spend Thursday and Friday cleaning the house in preparation for our big move on Saturday. So far we haven't received many positive responses for folks being available to help on Saturday, we're sure it will work out though. People are super busy these days, which we totally understand. We have large pieces of furniture that all need to be moved on Saturday, in five different locations. At least all five of those locations are within 45 minutes of our house!

Tony started his job at Whole Foods about a week and a half ago, so far he's loving it! Turns out Whole Foods is a great company to work for. I worked my last day for the landscape architect last Wednesday and am so relieved to be working full time from home now.

We went to an exceptionally beautiful wedding in Mendocino County on Saturday. Congratulations Matt and Leila Madrone! Their ceremony was genuine, heartfelt and very emotional. Still feeling extremely honored to have been present. Wow!!!!

I'm feeling pretty overwhelmed by the amount of stuff that we need to take care of before our baby arrives, kind of makes my head swim...wish us luck!

love,
~melanie (and tony).

Welcome Baby Stumbaugh Hootenanny

2010-09-08T17:46:00.000-07:00

The evite for our baby's welcoming party was sent out by Xochitl today, but just in case you have a difficult time with evite or something screwy happened and you didn't receive it. Here's all the details. If you want to come, either rsvp on the evite or send an email to: orangemelon@gmail.com

Welcome Baby Stumbaugh Hootenanny and Country Potluck!

Sunday October 17, 2010
Starting at 1pm
Ending at 5pm

It's a potluck, please bring something to share and let us know what you're bringing so we don't end up with ten versions of potato salad or a ton of hummus.

Here's the link to the potluck spreadsheet:
https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0AmNoBrlyi9uRdDBwWEk1RFhpQVF1U2RZV0E5TC0ta2c&hl=en&authkey=CPC-x_oB

If you'd rather not deal with the google spreadsheet, send an email to Melissa at melissimo@gmail.com, letting her know what you'd like to bring and she'll update the spreadsheet for you.

Please mark your dish if it fits into any "special needs" food categories (vegan, vegetarian, gluten-free, etc.), thank you!

We're encouraging everyone to bring their own plates/bowls/cups/utensils, for the sake of the environment. We will have some extras on hand, but please bring your own and if you happen
to have some extra camp meal necessities and wouldn't mind bringing them, that would be great too! If you do bring your own for sharing, please write your name on the bottom just in case we need to return them to you.

There won't be any games...aside from bocce on the massive lawn! If you have other lawn type games, please feel free to bring them. You won't be subjected to any "baby shower" type games.

There will be music, djs and a performance or two.

Children are welcome and encouraged to come! There's an amazing playground very close to the picnic site.

Here's where it's taking place:

Howarth Park
Gazebo Picnic Site
630 Summerfield Road
Santa Rosa

If you've never been to Howarth Park, check out their website:
http://ci.santa-rosa.ca.us/departments/recreationandparks/parks/cityparks/neparks/Pages/howarthpark.aspx

More than anything we want our family and friends to join us for a celebratory day in the park!

If you feel so inclined to help out with our baby needs, we are registered at the following two sites:

Amazon.com: http://www.amazon.com/gp/registry/baby/1V48M35QFLS3B
AND
Deposit A Gift: http://stumbaughbaby.mydagsite.com/

Can you believe it's been over two years?

2010-09-03T15:33:00.000-07:00

Tony and I started looking for a house to purchase back in March of 2008. We started off looking in the Santa Cruz mountains and after figuring out there's not much in the Santa Cruz area in our price range, we did some major soul searching and decided to try our luck living in Sonoma County. We've been looking in the Santa Rosa area for almost a year and a half and finally...

Our mortgage broker gave us the green light on giving our 30-day notice at our apartment today, which we did. Looks like we're moving into our new house midway through this month. We're scheduling our big move for the weekend of September 25-26. If anyone out there is interested, able and available that weekend, we could sure use some help! I'm not going to be of much assistance in this move as I won't be able to lift many boxes. This will be the first time all of our belongings (which are currently in five different locations) will be housed in the same place for over a year and a half! If you're interested and available, please let one of us know, we'll provide some beer and food to those who volunteer their time to our worthy cause.

There's some minor work that needs to be done to our new house, painting, floors (master bath needs new tiles and living room hardwood floors need to be sanded and possibly stained?), minor electrical, minor plumbing. If you are skilled in these ways or know someone reputable and reasonably priced who is, please let us know.

After working for Beckmanns Bakery since the beginning of 2003, Tony is moving on! He's accepted a position at the Whole Foods in Petaluma as the Bakery Team Leader. He starts next week. We're very excited about him having a local job, not making the two and a half hour commute down to Santa Cruz and he won't be gone from home two to three days a week. He's sad to be leaving Beckmanns, they've been great to him and us. He's happy to be taking on a new challenge career-wise.

Not much has changed in our pregnant world. I'm still feeling good. My belly's getting bigger and my passenger is still cruising around like crazy. What else can I say?

The evite for our welcome baby party will be sent out by Xochitl this weekend. If you're evite "challenged" be on the lookout for a blog post coming soon with all the details.

Until then...
Here we are at Plunge two weekends ago...

love,
~melanie (and tony).

But wait, there's more...

2010-08-18T21:03:00.000-07:00

I'll be 24 weeks pregnant tomorrow. Things are going great in the pregnancy world. The baby is kicking and cruising around like mad. Tony was finally able to feel the baby action the other morning. I'm to the point now it feels "normal." I've heard from many moms and pregnant women that are further along that the movement only gets more and more intense from here. Last Friday Tony and I went in for our ultrasound. It's the only one we're planning on having done. It was a truly amazing experience, so cool getting to see the baby! Our ultrasound technician was extremely knowledgeable and pleasant. I felt elated during and after the experience, a feeling of a large weight being lifted off my shoulders, finding out that all is groovy with our baby. I'm so excited to meet him/her (nope still didn't find out the sex). It's so crazy how much is going inside that belly of mine.

The date that the bank had set for the short sale we've been waiting on to close escrow was September 13th. Which means, we should have heard something by August 13th about them moving forward. Well, we still haven't heard anything. Two weeks ago Tony and I went to see a house in Rincon Valley, which for those of you that aren't familiar with neighborhoods in Santa Rosa, it's one of the nicer neighborhoods heading further east out toward Sonoma, really good school district. The house was listed a bit out of our price range, so I didn't really get my hopes up about it, thinking there's no way they'd accept any offer we'd be able to afford. The house was brand new on the market, so we waited about a week and put in an offer. They countered, we countered back...the countering back happened last Friday. We heard on Monday that they accepted our offer. Our agent came over on Monday night and we signed all kinds of official paperwork. They now have our official paperwork and the title company has our deposit check. The home inspection is scheduled for next Friday. We'll see where it goes, but things are looking promising on this one. At least it's not a short sale! Maybe we'll be having a house warming and welcome baby stumbaugh gathering at our new house...let's hope!

I've officially been laid off from my office manager job with the landscape architect in Sebastopol, which honestly, is a relief. It looks like I'll be able to pick up more hours with Yourdictionary.com, so I think I'll be fine. I've also filed for unemployment.

Tomorrow we're leaving for Plunge! Three and a half days at Camp and Sons, looking forward to seeing and spending a relaxing time with many of you there... Tony and I celebrate our six year anniversary this Saturday while at Plunge, I can't believe it's been six years. He's still my most favorite person!

Our Welcome Baby Stumbaugh Hootenanny and Country Potluck is coming up in less than two months, October 17th. Xochitl will be sending an evite soon, if you don't receive it and you're wanting to attend, please let me or Tony know.

More soon...until then, we hope you're all doing wonderfully!!!

love,
~melanie (and tony).

18 Weeks and Counting...

2010-07-08T10:09:00.000-07:00

It's been awhile since we've updated our blog. Now that we have bigger news to share these days, it seems the appropriate time to do so.

As many or all of you know, I (Melanie, not Tony) am pregnant. I guess Tony is pregnant in a way too, since he has to tolerate and support my various aches, needs, food cravings, food aversions, mood swings, body image issues, anxieties, etc. The baby is due on December 9th, I'll be 19 weeks on Thursday. So far my pregnancy has been relatively easy. I was exhausted the first trimester and couldn't really eat many vegetables, they just sounded terrible to me, but never vomited. Now that I'm in the second trimester much of my energy has returned and almost all of my food aversions have gone away, hooray! Pregnancy brain has begun and my short term memory isn't at 100%. Also with the second trimester, the baby bump has appeared, which you can see in the above photo.

We haven't had an ultrasound done yet, but will be getting one in a couple of weeks. So many people have asked if we're going to find out the sex of the baby, we are NOT going to find out. It will be a surprise. With that we're also keeping any name ideas to ourselves. I feel very lucky to have timed our pregnancy with my second trimester during the summer. We're looking forward to our non-traditional baby "shower" hootenanny on October 17th and hopeful that many of our friends and family will be able to attend.

Tony and I moved into an apartment in Santa Rosa two weeks ago. It's nice to be in our own space again after staying with friends and family for the past year and a half (thank you Sabin, Xochitl, Gerry and Laurel). Our new address is: 1165 Evans Drive, Santa Rosa, CA 95405. We'll be at this address until October 1st at the latest. We're still waiting to hear about the short sale that we've been in contract on since February 25th. The first time home buyers tax credit has been extended until September 30th, for those that were in contract prior to the deadline of April 30th. Which we were, so if the short sale goes through (and we're hopeful it will), we'll still get the tax credit. In the meantime, we've started looking at other houses in the Santa Rosa area, since there's less competition out there on the housing market now that the April 30th deadline has passed. Our new deadline for entering into official 30-day escrow on this short sale (or another house that we fall in love with) is September 1st. If we're not in official 30-day escrow by then, we'll be finding a house in Santa Rosa to rent long term. I have nesting to do!

Tony is still working for Beckmann's, driving down to Santa Cruz on Tuesday mornings and coming home on Thursday, working from home a couple days a week and driving out to bay area farmers markets on the weekends to train his employees. I'm still working as an office manager for the landscape architect in Sebastopol four days a week. Which is likely going to either end or get drastically reduced soon, since his business isn't doing so hot. I started working from home about a month ago for yourdictionary.com fifteen to twenty hours a week, so far I dig it and am hopeful it will go to full time or close to, so that when the baby comes I'll have a work-from-home job.

Other than being pregnant, moving, looking at houses and working, we've been keeping ourselves busy with our usual summer outings and planning the first fundraiser for the Out There Project (with the other six members), called Plunge.

Hope life is treating you all well and we'd love to see you soon!

