Happy New Year! 

And just like newborn babes, we stumble out of my mother's care on our own again at 6am. We navigate the flight over, which I won't revisit, and land in the tiny Puerto Iguazu airport. Erin asks if I had looked up how to get to the hostel we had booked (which she had reminded me to do back in BA). No, but it'll be fine. Our bigger problem was that in my haste to take out money to pay for our tickets this morning, I took just about exactly what was necessary, and no more. Now here we are with enough money for maybe our bags to go into town without us and the one ATM is broken. that was a fun problem. but hey, you've got to crawl before you can walk.

We arrived at our pension at 10am, dropped off our things and hopped on the bus to Iguazu national park. A friend of ours said she had spent one day but could have stayed for a few more, so we were expecting the park to be quite large. In honesty, if we hadn't been so tired, we could have easily done the park in one day, that's just the kind of travelers we are. But since we decided to take a nap in the shade for a couple hours, and I was toying with the whole "take your time" travel idea (i think erin was of the same mind), we decided to take the two day pass. 

At the entrance there's a picture of a family walking down a trail surrounded by a dozen little creatures, with some tagline about how much nature is in the park. I thought it was one of those setup shots where they probably have a bunch of food in their pocket, luring all the animals for that one perfect shot. That was until we walked about 100 feet into the walking trail and were met by a dozen little creatures walking all around the trail. they were a mix of raccoon and monkey, and we were a little intimidated by them - quick hide the food and water bottles! But luckily tourists haven't turned the coati's into dependent scavengers. they just walk around, burrowing their noses in the ground looking for ants, uninterested in the groups of people taking their pictures. In the end erin had to convince me not to grab one of the little ones and stuff him in my bag to take home.

The falls themselves are, as you can imagine, pretty spectacular. there is such an immense quantity of water falling into this whole in the world. We took all the paths to see the tops and bottoms of all the cascades on the Argentinian side. The Brazilian side is where you get the closest to the Devil's Throat, which is the highest flowing part of the system, and we were hoping to go there on the third day but that never happened (waiting at the border for an hour for a bus didn't help our tight schedule).

Leaving Puerto Iguazu mid-day, we crossed into Brazil. Brazil! Hooray! Although I am sincerely sad that we didn't get to hike patagonia, I am so excited that we get to explore Brazil for a month. I have grown up being Brazilian, and speaking the language, but in my 30 years, I've only been to Rio and Sao Paulo, mostly spending my time with family, hardly sight-seeing, and never choosing what we were going to see, so this is going to be my chance to do it. And as much weight as we'd gained in BA with my mom, I was planning on doubling it eating all the delicious Brazilian food, and drinking the juices and caipirinhas.

It took us long enough to cross the border that we didn't get to see the Brazilian side of the falls, and it turns out Florianopolis is a popular place to go, therefor the bus there was sold out, and we opted to go part of the way to Curitiba on a sleeper bus. We spent the afternoon sitting at an outdoor restaurant, eating as much rice and beans as we wanted, chatting, and reading until our overnight bus. 

The bus ride itself was not as relaxing as the websites make them out to be. As much as erin complains that I could sleep on a donkey in the middle of the day while a mariachi band plays, that doesn't mean i would sleep well. 

But yet we forged on, arriving in Curitiba at 7am, finding a hotel, dropping off our bags, and going to the train station to catch an 8:30am train through the southern rainforest. BAM, we're back to being lions of travel.

This train is one of the few in Brazil, and exists pretty much solely for tourism. We wound our way through the hills, overlooking vast valleys covered in thick green vegetation, saw waterfalls, remains of disused train stations from the old days, waved at all the small children that came out to watch the train ride past, had another caseiro (homestyle) buffet lunch, tried ginger ice-cream (but stuck to coconut and passionfruit) and took a nap by a river where the boys came up with different ways to almost kill themselves by flipping off the high banks.  Most people apparently just take the bus back, and on our slow train ride back we could see why, but we made it back, and after a shower and a quick rest, we went out into the city for dinner.