We'll be updating our blog more regularly and they'll likely be shorter posts.

love,
~melanie.
(and tony)

So long, and thanks for all the fish......

2009-04-14T15:47:00.000-07:00

As the the final sun sets over the Peruvian coastline, our two month extravaganza finally comes to a close. Our lasy days here we have been killing alot of time and eating scrumptious food. Well, I have been eating well, Melanie is dreaming of eating gallons of cooked chard. We had dinner last night at Astrid y Gaston, one of the most famous restaurants here in Peru. ww.astridygaston.com

Everything about the meal was top notch. Excellent service with dudes in suits, heavy plates and flatware, and 5 different types of home-made bread with three different dipping sauces. Melanie even got an armed escort to the lieu. She had a house salad with avocado and thinly sliced asparagus that was perfectly moist and seasoned well. She also had a risotto made for her that wasn´t on the menu, veggies and cream. I had the triple sashimi appetizer, little cuts of fish in three different spicy sauces. For dinner I was supposed to have blue marlin, but they ran out and I had some other giant ocean fish instead with jumbo gulf prawns cooked in a tangy bbq sauce with a chili mandarin risotto with potato. We accidentally didn´t bring all of our cash and were keeping our fingers crossed about the bill total, in hopes we wouldn´t have to run 15 block back to our hotel for more cash. It worked out, and was a great meal to have on our last night out.

In a way, our brains are already home. We´ve been checking out craiglist for jobs and future houses, talking about the possibilities. Our summer calendars are already starting to fill up with events, and now that we will be positioned in the north bay closer to family, it doesn´t look like it will slow down any time soon. But we are looking forward to being closer to most of you (sorry Santa Cruz friends), and hope we will have easy adjustment to the new (yet old for me) surroundings.

This trip has been a blast, and we are glad to know that we conquered yet another continent. Next stop, Antarctica! Not really, anybody who knows Melanie well enough knows that she would not endure that kind of cold.

Much love to all of you, thanks for reading and we hope to see you soon.

TnM inc.

coming close to the end.....

2009-04-09T11:03:00.000-07:00

Greetings friends and family, you will be happy (we hope) to know that we have much more to report compared to our lazy beach time.

In Lima we struggled a bit to find a place to stay in Cuzco. It ended up being way too much time on the internet and on the frustrating pay phones to go in explicit detail. We ended booking a reservation with the backpacker super company Flying Dog. Our taxi to the Lima airport was scary and exciting. Our hostel had called for a taxi to pick us up at 115pm, we needed to be there by 2 and it takes close to 45 minutes with all the traffic. At 145pm with the taxi being a no-show, we started to panic. It´s advised to only take registered taxi´s here in the big metropolis of Lima. There are unregistered taxi´s, tiny little car like things that appear to be on their last legs, that are much cheaper but have a much higher incidence rate of burglary and crime. We´ve avoided them up to this point as we were desperate. Our gracious front desk man at the hostel picked one out of the crowd and seemed to have some sort of stern private talk with him in spanish.

At first the guy seemed pretty normal, I think our feelers were a little off due to the airport panic. The guy ended up making brief small talk with his limited english and our short bus spanish. Within several blocks the intensity of his driving had picked up, honking his horn and driving through intersections when he had a red light. His speed increased and ran stop signs in the residential slums, the bounce over speed bumps made me hit my head on the car´s ceiling. Every time he would do something crazy he would clap his hands and laugh, saying ¨ahhhhhh Peru¨. When we got to the very busy 6 lane avenue, he began to drive on the curb and parallel walking paths to speed ahead of the traffic. He would jump the curb and re-enter the avenue when a small amount of space opened up during the times when the traffic accelerated. Packed buses, small and large, would honk their horns at him when he would magically appear in the cloud of black smog that emanated from the vehicle in front. As we neared the airport he removed the taxi sign on the roof of his car as it is illegal for unregistered taxis to enter the airport. I don´t know how he convinced the guard with the big gun that we were his gringo friends and we just happen to be riding in the back with large luggage, but I didn´t ask any questions. When he pulled into the heavily trafficked drop-off area of the airport, he honked and yelled at a car full of nuns to get out of his way so he could park. As maddening, frightening, and insane the ride was, he got us there in one piece in only 20 minutes. We would have missed our plane if it weren´t for him. We had to be specially escorted to the front of large lines so we could make our plane, they were boarding when we arrived at the gate.

Okay, I know that was a long description but it I feel it needed to be well documented for future generations.

The ride to Cuzco was really nice, and a little scary at the end. With the city being over 4,000ft in elevation, and being located in the middle of a valley with even much larger mountains, the landing is extremely difficult with the heavy winds and the airlines only use their best pilots for the job, at least so they say. It was a little dizzying, kind of like being on kiddie-style roller coaster full of foreign tourists.

The first steps getting out of the plane was a good preview of the new few days to come. Adjusting to the altitude is a strange experience. I hate to use another rollercoaster/theme park reference, but anybody out there ever go on the Gravitron at your local country fair? You know how when you get out it´s hard to walk and your chest feels like it´s falling? Well, it´s like that only it last 2-3 days. Slow steady steps, sleep, and lots of Coca tea help tremendously.

It was raining buckets when we did our senile walk outside of the airport terminal. Luckily we had a taxi waiting for us from our hostal, holding up a sign that said ¨Melany¨. We arrived at our hostal and had our first introduction to Luigi the ¨Jungle Boy¨. Luigi worked at the hostel, but spent most of his nights going clubbing with foreigners and working the following day with little sleep. Luigi the jungle boy was from Iquitos, the jugle city capital in north eastern Peru that isn´t accessible by car, only plane or boat. He had long curly hair and could speak very muffled english, but his enthusiasm for the language did not slow him down.

¨I am jun-gol boeee! I am (mumblemumblemumble), and strong in heart. Do you guys like to party? I have been (mumblemumblemumblemumble) for long time (laughs loudly).....I am jun-gol boeee!¨

The other person working the hostel looked like an ex-con. I didn´t catch his name but he wasn´t very friendly and also alerted us that we only had a reservation for 2 nights instead of 3. One of the few bad things Flying Dog has on their report card. We had an email confirmation but the ex-con didn´t sympathise for us at all and merely shrugged his shoulders.

The place is relatively new and has lot´s of shiny looking toys around the common areas. New kitchen, new computer with huge monitor and fast internet, big flat screen tv with lots of bootleg dvd´s, and a plush couch to curl up on. The place was crawling with backpackers, which sealed the deal in our minds as we realized we are too old to be staying in places like this (at least when traveling together, I can probably be satisfied with cramped floor space on a Vietnamese kitchen with the right group of guys, you know who you are). Our room was nice enough, an okay view of the colonial city and green hills as far as the eye can see. The shower has a tiny electric heater for it on the ceiling, only it´s dangerous for tall people because the metal tube that connects to the shower head is known for electrocuting when touched.

After some time catching our breathe and trying not to think about moving to another hostal for a night, we headed into town. The cobblestone streets and alleyways with people selling crafts are charming. Lot´s of teeny tiny little women walking around in colorful garbs, carrying heavy looking sacks of miscellaneous items on their backs. Some walk around with their daughters and baby alpacas trying to have tourists take photos of them for small change. Cuzco has the most reported incidences of theft and crime in any other city in Peru. We were on guard with our money stashed in secret pockets and we stuffed socks in the shirts of our arms to make us look buff (not really). It was hard to keep our wits about us when a small man with a dirty stained baseball cap was chasing his small heard of runaway donkeys down a busy street.

The food. Lot´s of fine dining options in Cuzo that cater to the upper class travelers here for Machuu Pichuu. Speciality food includes alpaca, cow testicle, guinea pigs, and corn beer that is made from the fermented saliva of local villages. They chew on dried pieces of corn and spit it into a giant pot, a tradition that dates back hundreds of years in this region.

The first night I had some trout from the nearby Rio Urabamba with a spicy passion fruit glaze and citrus mashed sweet potatoes. There is a local Cafe called ¨Jacks¨ that has a line going outside at all hours of the day. Really good breakfast and a great atmosphere, very reminiscent of a good breakfast spot from the states. So far we´ve had, giant banana pancakes with a maple infused caramel sauce, egg platters with home fries and and home-made bread with grilled tomatoes and pesto with a hint of mint, huevos rancheros with real salsa and tasty local beans, nachos made from frito corn chips (I know, sounds sacrilegious but it was incredible), and a grilled panini with smoked trout and caper cream cheese with real potato french fries and house made aioli. Yup, Jack´s is awesome and has fulfilled our craving for tasty breakfasts rather than the national standard, white bread and jam.

A few other food highlights to get them out of the way and to make you hungry. Pineapple coconut curry shrimps (Melanie had a version of this that had apple in it, very interesting combination of flavors and something that will be experimented with in the kitchen at home), mint risotto with smoked cheese, teriyaki trout skewers with panko crumbs and pepper rice.....and to our delight, we just found an Indian restaurant that is cheap as sin and deliciously spicy. Had two different kofta dishes with raisins and nuts, good korma and Melanie had some great creamed lentils.

Just thought I´d get the food portion over with so I can try and remember the rest of the many little details about our trip.

We took a long walk to the Mercado Central and were overwhelmed by everything it had to offer. The place was the size of the cow palace and took up 8 city blocks. The fragrant smells mixed from luscious to putrid. Rows upon rows of exotic jungle flowers, and then rows upon rows of butchered meat that sweltered in the claustrophobic heat of the building. Equally sized rows of breads, cakes, sweets, vegetables, potatoes (I list this separately as there is a separate isle just for taters as taters are rule the farm supreme here) hand bags, kitchen utensils, fruit juice (yup, it was like a swap meet for small time Jamba Juice junkies) food carts, and stinky fish. I was planning to get some vegetables and exotic spices as it was going to be our last night with kitchen access. I ended up not getting anything as walking still made me dizzy and I didn´t trust myself with my knife and also didn´t trust the backpacker kitchen.

Lot´s crafts here, better than any other place on this trip yet. We bought a few nice little things, a painting, and some small gourds that have incredibly detailed hand carvings on them. I fulfilled a long time dream of getting a hand-made chess board, Inca´s vs. Conquistadors, very cool except we know the sad outcome of the real battle.

We moved into our new room the following day. Even though the view wasn´t as nice, it made up for it on every other level. Nicer people, reliable hot water, tv, and much closer to the Plaza De Armas aka the town square. It was really nice since we were going to spend two nights in the sacred valley and come back to the same hotel, that way we could leave items with no hassle.

We had some problems with our train tickets from Peru Rail. Peru Rail has a monopoly on trains going to Machuu Pichuu and the Sacred Valley. Besides charging exorbitant prices for short distances, they aren´t very friendly to boot. I was having a problem with their website as they would only let me buy a one way ticket from Ollayantambo to Agua Calientes (aka Machuu Pichuu Pueblo), and no access back to Cuzco. We tried going down to the office but it was closed for Jesus day, Sunday. We went the first thing Monday morning, the day were to leave on the bus for Ollayantambo, crossing our fingers really hard in hopes we would get this sorted out. If the tickets were then sold out, we would have to change our plan drastically and miss out on part of the Sacred Valley in order to get to see Machuu Pichuu. I will also note here that at this point of our trip, going to Machuu Pichuu seemed like a necessary hassle, and we were looking forward to getting it over with.

The office was loaded with people. We took a number and had to wait an hour just to talk to somebody. Seeing irritated travelers at the rows of desks was doing nothing to get our hopes up. When it was finally our turn the lady told us that the return trains to Cuzco on the day we wanted to travel were now full and that there was nothing she could do. I asked if she could change our ticket for the following day, but she said she needed a printed copy, which we didn´t have, even though they had all of our information including our passport numbers in their system. We took another number knowing it would be at least another hour as the office was over filling in the late morning.

During that time, Melanie and I were cursing every other word and trying to figure out our options. I was convinced that there had to be another way to get to agua calientes besides the expensive train, 4 wheel drive Jungle bus? Ziplining through the trees? Hanglide? Melanie and I split up. She went to an internet cafe to print out our tickets and I went to a nearby travel agent to inquire about alternative means of transportation. The first travel agent told me in broken english that it was possible, but was trying to sign us on to a package that would include lodging and meals. We really just wanted a ride back to cuzco as we already paid for a train ticket to Agua Calientes as well as lodging. I tried another travel agent and she dispelled my hope of taking some sort of extreme jungle vehicle, as there really are no roads to Agua Calientes, just the train tracks and hiking trails. She did somehow manage to get us a train ticket, not sure how since Peru Rail itself couldn´t provide one but we weren´t complaining. The only thing was that the ticket would be waiting for us in Agua Calientes, one of their guides would meet us at the train station holding a sign with our names. Seemed to be a decent plan? Keep reading.

Stoked that we wouldn´t have to drastically change our plans, we took a mini-bus through the Sacred Valley to Ollayantambo. The valley was gorgeous, lots of high tiered farming over luscious green canyons and clear lakes. Lots more tiny women in brightly colored clothes and strange non-functional hats (Non-functional because they didn´t seem keep any sun out of one´s eyes). Lot´s of donkeys, cows, and giant sacks of potatoes were other common sights along the valley road.

We arrived in Ollayantambo just before dusk. The towering mountains and ruins loomed overhead of the tiny village. There is a great photo here where you can see the contrast of the village to the mountains. We unpacked our bags for our one night stay and loaded up on ibuprofen since our heads were pounding from the drastic altitude change and windy roads on the bus. We had some french fries and coca tea at small restaurant with a nautical theme, big ropes holding up antique chandeliers and old black and white photos from years past in the valley while we played dominoes. We walked around the town lined with cobblestone streets that was dimly lite from old style lamps. They had a great little plaza with overgrown sunflowers and monstrous datura plants that surrounded a bronze statue of an Inca warrior. We looked at many restaurants in hopes for some Melanie friendly food, found a nice place that she could settle on right next to the roaring river that seemed good but decided to keep looking just in case. Our guide book recommended a place at the edge of town, had nice patio garden and colorful lights that matched the funky decor inside. It was pretty dead, and after looking at the menu we didn´t think it was the right place for Melanie food but the owner was there and insisted that we stay and that her chef could make her anything she wanted. Seeing this as some sort of omen, we stupidly decided to stay. The food was awful and boring. Melanie was supposed to get rice and veggies cooked in basil and spices with a tomato based sauce. The result was plain steamed veggies and white rice. I had a small sampler plate with bad cheese and cold beer. Good thing they didn´t make the beer!

We woke up feeling motivated, first to find some good food to re-layer our sumptuous palates, then to hike up to the ruins and explore for several hours before our train to Agua Calientes. The ruins entrance was a short walk from town, the hike up is what takes time. The tiered stone walls were impressive, even more so when you reach the top and appreciate how long it must have taken to haul up the large boulders and how many people it took. It was a good preview to what was to come in Machuu Pichuu. At the same time, after walking some ways within the ruins, our brains started gravitating to thinking ¨it´s just a bunch of rocks¨, albeit impressive history, but a bunch of rocks nonetheless, and much more impressive looking at them from a distance to see their intricate layout and design. We had a good lunch, Melanie with a hearty bowl of miso soup, and me some local trout skewers with panko crumbs and teriyaki sauce.

We got the aftenoon train to Agua Calientes and it had spectacular scenery. More giant mountains with mist and fog around the summits edges, along with lush jungle forests with colorful birds and the roaring Urubamba river. We were starting to feel the Machuu Pichuu buzz, getting really excited about the expensive portion of our trip.

We arrived and the train station was packed. Tourists in all shapes and sizes flooded the area waiting to catch their train back to Cuzco as most visitors make Machuu Pichuu a day trip from the 3 hour ride to Cuzco. We saw a handful of people holding up signs at the entrance area, none of which had our names on it. The tropical rain started to pound, the herds of tourists ducking for cover under awnings, rain coats, and trash bags. Melanie watched our stuff while I stood in the rain trying to use the pay phone to call our contact person who had our return train tickets. The number wasn´t working, and after several frustrating tries, we marched through the rain to our hotel in hopes we could figure this outthat evening.

Our hotel was nice, a huge group of American teenage girls from Melrose on a high school trip lounged around the lobby which was good eavesdropping entertainment while we tried not to freak out about our tickets. The boy at the counter was really nice, and helped us get ahold of the travel agency in Cuzco where we purchased our return tickets. They said the guy with the tickets would be there in 30 minutes and to not worry. 1 hour later we called back and they said he would be coming by our hotel in the morning, and to not worry. Pretty miffed, since we called them back, and if we didn´t, how much longer were they going to keep us waiting in our hotel lobby before they called?

We went out to an overpriced vegetarian restaurant and ate a small plate of food. Soon we discovered that everything in Agua Calientes is 3 times the cost of anywhere else in Peru given the remote locatation and high density of tourism, knowing they would have no choice but to pay up. We were exhausted from our day, and knew the following day would be even longer with waking up at dawn for Machuu Pichuu and the train and bus back to Cuzco in the evening.

Our train ticket arrived sometime in the night. We were very relieved but also wanted to curse the guy out for being a flake. The early bus in the morning climbed steep up the mountain that was shrouded in mist. The entrance gate was already crowded, several hundred people looking for coffee as they completed the 3/4 day trip hiking the Inca trail.

Okay, we hope not to dispel any of the magic of Machuu Pichuu here, but we have some gripes with our experience. It was pretty, it was, very impressive again about moving rocks up this mountains and how the lived. The mountain scape is gorgeous, the surrounding area is too, but the whole thing was over in 5 hours, and could have been done in 2 hours if we didn´t hike up the adjacent mountain side for something to do. We did this trip pretty cheaply too, most people pay 400 dollars for their plane tickets to Cuzco from Lima (because they buy the tickets from their native foreign counties rather than buying them once in Peru), and we paid 150 two days before our flight, with more planning it can be 80. Anyhow, we dropped alot of cash on top of that, and don´t think it was worth it. It was beautiful, but like we said earlier about the ruins in Ollayantambo, it was much prettier from a distance. We would be more than happy to talk more about this with any of you in person, but thats it in a nutshell. It´s pretty much like disneyland for south america.

The way back to Cuzco was long. The train was dark and crowded. Then our packs were on the top of the bus and it started to pour rain. The driver pulled them down for us and they managed to crunch on our laps in the very crowded space. A sick Korean girl next to us was sympathetic and provided good conversation. I got a massage in Cuzco the following day, today I´m nursing my wounds. She beat me up pretty bad, nail marks and bruises.

We´re back in Lima now, counting down the days to our departure. Not much left to do here, gonna meet up with a friend of a friend, and also go to the gold museum. Melanie is stoked to return, last night a restaurant put steak in her beans on a ¨vegetarian¨ taco.

Much luv everybody, this might be the last post, maybe one more.

TandM

Donde Esta Mis Pantilones¿?¿

2009-04-01T12:29:00.000-07:00

Okay, this is probably going to be the most energy I´vd expelled in some time, please excuse if my fingers if they can´t take the workout, I will later post photos of Melanie squirting gatorade in my mouth as I conjur up the necessary energy.

Yup, we´ve been pretty relaxed this past week. Our hotel is a small slice of paradise, the biggest challenge of the day is squinting our eyes shut on the back of motorcycle taxi´s (similar to tuk-tuk´s in Thailand) while they blast down the 2 miles of cliff trodden gravel road to our tucked away hotel. Luckily most of the time the motorcycle´s barely have enough juice to make it up hill, but on the downhill the driver´s like to make up for speed with the extra inertia, which makes us subconsciously cradle the family jewels in winded anticipation of disaster. Once we arrive our destination (which really, there is only two, our hotel and the town center where there are restaurants), it´s a short walk to a stool/lounge chair/bed/pool/bar/ocean etc.

We tried unsuccessfully to go for a hike yesterday. We got word from our much attended vegetarian restaurant that a hike only 2 miles from town can bring you to a national park. Well, we walked for some time, but the vegetation was so ugly and murky we decided we´d have a better time going back to our routine. Wake-up, read, shower (maybe), walk downstairs for breakfast overlooking the ocean, eat while playing dominoes, walk back upstairs (one flight), read some more, walk to the beach, Tony eats up the sun while Melanie hides in the shade, walk to the pool to cool off, moto-taxi into town for lunch and dominoes, internet (for investigative purposes on further Peru locations only, promise), moto-taxi back to the hotel, more reading, more pool time, walk on the beach to watch indescribable sunsets, back to the room for more reading or NPR podcasts, moto-taxi into town for dinner, Tony eats incredible seafood while Melanie eats a bit of dust with rice and beans, moto-taxi back home for more reading and then eventually sleep.

That mostly sums up our days here. The food (for me) has been incredibly good. All sorts of fish and ceviche, very fresh and well prepared. Mancora was a fishing town before it became a surfing mecca, it´s managed to hold on to that vibe despite all the really buff guys with perfect teeth huddled next to their boards with empty beer bottles littered about like swarming sharks. Fishing still thrives here and is the backbone to the beach front tourism, you can smell it in the air wherever you go. We found a great spot that serves fresh fish and sweet potato chips with an icy cold beer (stored at 3 degrees) for only $4. Lucky for me they have really good rice and beans for Melanie so I get to go back. There are a couple of fancy pants restaurants in town, specialising in deep sea tuna cooked and sauced to perfection.