The following morning we packed up and headed south to Florianopolis. We arrived in the early afternoon, and hopped on a local bus that took us to Lagoa da Conçeçao, a lake in the middle of the island.  We were dropped off at a campsite, which was not the one we'd planned on staying at, but it turned out to be more fun, as we quickly made friends and spent the evening drinking communal caipiroskas with locals, regulars, and foreigners. 

The next day we got up early, and after finding a coffee (surprisingly a difficult task) headed over the hill to the beach. What a gorgeous day that was. We spent all day playing in the crystal blue surf, sitting on a beautiful sand, and eating grilled cheese on a stick and fresh juices. The next day we hauled our packs to another beach to get in some more sun before we headed to the bus station and learned the difference between a vitamin (fruit/milk shake) and batida (alcoholic mix drink). Live and learn. 

This week made Brazil for me. It was the country I was looking for, and there are still two more weeks to explore. Next we're headed north to Sao Paulo, then Paraty, Rio and Salvador Bahia. No way one blog post could contain that all. Til next time!

-SB

Waterfalls and cooking.   Those are the two things I want to write about in this post, and I've been trying in vain to come up with a clever way to link them together.  You don't necessarily cook while looking at waterfalls, and the water doesn't need food to keep it falling.  I thought about switching the two topics for things that matched a little better, but Iguazu comes next in the itinerary, and I've been looking forward to writing about food for weeks.  So I just have to settle on having two slightly unrelated topics to try to work in a clunky transition between.  So here goes.

For those of you who haven't heard of Iguazu Falls, it's a series of waterfalls right on the border of Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay.  It was one of the places that we had hoped to get to, but as our pocketbooks and time remaining got thinner and shorter, respectively, we talked of cutting it out of the trip.  It'll always be there, it's right in-between Buenos Aires and Brazil (and all of Steph's family) so it wasn't like the opportunity to see it wouldn't come up again.  In fact, we had all but made that decision, when fate took control and sent a rather irresponsible camper to Patagonia to start a forest fire.  The next thing you know, trails are closed, backpackers are evacuated, and we're on our way north instead of south.  As sad as I was to miss out on Patagonia (and the friends who were going to meet us there), I think in the end it probably worked out for the best.  We got to see the waterfalls AND have an extra 9 days in Brazil.  Not such a bad alternative.  

As I was saying, Iguazu Falls is an incredible series of waterfalls on the borders of three countries.  And when I say incredible, I mean it.  Niagara eat your heart out.  I don't even know how it's possible for the Iguazu River to sustain the intensity of the falls 24 hours-a-day, seven days-a-week.  It was so much water, it seemed like it would have to run out sometime.  But no, on and on it goes.  At the main falls, the water fell with such intensity that standing 100-meters away the spray was so strong I could probably have taken a shower and shampooed my hair.  It was really incredible.  Unfortunately, this also meant that the town of Puerto Iguazu, where we decided to stay, was damp all the time.  We stayed at an inn, that was really just a room in someone's house, and it was probably one of the worst places we've stayed so far.  It was so damp everything was a little moldy and breathing was not easy.  This was something that might (emphasis on 'might') have been acceptable before we stayed with Steph's mom in Buenos Aires, but after the luxury it was like a slap in the face.  Back to reality.  

Due to the state of our accommodations, and how aware we were becoming of the limited amount of time we had left before returning home (as of this writing we return in exactly one month), we cut our time in Iguazu short by one day, jumped on an overnight sleeper bus to Curitiba (more on that in the next post), and felt satisfied that while we had not hiked Patagonia (one of the things I was looking forward to the most), we had at least seen one of the world's most amazing waterfalls and successfully crossed the border into Brazil nine days early.