There is a great breakfast join in town called ¨Green Eggs and Ham¨. They serve up real good gringo breakfast. Melanie has had great omelette's´s with spicy home-fries and crispy hashbrowns. I had some great pancakes and waffles splattered with fresh mango, bananas, and pineapple in coconut cream and vanilla yogurt. We also found a small bakery and I had a surprisingly great piece of pecan pie with vanilla ice cream.

The town fluctuates from quiet to busy with no particular schedule. Being right on the Pan-American highway draws lots of cars and big dirty diesel trucks overflowing with various products, buldging as if it were going to implode. It´s not that bad, the biggest drawback is the honking in this town. You´re in the middle of a nice meal on a patio and the cars 10 feet away from you start blaring on their horn.

Tomorrow we leave paradise and it´s back to normal traveling. We fly into Lima for a night and then on to Cuzco the following day. We have an outline of a plan, but nothing set in stone except our plane tickets. It´s hard to figure out since it will be unknown how the altitude will affect us. Its a good time of the year to go river rafting through the Sacred Valley which we´re hoping to do if the altitude allows. This whole easter thing has been a bump in the travel road. We have been hearing more stories how tourist destinations fill up, one popular hotel here in Mancora has over 300 people on a wait list.

A short list of random images Id like not to forget.

Moto-taxi ride with an older man with a giant handlbar mustache and sherlock holmes-like spectacles.
Moto-taxis dragging up to 20 feet of cargo that slides on the ground, bush trimmings, lead pipes, cement mixers
Watching 4 vultures, 3 red heads and one black head, fight over a fish carcuss from our balcony
The feeling of a deserted town with the street lamps off and everybody indoors watching the Peru vs. Brasil soccer match.

Been reading The Road by Cormac McCarthy, whew, darn good book but really depressing. Sorry no photos in this blog, 3 internet cafes in row didnt have usb ports for us to plug in. I will try and put some up later.
Hope all is well

-T

Five sunsets....

2009-03-26T20:19:00.000-07:00

We´ve been in Peru for just over a week now...

This will be my first blog post, just so you all know, my writing style is much less colorful than Tony´s...so bare with me.

Spent the first couple of days in Lima, I was sick...which I`m mostly better from now, just a residual cough and...some ear issues. Last Thursday was tough, spent most of it chilling in our hostel...it`s really hot and humid in Peru, much more so than Chile. Tony made us some potato leek soup in the hostel, while I watched Zodaic in the livingroom. Friday I felt a bit better, so we ventured out into Lima and ended up making a flight reservation for the following day to Tumbes. Had lunch at a krishna restaurant that gave me a massive heap of yummy veggie fried rice. Went to a pretty epic dinner at a place called Las Tejas. For some odd reason (paranoia) we didn´t bring our camera out with us, so there aren´t any photos. My meal consisted of veggies, some potato dumpling thing, yucca fries, fried banana and some crazy corn on the cobb, the kernals were way bigger than what we have in the states and much sweeter, super good. Tony had some fish and veggies. After our meal, we went to see The Watchmen at the movie theater....ummm...yeah, not really sure what to say about that.

Saturday we went to a lunch not really worth mentioning...then caught a cab from our hostel to the Lima airport. Our short flight from Lima to Tumbes was relatively uneventful, aside from the last bit being a bit painful...for me anyway. When we arrived in Tumbes, it was hot, really hot and really humid...and there were these maniacle mosquitos that are truly out for blood. After getting our packs we took a hair raising two hour cab ride to Mancora. About fifteen minutes into the cab ride my right ear finally popped and could really hear....the left one still hasn´t fully recovered. The cab ride was INSANE! I was very relieved when we finally arrived safely in Mancora. We stayed at a Hostel International affiliated place called La Posada, the room was clean and very dark. Woke up on Sunday morning, knowing we wanted to find another place to stay, we went out to find some breakfast grub...the first place we see is called ¨Chill Out¨, we take this as a sign. I must share something and if any wonderful Chileans are reading this, please don´t take offense....Peruvians know how to cook some eggs! With the exception of one fabulous omelette we had at Tinquilco Refugio in Huequehue Parque in Chile, prepared by the owner Patricio, I didn´t have very good egg experiences in Chile, Peru has been an entirely different story. After having a great breakfast we walked along the beach in search of somewhere new to stay, we found a place right next to where all the surfers were catching waves, we negotiated a price and went to fetch our bags. We spent one night here, as it´s a surfers paradise...and not so much for the non-surfer. The beach here is over-run with pushy vendors. The next day after another fantastic breakfast at a place called Green Eggs and Ham, we went to another, (much more secluded), part of the beach, which is reached by a five minute taxi ride from the town of Mancora. We´re now staying at a place called Sunset, it´s a bit more expensive than we typically pay for accomodations ($60 per night), but totally worth it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Tonight will be our sixth night at Sunset, we´ve made a point to catch each sunset, each one spectacular and unique. The view from our second story room private balcony is awesome, there´s a very small wading pool outside and supposedly the best restaurant in all of Mancora, which we´ve yet to experience. We have had two lunches at the hotel, Tony had some fried seafood thing which he raved about, I´ve had a couple salads there and some rice, which I believe one of the salads (from Thursday) made me sick. We won´t be having lunch there again. The first sunset we saw in Mancora was exceptional, it´s the one with Tony and I together, there´s no way pictures do it justice, of course, I´m very happy to have had that experience. Mancora has a lot going for it, The beach is amazing, the people are quite friendly and there are good food options. There´s a vegetarian restaurant called Angela´s Place, Angela is an Austrian woman who´s been living in Mancora for eight years, we eat at Angela´s often. The mexican food place in town, El Aji is decent and there are two fancy pants restaurants we´ve been to, one for Tony´s birthday, El Tuno and the other we ate at on Thursday night, Sirena.

As I´m sure many of you know, Tony´s birthday was on Tuesday...in order to make his birthday somehow more special, I woke up in the middle of the previous night and spelled out ¨Happy Birthday Tony¨ in toothpaste on our bathroom mirror. Unfortunately there aren´t any photos of this, as we believed we had to move that morning to another room, Tony quickly wipped it away when the cleaning people arrived...turns out we don´t have to move and get to spend all ten nights at Sunset in the same room. It´s been great getting to put clothes away in closets and not be living out of our packs for awhile. Tony´s birthday was spent much like the other days we´ve had here....relaxing, watching the waves, swimming and then going out to a great meal at El Tuno. Tony had tuna (their specialty) cooked in a fig balsamic reduction, with asparagus, glazed baby carrots and a potato soufle, I had gnocci with pesto. Yep, I tried out eating some wheat...and nothing happened. I´m not going to make a habit of it, I don´t want to push my luck, but it´s nice to know that I can, on occasion, wander into the world of wheat. Baby steps... Tony finished off his dinner with mango cheesecake.

The morning after Tony´s birthday we spent hanging out next to the ocean, reading, listening to music, and generally relaxing in what we thought was a very shady area. Heading into town for lunch, I looked down at my legs and felt betrayed by the coconut trees that I thought were providing us with shade, let´s just say I spent a large portion of the rest of the day with cold compress towels on my legs, they´re still a bit achey, but nothing like I imagined they would be. That same day Tony booked our next and last flight in Peru. We leave Mancora next Thursday, April 2nd, flying to Lima. We´ll be leaving Lima the following day, flying to Cusco, where we´ll spend seven days taking in The Sacred Valley and Machu Picchu, flying back to Lima on the 10th. We were hoping to spend more time in The Sacred Valley, but Easter threw a wrench in our plans, turns out it´s a really big deal here and all the flights out Easter weekend or the Monday afterward are either booked or very expensive. So we opted to spend a couple extra days in Lima. We fly out of Lima, back to San Francisco very late on the 14th...we´ll be home on the 15th, after a layover in Miami.

Well that´s all folks...hope all´s well with you all.

love,

melanie and tony.

bye bye Chile.......

2009-03-19T16:20:00.000-07:00

We just arrived in Lima this morning, had to say farewell to one of our favorite new countries, but we know we will be back someday. Not too much to report but I figure I would close the Chile chapter in a post so we can focus on Peru.

From Pucon, we ventured out to Parque Nacional Huerquehue (pronounced ´ear-kay-way´) for a 3 day, two night visit. We took the morning bus from Pucon, it was only an hour´s journey, half it down yet another dusty dirt road. The bus was pretty full of hikers heading to the park for a day trip, and along the way we picked up many kids on their way to school in their uniforms. The single person seat in front of us was occupied by a dutch traveler with dirty curly hair and comfortably sleeping with his head rolling about on the seat in front of him. There was a young kid of maybe 5 that was just mortified by this and could not keep his eyes off the wayward traveler. It was quite amusing watching the kid behind his spectacles with a look of shock.

The kids jumped off for school, we really enjoyed the last part of the ride into the park with great views of nearby mountains and volcanoes. We had to hike about a mile into the park with our heavy packs on to reach our refugio. Melanie had a bit of back pain so it was a little difficult but she pulled through like a champion. Refugio Tinquilco was our secluded forest paradise. A beautifully built lodge owned by the boisterous and kind Patricio, and staffed by a mountainous chileano version of Lucille Ball, Ingrid. Ingrid greeted us when we pulled our packs off our sweaty backs and entered the living room area of the well decorated cabin. Old typewriters, paintings, electronics, and photographs lined the walls. Ingrid didn´t speak of word of english, but that didn´t slow her down from talking to us like we were having our hair permed at an 80´s Jersey salon. She is a wildy animated person and the keeper of the refugio. She spends all day, every day, 9 months out of the year (she gets the snowy winter off), cooking and cleaning like a stout Martha Stewart in the woods. They have a great wood fire stove that continuously has a giant kettle of hot water bubbling, and lots of enormous cooking pots and pans for big meals.

She showed us to our room and Melanie rested for a bit before we hit the trails. The popular route for the day trippers is a 3,000ft steep climb up a mountain with a several mile loop trail at the top circling around 3 high altitude lakes. The maps they give for the park are terrible, as well with the overall lack of assistance of the park rangers and information area (we actually didn´t even have a map, they are not available at the park at all, you have to buy one in Pucon). The park doesn´t receive alot of funding despite getting a goog amount of visitors. The trails are poorly marked and apparently hikers getting lost in the woods is not an unusual occurance. We heard all of this from Patricio, I´ll get to his introduction in a bit.

The trail was a butt kicker. Hiking 3 hours straight up can dampen the spirits, but there was rays of sunshiney hope as there were several miradors (lookout points) along the dense forested trail that provided views of the lower volcanic lake near our refugio. At the highest mirador we met some Chileano hikers with a map, we had been jack rabbiting back and forth with along the trail. According to their map, it seemed we were only half way up to the first of the three lakes. I had a feeling that it was incorrect by the amount of time we had hiked and elevation climbed, but it was hard to see the top as the steep trees were blocking the view. The Chileanos opted to head back, I sweetly convinced Melanie through her curses and gritting teeth that we were close, and she agreed to 30 minutes more at the very max. 20 minutes later we arrived to Lago Chico.

The lake was still and stunning. The quiet surrounding the lake and high rocky gorge was deafening. The gorge sprouted up over the edge of the lake like a giant ugly andean potato dropped from the sky. The beat in our feet and rumble in our bellies told us it was enough for the day and headed back home, hiking while the sun started to go down and hoping our knees wouldn´t give out. We happen to witness an ant carrying a dead scorpion, witness the photo!

We made a nice simple meal from the food we hiked in. We were to later find out that Ingrid was upset (fake upset, not genuine upset) for bringing our own food to cook because she wanted to cook for us. Next time, and there will be a next time, we will have ingrid cook for us and not hike 3 days worth of food into the park. Later in the evening we finally met Patricio briefly before going to bed. We had some trouble with his email, as we thought he never responded to our inquiry but it turns out his email had been acting wonky. He thanked us for being persistent and went to bed. Melanie and I had an epic game of dominoes, only Melanie doesn´t really care about games so I was left to scream about it´s insanity (or my own) by myself.

Looks like this post is going to be a little longer than anticipated, oh well, I´m sure we will all get over it.

The next morning we had a breakfast along with strong coffee before venturing out to our hike. Patricio caught up with us on the sheep filled lawn before we embarked. We were going to climb up Mt. Sebastian, or at least go as far as we could, it being the biggest mountain in the area and all. He warned us about the bad marking of trail signs, a person died on the same trail the previous month for underestimating the amount of time it would take and trying to hike down in the dark. Apparently he has been arguing with the rangers for years, they had once posted a sign about a hike to the hot springs in the park being a 3 hour hike, when in actuality it was closer to a 7 hour hike each way. Many people got stuck in the woods without food and shelter, Patricio ended up cutting down the sign.

This Mt. Sebastian trail was barely used, especially in comparison to the lakes trail. It was overgrown with a variety of bamboo that isn´t hollow in the inside and is great to use for buildings. This was a much steeper hike, and the great views didn´t come until we reached a high point clearing, and we had a clear line of sight to the Villaricca volcano which was covered with snow and is where people ski in the winter. Off the trail in the woods we found a set of chairs and a small table carved by a chainsaw. Nice place to picnic and take a rest. There were many arrucanyo (not sure if this is spelled correctly) trees that had many medevil looking spikes and were very cool to look at. You can see Melanie trying to eat one of the branches in the photos, I had to tackle her to keep her away, she was hungry.

Back at the refugio we met a girl from Maine who´s accent made her sound european (I thought she kinda sounded like Dorothy from the wizard of oz, Melanie didn´t hear it). Patricio made us one of his legendary Pisco sours and joined us for cocktail hour. He opened a bottle of wine, then forced Melanie and I to drink straight pisco, a very unexpected event on our last night there. Lot´s of good conversation into the quiet night, the nearby cows didn´t even keep us awake. Did I mention there was tons of cows along the trail?

note - The Bull in the photos is not from Huerquehue, but from the bumpy bike ride. It was right in front of us and we had a brief freak out hoping we didn´t have to hone our matador skills.
Ingrid was in tears as we left, we really wanted to take her with us. She knew one of the fews things we knew how tos say was ¨hola¨, and she would say it to us after being gone for only a minute. Then she would go about the act of talking to herself and making herself laugh while rolling big sheets of dough for bread and meticulously cleaning the wood fire stove.

We took a brief swim in the lake via Patrico´s private trail to the only beach on lake Tinquilco. Back in Pucon we took is easy and tried to hit the sack early for the early flight back to Santiago. Nothing too new to report on the cuisine, I guess I did have some ravioli´s stuffed with apples and blue cheese in a pesto cream sauce. I was told about an atlantic krill empanada which was the reason we tried the restaurant with the ravioli´s, but the empanada was made with a whole wheat dough which didn´t blend well with the rich krill and cheese. Should have brought the tapitio for that meal.

Back in Santiago we were picked up by Joce, our saviour, again from the airport. The four of us (Saulito was with us) went to the really old sky tram thingabob, you know, those things they have at amusement parks that slowly carry you across the park and enable a great view? Yup, just like that, only it´s way up above the city and you can see for miles. Saul was mesmerized, he was so busy staring he would blindly bite his giant cookie.

The following day Melanie and I got another good walk around the city, stopping at the big library, Santa Lucia, and got to visit a cafe con piernas. That night I made a typical Tony meal for Joce, Ari, and thier two friends. Coconut green curry with veggies, spicy fat noodles with egg and peanuts, buttery garlic mushrooms, coconut butternut squash soup, and Joce talked me into cooking baby octopus for the first time.

We went to bed and watched 24, did I mention Melanie and I are now hooked on this tv show? A great way to spend time in between Peru planning and packing.

On our last night in Santiago, Ari took us out to a really good meal at the best Indian restaurant in town. We hadn´t had Indian food in over a month and were dying to sink our teeth into some spicy Indian goodness. I got to have Indian style conger, which would be my last conger dish for hopefully not too long. I do love that fish-eel. Our hosts had really been wonderful, and they really made it easy to have as a home base in between locations with such great hospitality. We love Chile, if you didn´t already guess.

We flew into Lima this morning, and we yet to have any concrete plans. We know what we want to do, basically two weeks at a beach up north and two weeks around Cuzco and Machhu Pichhuu. The gist of our conundrum is that the better time to go to Cuzco would be at the end of our trip because there would be less rain. On the other hand, it would be much nicer to end our trip with two weeks at the beach. Thats the gist, there are other little details that don´t seem like much but do add up. Melanie just became sick as of yesterday, her throat is sore and feels pretty down. Taking a bus or flying to an extremely high altitude somewhere is not sounding good. Hopefully we will know more by tomorrow, and be assured that I will have heapfuls of fish in my belly, as the cuisine portion of this trip is about to summit. First meal today, which seemed like a touristy place and was not expecting much more than nutrients, had some great shrimp risotto with marinated red onions and pepers on top. Melanie had some spicy lentils and basmati rice cooked in raisins and arabic spices, yummy. Tommorrow we go ceviching!

Hope all is well back home

T&M inc.

Yo Quiero Comer........

2009-03-11T16:02:00.000-07:00

Whew! It´s been a little too long and I´ve got a little too much to report. Hoping to avoid some finger cramping on this post, I will attempt some mild hand yoga and hopefully all will be fine.

Let´s see, well, we left Punta Arenas and arrived late last Tuesday in Santiago. Brandon and Annie had arrived earlier in the day and took a bus to Valparaiso. We meet our new good friend Jocelyn and her husband Ari. These two extremely nice people picked us up from the airport at 10 even though they had to wake up early for work. They live in the Santiago hills and have a great house near a creek and lots of countryside to view, it does not feel like you are in a big city at all. Ari had to take their two year old son Saul (hopefully I´m spelling that right) to school in the morning, and would be back at their house around 11 to leave for work downtown and could give us a ride. Compared to our last time in Santiago, we took a very extended walk around the neighborhoods and got alot accomplished, completing alot of errands. I stupidly left our copy of the Peru guidebook on our plane ride down south and it needed to be replaced. Luckily we found a copy (paid double what we would in the states but it´s worth it), and I had a lovely visit to the Mercado Central. I say ¨I¨ because it is mainly a fish market, and Melanie was plugging her nose from the strong stench and visual feast of fishies. There were dozens of restaurants in between vendors, all had aggressive salesmen at the front of each establishment, doing all they could to get your business. I found a nice non-touristy place and ordered a small bottle of chilled wine for us. Our waiter was talking fast, looking to get our order in so he could get back to attacking the aisles for more potential customers. He recommended something, I said yes and I´m still not sure exactly what it was. I can say that it was one of the best pieces of fish I´ve ever had (I should also mention early in this post that there are more ¨best of´s¨ coming in this long winded post, and my taste buds have been hula-hooping in ecstasy). It may have been a tuna steak but seemed a little different. The texture was perfect, and it was served with a little bit of browned butter and salt. I could have kissed my waiter but his modern jheri-curl was dripping and I didn´t want to ruin the flavor that was still in my mouth. After we found a vegetarian restaurant for Melanie, food was decent, good enough to return in a pinch. The restaurant had been around for roughly 80 years, which is the oldest vegetarian restaurant we´ve ever encountered.

We meet up with Ari who had our bags in his car at work and he dropped us at the metro station. We caught a late bus to Valpo and called ahead to have the hostel let B&A know that we would bed a little late but still wanted to do dinner with them. Jocelyn and Ari happened to have an extra cell phone and lent it to us for our Chilean portion of the trip, score! Definitely has been very handy so far.

We arrived in Valparaiso and took a taxi up some very windy roads on the way to our hostel. The town is very reminiscent of a coastal Italian town, only with more variety in culture and an open art scene that is both beautiful and has a hair of squalor. The combination makes the city unique and worth visiting. After several near death experiences in the taxi, and him cursing out some would-be horrible drivers, we made it safely to our temporary place of rest. We were greeted by their adorable staff, they sat us in their living room and chatted with us for thirty minutes about the town and some other juicy stuff. Brandon and Annie arrived, and even though it had been less than 24 hours since we saw them, it was a welcome reunion. We were only going to have a few more nights together and we wanted to make the best of it while we could. There were several restaurants we wanted to try but many were closed (not really sure why either). We hit the streets, gallivanting downhill and taking in all the art painted on the buildings. After lots of ¨ooohhing¨and ¨aaahhhhing¨ we found an old timey restaurant at the bottom of the hill, the name was good enough convince me.

We entered Cinzano (yup, just like the drink, and the logo was exactly the same, and no they are not owned by them) and it was like entering a Chilean time machine. Lot´s of antique furniture, old black and white photos plastered the walls in between small animal heads and other figurines, a small cloud of smoke traipsed along the ceiling, and the music coming from the back of the cavernous room was tickling my ears. There was a small trio hammering out old Chileano folk tunes. We couldn´t see the piano or guitar player, but the women in her mid-fifties was belching out some latin goodness as we planted ourselves at a table in the rear. Our waiter was very kind, and luckily the advanced spanish student Annie helped us navigate our food order over the loud music. We arrived at a good time, the place filled up soon after we arrived. The food was decent, nothing to write home about (I suppose that is a bad metaphor since I am technically writing home about it right now), but I can say for the record that this is the first time I had my new favorite fish. It´s called Congrio aka conger and is pretty much like an eel. For visual enhancement, look here.

http://pescabenaluense.es/Images/Congrio/congrio3.jpg

It tastes pretty similar to cod, but is generally thicker and fatter. Pablo Neruda´s favorite dish is a Conger soup, I haven´t tried it yet but I hope to do so before we leave the country. I order it every time it´s on the menu and people here love it deep fried. We started a conversation with the table next to ours, two guys and a woman eating a pile of char-broiled sausages and steaks that was served over a small bed of flaming coals to keep it warm. They spoke some english and we some spanish, after several pisco sours and two bottles of wine you´d have thought we were best friends. They taught me a very important phrase, forgive me if my spelling is totally incorrect as I am an ignorant gringo, ¨bakativa de la casa¨, which effectivly means the ¨house¨ will give you a free digestive after a large meal. After practicing several times with our admiring teachers, I conjured up the courage to ask the waiter and it worked!

We slept in till at least noon and had a great breakfast of fresh fruit and home-made bread at our hostel. They even had real coffee rather than the norm which is Nescafe. Several games of cribbage and three large beers later (Brandon and I finally got some good cribbage time in), we hit the streets for a daylight walk around the city. We walked to the opèn air museum, which is pretty much like a barrio within a barrio with exceptional art and cobblestone streets. We walked all the way to the bottom of the hill and then hired a boat to drive us around the bay. The view was stellar from the water, and we got a close up and personal look at the massive cargo ships and navy boats parked off the coast some ways.

We walked up the steep roads to our hostel, stopping by a small mercado for some dinner groceries and a cheese empanada to hold us over. We had a simple risotto with lots of zucchini and a heaping pile of basil. Oh, I forgot to mention that we stopped by a an outdoor vegetable market earlier in the day, mostly uneventful except the really tan and hairy guy working the corner while blaring Bob Dylan said Brandon and I looked like the beach boys.

We went to bed early so we could wake up and rent a car. We headed north along the coast, our plan was to hit up one of the small sleepy beach towns which promised less people and cheap accommodations for a beach cabana. We landed in Maitencillo (I´m pretty sure I got this name wrong, please don´t quote me), and it had everything we were looking for. We found a nice little two bedroom place with a kitchen and a patio with view, and it was less than a 5 minute walk to the beach. The waves were roaring and perfect, the sand was soft in our toes, and guacamole never tasted so good while being kissed by the sunshine. The fierce cribbage action continued, I ended up beating Brandon 6-2 with alternating dealers (for those who care). We had leftover risotto with avocado and hard boiled eggs for lunch, sounds gross but believe me it was awesome at the time. I´m not sure if I mentioned our Tapitio situation, but Brandon and Annie had an extra water bottle full of Tapitio for us and we´ve been ravaging through it. You can see the bottle in some of the photos, bare in mind that the bottle was full just a few days before, I will continue to post updates on the situation as it is dire. We´re hoping that we won´t need it as much in Peru as they tend to eat spicier food in general.

We drank pisco and watched the sunset, our balcony providing excellent views. We cooked up a feast, shrimp cocktail with avocado and home-made sauce from Annie (we went through 4 avocados in our one day at the beach), Roasted taters with corn (notice the gigantic corn I´m playing with in the photo) in a peanut chili sauce, and refried beans made of fresh purplish beans we got from the Bob Dylan produce dude, and the first tortillas we´ve had in weeks. We played cards late into the night, it was our last night together (potentially, B&A might rejoin us in Peru if they are smart) and it was very special.

It was hard to leave the beach house the following day, we could have easily spent another week there doing nothing but cooking food and having some serious beach time. We drove back south around 1pm, we were meeting up with Ari and Joce in Vina Del Mar where we would be getting dropped off to stay with them for several nights. Brandon and Annie joined the group for lunch before heading back to Santiago. We were joined also by Ari´s parents and Saulito, and I got my second helping of conger served fried with slices of lemon. Ari let me try his plate of Macha, which is mussels that had their shells removed and then cooked in white wine, cream, and cheese. We said our goodbyes to B&A, the headed to Ari´s parents beachside apartment on the 17th floor. The apartment was immaculate, and had more great views of the beach and Valparaiso in the distance. Ari, Saul and I left the girls at the pool to try and attend a nearby soccer time, which had a big team from Santiago and the local team in Valparaiso. It was going to be Saul´s first soccer game ever (mine too for that matter) and he is mad about the sport. The game ended up being sold out which was a bummer, we could hear the crowd a mile away from the stadium of 10,000 going crazy after the first goal.

Later in the evening just the two couples went out to dinner in Valparaiso. Caruso´s ended up being one of the best meals I´ve ever had, and the cuisine was Peruvian influenced. We started off with some mixed seafood empanadas along with some type of raw fish with maybe a spicy saffron something or other sauce on it, damn good. The mouth watering entree was a type of strudel, a puff pastry wrapped around a giant serving up crab meat, nestled on top of a bed of sauteed spinach and lightly covered with hollandaise. The picture above does not do it justice.

Ari had to leave with his parents the following day, leaving Joce, Saul, Melanie, and I all by ourselves. We spent most of the day walking around the beach front, I had a had a fresh churro stuffed with dulce de leche. We talked until the sunset and went to bed early. The following day on the way back to Santiago we stopped and did a wine tour at a beautiful winery that was built over looking the casablanca valley. They were in the middle of harvest, and the smell was strong all around. The wine was decent, we grabbed a bottle to bring with us on our next leg of the trip. It really is too bad we can´t bring home a few cases with us, some extraordinary wines down here.

We drove back to Santiago and chatted, Melanie and I barely able to keep our eyes open after the wine tasting and the sleepy afternoon. Back at their house we got a chance to regroup, repack, and rethink our remaining days here in Chile. Ari and Joce highly recommended the City of Pucon as a great place to visit. We had a great meal with them at their house, it was great to have something home-cooked after eating out so many meals. We had some simple fish, veggies, mashed potatoes, and some great habanero hot sauce out of Ari´s stash. We tried some delicious little fruits that were green, very seedy, tasted very melon like, and no I can´t remember the name. Then we had some great ice cream, chocolate with fudge and another kind with a type of fruit that was delicious and has a name that I can´t remember either.

We caught a flight down to Temuco, then took a few hour bus ride out to Pucon. Had a brief layover in another town, we got off the bus and thought we were in the right spot, nope. Pucon is a great little town, looks alot like tahoe, very cabin like and lots of little shops. It sits right next to a large lake, and there is a gigantic active volcano that casts a shadow over the town, the perpetual smolder is omnipresent and creepy. But since we are close to a volcano, there are over 20 different hot springs around here, hopefully we will get a chance before we leave, our time seems to be disappearing rather quickly and we still have alot of Peru planning to do. Tomorrow we leave for a two night stay in Huerquehue national park. Lots of hiking to be done, only right now we are recovering from a 10 mile bike ride earlier this afternoon. It was epic in both beauty and butt pain. We got to a very private part of the lake that was great for a relaxing dip along the black sand beach, little chickens from a nearby ranch danced around us while we had a snack. The road was unforgivable bumpy, the rental moutain bikes were awesome and definitely helped us get there and back in one piece, only one of our pieces feels like it needs to be soaked in thermal water for several hours. We´ll have to settle for beer and nachos for the time being.

Whew! Didn´t think I was going to make it through that one. I´ve been having to split these suckers up in two days as it is quite the time sucker. Thankfully our hostel has beer on tap and happened to play some Parliment while I´m writing this.

Keep your fingers crossed for us dear readers, tonight we have to buy groceries, buy two plane tickets (on a peruvian website that has beeen giving us challenges), pack our bags, and feed ourselves within the next 70 minutes so the stores don´t close and we can get enough sleep to catch our early morning bus to the park. Gotta ask ourselves in this situation, what would George Clinton do?

-T&M

p.s. check out the Yerba Mate section at the grocery store, intense!

Last day in Punta Arenas.......

2009-03-03T06:13:00.000-08:00

Our time in Punta Arenas and Patagonia has been wonderful. Our hostel in Punta Arenas has probably been my favorite out of all the hostels in the world I´ve been. Lonely Planet gives it a somewhat drab description, which is very untrue. The place if very homey, nothing really modern except the big flat screen tv, but incredibly comfortable. The owner is extremely friendly and speaks good english. They provide a computer with free internet, and their kitchen is well stocked with lots of pots and pans and ample fridge space. You walk in and you feel at home to sit anywhere or touch anything. Our first night here we had a wonderful dinner with our new Dutch friends Fons (pronounced like the Fonze, only with an S, in his own words) and Margreet. Our dinner party also included a young british couple on a very long road trip. They bought a jeep in Santiago and drove it all the way down here at the end of the world. They had a pretty great story about a nasty rain storm in northern patagonia, the waterfalls next to the road flooded and created a small river making it near impossible to pass. They drove through anyhow and luckily made it despite water pouring in through their windows. There were locals on the other side of the ¨river´ taking photos of them the whole time. We stayed up late into the night drinking lots of wine and sharing stories. It was really nice to have some down time between the long flights and bumpy bus rides.

We left the following morning to catch a bus leading us to Puerto Natales where we would meet Brandon and Annie. We had a great introduction to the warm atmosphere the local people put off right when arrived at the bus terminal. Realizing that the little map we had in our guide book did not include the street our hotel was on, we knew we would have a small challenge on our hands finding the place. There were people at the bus station trying to hand you fliers to their hostel or buy a tour with them. We told them we had a hotel, and after giving them the name, one biggish taxi driver in a burgundy sweater vest offered to drive us there for free. He said he was a friend of the owners and was happy to do it, rad!

Our room was decent, it was great to have our own bathroom for a change. The place was a little far away from the main part of town but not too bad, probably helped prepare us for the long walks soon to come. Melanie and I went out to lunch and we were pretty hungry. It was a little late for lunch by Chile standards, and were lucky to find a nice looking place still open. I had heard of the King Crab down here being a specialty and was looking to sink my teeth into some. They brought out some really nice bread and butter which I scarfed down immediately while Melanie salivated (she doesn´t eat bread, pretty sure everybody knows but just in case). The big plate of crab was good, but really needed garlic butter to make it great, people down here love their mayo. The flavor was somewhat bitter, and lacked that smooth richness Alaskan crab has.

We made our way back to the hotel and meet up with B&A. It was great to see some familiar faces and knowing that more good times were ahead. We took a bus the following afternoon up to Parque Torres Del Paine. There was alot of headache trying to figure out what to do in this gigantic part, the headache coming in with too many options and not enough time. We talked to some people in PN and got some good advice on how to conquer the park in the short 3 day visit. It involved 8 hours of hiking per day, hitting the trail at 5am, needless to say we would be modifying that plan just a little bit. We would stop off at the Refugio (pronounced re-foo-he-o), where you could rent a bed or a campsite, along with the necessary gear. We had to take a catamaran to get there, it provided excellent views of giant mountains from a crystal blue lake (getting it´s color from the nearby glaciers), at a premium price. Being that the refugio was so remote, they jack up their prices for moderate accomodations, especially in the peak season which we are in. After a very long discussion, and Brandon accidentally asking the front desk woman if we could take her girlfriends back to our tent in spanish, we decided on renting two little domes to sleep in. We drank some box wine and dined on small sandwich fixings into the night. We never did see the front desk woman´s girlfriends.

We woke up the next day with rain clouds over our heads. Our plan was to leave most of our stuff with the refugio and take a day hike out to Glacier grey. We noticed that one of the other domes had completely blown over during the windy night, pretty lucky it didn´t happen to us. Suprisingly we didn´t hear anybody scream when that happened, that or we were too tired to care. We hit the trail at 10, and proceeded uphill to an extremely windy 20 kilometer hike. The further we hiked, the windier it got, breaking at times when the trail ran through a small amount of forest. Hiking along a ridge gave us incredible views over a lake and forests. Small amounts of glacier bits that had broken off upstream was lining the shore. Hopefully my blogging skills are improving, we reached the lookout, and this is what we saw.

After having a well deserved lunch of trail mix, dried fruit, and more avocado sanmich fixings, we headed back to the refugio. We were feeling somewhat taken by the inflated price at the refugio, didn´t want to risk the domes, and tried to decide what to do for the evening. We wanted to make our way north, over to the main refugio in the park, Hosteria Las Torres, were we could make a journey up to the granite towers. The only problem was that I heard through an email from the reservation person that the beds were all booked up and there was only camping available. The girls really wanted to sleep in beds, which was understandable since we had a hard day on the trail sucking on glaciers and being slapped around by the wind. We wanted to call and see if that was true but the refugio was saying they didn´t have a phone for us to use and was being rude about it. Brandon and Annie went back to Puerto Natales that night and Melanie and I went on to Las Torres to test our luck or get stuck in a rainy tent. After taking a boat, then a bus, then another bus that went over a bridge so narrow it had about 2 inches of clearance on either side, turns out Melanie´s enormous childhood collection of rabbits paws has finally paid off, they had a room with a bed for us. Well, ´bed´ might not be the right word, bunk beds in a room with a leaky ceiling and a bucket in the middle of the room to catch the rain drip is more like it. But hey, it was warm and we were tired.

The following morning we woke at sunrise to make the hike up to las torres. This was the busiest hike in the park and as it lacked in isolation, it exceeded in beauty. We were in the middle of an REI catalogue and the holes in ground from all the hiking poles were there to prove it. We heard numerous conversations about the different fabric certain outdoor clothing companies started to use and not all of their gear clothes were city worthy etc. Are we in Chile or Berkeley? The hike was pretty, we got snowed on briefly, and made it back to our base to catch the afternoon bus back to PN. Brandon and Annie had already made it to Punta Arenas so we caught the late bus to meet up with them, and dreamed about staying an extra night at our favorite hostel. Since we bought our tickets last minute, we couldn´t sit next to each other because all the other pre-assigned seats were taken. One of our seats was in the aisle at the very back of the bus, right next to the smelly bathroom. I let Melanie escape the stench and took my seat next to the lieu.

My travel mate/bus neighbor/mother/ and albino puppy owner took her seat next to me. I was a bit confused on how she was going to get away with bringing animals on the bus, along with her puppy. She positioned the half open corona box with her albino puppy in it on her lap, then her chubby 5 year old squeezed in front of her legs between the seat. She must have noticed the puzzled look on my face because she motioned for me to sit down. I knew immediately that it was not going to work out, and I grabbed the albino beer box puppy and set it on my lap. She rather appreciated my gesture, and for the rest of the ride offered me handfuls of junk food and sugary sweets when she could pry them from her kids dirt stained hands. I pretended to sleep most of the way as the child kept trying to make conversation with me, and when I couldn´t respond due to the lack of spanish, he would look at his mom as if I was crazy and probably had some sort of learning disability.

Made it back to Punta Arenas and have been feasting like kings. Melanie made a big pot of soup yesterday and it was great to have after doing alot of hiking and eating cold food for several days. Yesterday we took a boat to and island through the straights of Magellan, where we visited a penguin colony of over 100,000. The penguins are well, I told them you all said hi and they thanked you for the christmas card.

This morning we had a roasted red pepper frittata with chard and buckets of gruyere along with roasted taters. We were tired of lots of places claiming they have ´real¨ breakfast, when really its just bread, jam, and armpit flavored coffee. Brandon and Annie just left for Santiago, then they are taking the evening bus to Valpariso. Our flight is later this evening, we are getting picked up by a friend of our good friend Molly. Joce is kind enough to put us up for the night, and hopefully she will be joining us later in wine country and joining the Tony and Melanie army of friends.

Thats all from this end, just killing time in our hostal, El Fin Del Mundo. Some Australian bicycle tourists just showed up and are throwing their water proof totes everywhere. Gotta run before they start throwing punches, much love to everybody and we´ll give you the update when we can.

T&M inc.

Fresh from the Desert.....

2009-02-24T18:39:00.001-08:00

Howdy gang, Melanie and I arrived in Punta Arenas, Patagonia several hours ago. We had a long day of traveling, two 4 hour flights from the top of the country to the bottom of the world. We just had dinner and drank a bottle of wine so bare with me on this post.

We just spent 5 days in San Pedro de Atacama (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Pedro_de_Atacama). Some of our plans didn´t work out as we thought, but was made up in other ways. Our little blue rental car was a blessing and curse, more of the former than the latter. More on that later.

We spent our first evening visiting valle de la luna, a national park a 10 minutes drive out of town. We started off hiking through some lava caves, although we didn´t know the caves were part of the trail and it was a good thing we had our head lamps. There was a group of young Chileans hiking throughout the cave, using their cell phones as lights. You could say we saved their lives, although I don´t think they thought of it that way.

We then drove out to a very old salt mine that sat behind a few boulders that were in the middle of the desert. The boulders were a main attraction of the park, we didn´t find out why until later, apparently they are 1,000,000 years old. The salt mines were nice, only I had to hold Melanie back from wanting to lick the ground and I wore out my arms from her determination.

We ended our time at the park climbing a giant sand dune and from there climbing out through a rocky mountain valley to watch the sunset. We could tell why the park was called Valley of the Moon, walking around the park had strong moon like qualities. The pictures don´t do it justice, the few I´ve posted here make them look tiny, trust us, they were HUGE!

We found out that there were some hot springs along with waterfalls and swimming pools 15 miles out of town. The following day we piled into the great blue clunker and headed northwest. Not far from town, the road was so incredibly riveted and bumpy that we couldn´t venture forward. Somewhat bummed to miss out on the hot springs, we heard of some man-made swimming pools south of town, Pozo 3 (not sure why the number 3 is here, it´s not like there were two others). It was pretty much a Chilean family picnic grounds that had a giant pool, 30ft deep in the adult section. It was a great way to beat the heat for a little while, the sun in this desert is a force to be reckoned with. I did mention it is considered the driest place in the world right? In town they have a stop light displaying the danger levels of solar rays. During the afternoon (code purple) it says that white folk like us shouldn´t be in the sun for more than 11 minutes at a time!

After swimming we decided to continue the drive since we were already out of town. We headed East towards the Andes, a slow and steady climb up to around 4,000 meters. There are several flamingo reservations around San Pedro, we wanted to find one of the few in high elevation. The drive was beautiful, crisp clear blue skies and a great view of a volcano in front of us as we ascended. The lonely road ran parallel to a giant canyon, giant boulders lining the walls. We saw a pack of wild alpacas grazing in the mountain range. Apparently the alpacas love it up there because they and see their predators (pumas) from miles around, not many places to hide in the desert range. I pulled over to take a few photos of the alpacas and the high elevation really hit me. I was totally fine in the car, but taking two steps left me faint of breathe and wanting to keel over. We decided it was enough high elevation for the day and figured we would let the flamingos play by themselves. We headed back to town for some dinner and sleep. Melanie got some mushroom risotto made with a fruit that only grows in the Atacama desert, Chañar. They made a sweet flavored Chañar reduction to top the risotto and it was lip smacking good.

We the had an appointment with a french astronomer to take a tour of the stars. Northern Chile is supposed to be one the best places in the world for some star gazing, they have some giant observatories here. You needed reservations a month in advance, we settled for the local tour. Our appointment was for 9pm and was going to be 2 hours long. We had dinner first at a restaurant down the street thinking we had plenty of time. We arrived at their door 5 minutes before 9 and waited around for someone to show. A few minutes after 9 we heard some voices inside their office and knocked on their wooden door. The people inside informed us that the tour left 20 minutes earlier, and as it turns out, our travel time piece is, well, it´s a piece of something that doesn´t involve time. We missed our tour and were really bummed, partially because it was the whole reason we rented a car in the first place. But, since we had the car, we figured we would go star gaze by ourselves. A 20 minute drive out of the tiny 3,5000 person village left a bright sky even brighter. The milky way was hovering over us so close we wanted to grab it with our hands.

Our last day in the desert we decided to give the high elevation another try, this time we were armed with some special tea that locals drink to help the blood get to their brain, making it easier to acclimate. Our destination was two alpine lakes that had breeding grounds for flamingos, what seemed just an hour from town on our map. Well, 45 minutes out of town it turned into a dirt road, and we were hoping it was better condition than the road to the hot springs. It was, for the first 45 minutes. The scenery was desolate and beautiful. As far as the eye could see was desert and mountains. The slow and steady climb with out little putt-putt car started to get more difficult as the road worsened. We were getting passed by speeding tour buses with 4 wheel drive. People would just stare at us like we ate the wrong end of a snake. We eventually made it after 2 hours on the road, Melanie´s back was killing her from the bumpy ride. Blah blah blah, more gorgeous mountains, pretty lakes, is this getting repetitive or what? They wouldn´t let us go down to the water as it is protected flamingo territory. I want to say we saw herds of flamingos, frolicking and fornicating, but I wouldn´t be telling the truth. We were in the wrong part of the season, and we only saw several lone flamingos, and they were so far away we could barely make out the lines of their thin bodies.

We drove back to town, rocking out to Chairmen of the Board on our little travel speakers (we didn´t have the cable for the auxillary input in our car and the local radio was terrible). We were pretty grateful for the rental car, it was difficult at times, but we saw some great stuff thanks to it. It was also much better than donig stuff on a tour.

We woke up at 5am the following day to catch our flight back to Santiago from the Shithole. After getting yelled at by a bus driver for driving down the wrong way on an unmarked one way street, we luckily navigated ourselves back to the airport just in time for our flight. Most of the 9 hours on a plane down to patagonia was uneventful, except for one of the coolest things we´ve ever seen in our lives. South of Puero Montt, we got to witness the legendary volcano Chaiten erupt from the sky on a clear blue day.

http://uk.reuters.com/article/scienceNewsMolt/idUKTRE51I77H20090220

see other cool Chaiten pix here, some amazing action last year with volcano battlin a lightening storm.

http://www.rumormillnews.com/cgi-bin/archive.cgi/noframes/read/124233

We are meeting up with our dear friends Brandon and Annie tomorrow, then we head off to Torres Del Paine national park.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torres_del_Paine_National_Park

That is all for this report, I cheated and finished this post the following day. It was too hard to stay up after the long day and wine. We met a great Dutch couple, and today we went to a maritime museum where they had pictures and artifacts from Sir Ernest Shackleton´s (one of my heroes) great voyage to the south pole in 1914. If any of you haven´t seen The Endurance, you need to rent it now. We are going to make some squash and musrhoom risotto tonight. The squash here are the size of horse heads. The mercados here cutt of 1/16 pieces for about a dollar. I also go some local scallops (at least I think they are scallops) that I´m going to cook in some chili and lime butter.

much luv to all of you back home

T$M

OI Vei! with a capital Ñ

2009-02-21T09:38:00.000-08:00

Whew, what a whirlwind. Well, we´re here, despite a few bumps in the road. We got stuck in Lima by the international narcotics authority. They thought Melanie´s bag of unmarked vitamins were drugs. We got strip searched and vocally abused in several languages. They took our camera, passports, and credit cards then let us loose to survive and whatever means possible. JUST KIDDING! Sorry moms, had to mess with you a little bit.

We are now in San Pedro de Atacama, a small desert town in northern chile. Sorry we didn´t post earlier, this has been the first crack at the internet since we´ve been here. We arrived into Santiago on the morning of the 19th. We took a taxi to our hostel in the Provedencia region of Santiago. Our place was nice and quiet, exactly what we were looking for after traveling for 24 hours straight. The room was a little dark and had bunk beds in them. We had to go through another person´s room to get to ours, luckily it was the habitat of a very nice older Canadian Terry. Terry teaches English, and lives in South America 5 months out of the year to beat the cold in the great white north. He was a great resource to have so early in the trip. We unpacked our bags and took a good long, well deserved nap, me on top of the rickety bunk bed. I had a bookshelf a foot above me so every time I turned over my arm hit the thing. Luckily no serious bunk bed injuries transpired.

Woke up from our nap and desperately needed food and water. Terry told of us of a nearby grocery store and bank. We walked around the neighborhood that was bustling with young Chileans and business people alike. Santiago reminds me of a Latin Portland, lots of trees everywhere and the hipster youth factor was abundant. We were testing the waters of restaurants that meet Melanie´s inscrutable dietary restrictions. Nothing seemed of particular interest so out of sheer hunger we decided to cook our first meal here in Chile. Luckily I brought one of my Henckels cooking knives which is an invaluable possession to have while traveling. You never know when you will need to cook and it´s hard to rely on wonky hostel kitchen utensils. We cooked up some rice with zucchini, had a very fresh avocado and soft chilean cheese on top, delicious! Can´t believe we forgot Tapitio though.

We then took the metro and walked around the Bellavista area, lots of street art and is the hub of the night life in town. It was getting close to sunset and we got some great photos of the art. We decided to head back for some relax time and then to dinner. Dinner proved to be somewhat difficult and we put that down as strike number two in Melanie´s food quest. We went to an Italian restaurant (lots of Italian influence in this country) that was down the street from our hostel. We sat down and tried to get a menu, the waiter didn´t speak any english, I tried to ask for a menu and he was basically saying there was none. Not sure if it was some prejudice against us or there was some secret sign language for getting fed, either way we split and found an empty chinese place. Melanie had some plain veggies with rice and we had a hell of time trying to ask for hot sauce, which we were unsuccessful. We did get a small plate of pickled peppers which were good.

The following morning we woke with a big breakfast on our minds and getting back to the airport for our 4 hour flight up to northern Chile. We made a big breakfast of eggs and chard with the leftover avocado and great cheese. We bid farewell to Terry, wishing we had exchanged email addresses, but we´ll get back to that later in the story.

We took the busy subway to a bus stop, trying to keep ourselves from falling over with our heavy packs on our backs. Since we´re going to be in many types of climates, we had to have many clothes options. Anyhow, teetering tottering back and forth, we made it to the bus stop and luckily there was a bus just about to leave for the airport. When we checked in, we realised our brains were still fried from the jet lag and previous few days long journey to notice that we were an extra hour early for our flight up north. Could have used that sleep in a comfy bed! Oh well, no rest for the wicked.

The flight was serene, a glorious view of the andean mountain range the entire flight. Some of the mountains and volcanoes were higher than the plane was flying (around 20,000 feet!). There were great scenes of the desert turning into sand and ending into the deep blue ocean, just incredible. Wish we more time to explore the northern coast. The plane turned inland towards Calama, to quote our Lonely Planet guide book, it´s a shithole in the middle of the desert. A run down town that has survived off the surrounding copper minds. It´s the closest airport to our current residence in San Pedro. Our plan was to rent a car and drive to San Pedro. We didn´t have a reservation for the car, moving up the north bay right before leaving for the trip left us somewhat unprepared for certain destinations, not impossible to accomplish by any sense though. Most of the car rental agencies were totally out of cars. One place said they might have a car if we waited around for 20 minutes. A wonderful and interesting man Eric came to our rescue from the Budget rental agency. He spoke great english for Chilean standards, and had a very rich British accent, so rich it was kind of weird. He had one car left for us and was very helpful. He has lived his whole life up here in the desert, and is also fluent in German.

An hour later we were on our way to San Pedro. The challenge was getting through Calama. We were given vague instructions on how to get to the freeway towards San Pedro, and we ended up getting lost in nasty Calama for 45 minutes. At this time we were both starving and really needed water and did not want to stop in this town. The desert here is considered the driest place in the world. Within an hour of being here I could feel my hands and skin dry up (and I´m a guy, I normally don´t notice that sort of thing). The 100km drive was gorgeous. The sun was setting behind us and casting all sorts of orange and blue lights that slathered the snowy tips of the Andes with color. Too bad our camera was in the trunk, more focused on getting some food and water to pull over. We got 3 more nights here so I´m sure there will be alot of good photo opportunites.

We arrived in the very small village that was bustling with tourists on foot, along with a few cars and a horse. The dirt roads were bumpy and hard to navigate through the narrow streets. The need of food, water, and a place to leave our packs was overwhelming, and making it difficult to concentrate. We ended up turning down a road that was only supposed to be for people walking, we got yelled at by a big group of tribal native musicians and their crowds of fans. One nice guy who didn´t speak english helped us figure out how to get the hell out of there and where we could park.

After several confusing turns we found a place to park and set off on foot with our heavy packs, looking for a hostel first, as it was getting really late and we wanted to make sure we had a bed to sleep in. We got a dormitory room in a surprisingly clean hostel all to ourselves. We quickly found a restaurant that looked to have Melanie friendly food. The place was a really fancy, the outdoor dining patio had adobe walls and a thin wood awning with a nice fireplace in the middle. I scarfed down some bread served with a peanut-mint salsa that was delicious. I tried to serve melanie some cubes of butter, or a drink from the olive oil bottle but she declined. Our first real Chilean meal arrived and we were overjoyed. Melanie got a big bowl of a thick and dark quinoa with lots thinly sliced veggies and a tasty citrus sauce. I got a mint risotto that was combined with mashed potatoes, served with a heaping pile of shrimp, salmon, and the freshest calamari with a tomato cream sauce. Yup, it was tasty. We opted out on drinking wine this night, being too out of it to consume alcohol. We did have a small glass on the plane ride up north, which was surprisingly good for being plane ride wine.

Sleep was on our minds and hard to come by. There was some crazy loud thumpity thump music going on nearby with a super annoying MC. The music would stop for 5 minutes, we thought it was over, then it would just be the MC screaming in spanish, then music and screaming, then music, then silence, then music, then the MC etc. We fell asleep eventually and it was awesome.

Thats pretty much it for now. We´re going to try and see some flamingos this afternoon in a nearby national park. Tomorrow we have an appointment with an astronomer to give us a star tour. The stars here are indescribable. Hope everybody is well back home, please feel free to pass the blog along to anybody you think would find it interesting.

-t

P.S. bet you wondering when I would get back to Terry and his contact info. Well, on our way to the airport in SF, we stopped by REI and Melanie bought a new Marmot jacket that was the end all be all of jackets and especially great for this trip. Well, she accidentally left the soft shell (aka liner) of the jacket at our hostel in Santiago. Kind of a bummer, but I´m keeping the faith that we will be able to retrieve it with a lot of optimistic thoughts, and a serious amount of luck. Keep your pinkie toes cross for her por favor.

Kick Off baby!

2009-02-15T10:39:00.000-08:00

Howdy folks, welcome to our new blog. We (Melanie and I) will be posting here during our upcoming travels to South America. We are a bit overwhelmed right now, leaving in 3 days! We just moved into our cozy new house in Cotati. We are living with our good friends Sabin, Xochitl (pronounced "so-chee"), and their 6 month old baby Yona. It's been a challenging move, and we couldn't have done it without the help from massive friendpower, and my Dad for storing most of our junk at his place in C-Dale. We can try to finalize the the things on our many "to-do" lists, hopefully we can get it done in the next three days.

We're starting off the first month in Chile. We arrive in Santiago and stay for just a few days before flying to the Atacama desert in the far north. There we have a reservation with a local french astronomer who will give us a guided tour of the stars close to the new moon. After that we fly to the opposite end of the country (kinda crazy distance wise), to Punta Arenas. There we are meeting up with our friends Brandon and Annie and checking out Patagonia for a week. After that some days in their wine country, and hopefully a good amount of beach time.

Much love going out to all of you, we hope t hear from you on our travels.

T&M