As this epic trip is winding down, I've been starting to take stock of the places I've been, the things I've seen and experienced, and if it was all worth it/I accomplished anything besides seeing some really amazing places.  The biggest reason I decided to take this leap and travel the world this year was not to see things like Iguazu or Petra or Patagonia, though each of those places would be worth traveling the world to visit independently.  It biggest reason was to experience the food.  Having worked in restaurants since I was 15 (some better than others, I do count my years at Taco Bell and Olive Garden in there, since I certainly learned a lot about mass production), I have come to better understand how cooks learn.  Going to culinary school is one thing, and I would never discount what I learned there, because it provided me with an amazing knowledge base from which to build on, but it's not where I really learned to cook.  Cooks first learn to cook from other cooks, then second by experiencing new things and deconstructing how they were made.  For the most part, up until this point in my career my learning has been entirely the former.  Everyone in a professional kitchen has something to teach you, even the guy who clearly should have chosen another profession.  Which means I've spent 16 years collecting as many techniques, recipes and cooking theories as I could, in an attempt to become the best cook possible.  Because I love what I do.  I love the process, I love the exactness and inexactness, and I love the satisfaction that comes from mastering a new skill - each new skill adding a new level of understanding to the process.

The problem was, finally being at the point in my career where I felt comfortable enough in my understanding of that process, it was time to run a kitchen.  But when that opportunity unexpectedly presented itself, I realized that I wouldn't feel fully confident in that role until I had a larger base of the second kind of knowledge on which to draw from.  So I needed to get out, go to Morocco and Prague and Brazil, experience some new kinds of foods, flavor combinations and techniques and bring those back to help make any kitchen I run a slightly stronger and more interesting place to eat (and cook).  So this, in a nutshell, is why I came on this trip.  To be better at what I do.  

I know that when we first designed this blog, Steph and I both set aside a section of the site under the title 'wandering education,' and it was my intent to write about the things I was learning about food.  I have to say, it's hard enough to find time to write one blog post, let alone an entirely separate post just about food, so I'm sorry for anyone that was interested that I had to abandon that page so quickly.  But rest assured, I have been keeping notes in a journal along the way, and with Steph's help, I've been keeping track of some of my favorites along the way.  It's been fun.  Often during the course of a meal I'll say something like, "do you think this is something that could work at Heirloom (the restaurant I used to work at in San Francisco)? What if we changed this around, added a little of that, made this component into a salad instead, and then made a little sauce out of this? Yeah, that would work, and it would be really good.  I wonder what Matt would think about pairing with it?"  Like I said, it's been fun, exciting and educational.  Isn't that what all students hope their classes will be?

Some places that we've been were a little more educational than others, much like that guy in the kitchen that you're certain isn't going to last more than a few months before he heads off to get a job at a record store.  But I've taken as much information as I could, and I wanted to write a tiny bit on some of the highlights along the way (when have I ever been accused of writing a 'tiny' bit).

Morocco was one of the more disappointing places that we visited, and maybe because I had such high hopes for the food.  I expected highly spiced couscous with braised lamb and harissa paste.  I was looking forward to seeing the tagines (a traditional Moroccan clay pot), and tasting the difference that these pots can make (having never actually used one).  Aside from one meal which was pretty amazing, the rest of the food we had in Morocco was generally bland.  Though, the one meal we had (which I've already written about), will be one that I will try to adapt to Californian tastes at home.  Chicken, onions, potatoes, oranges, peas and spices all cooked together in a tagine, and served alongside couscous and chicken broth.  It doesn't sound all that exciting, but it was so perfectly done it was fantastic.  

Somewhere that I hadn't expected to fall in love with the food but did was Prague.  Prague is all about the charcuterie - roasted pork, smoked ham, sausages, dried and cured meats, homemade cheeses and surprisingly, pickled sausages and cheeses.  I had never even heard of pickled cheese before.  Surprising as it was, it paired perfectly with the light Czech-style pilsner that the city is known for.  I have long admired the restaurants that create their own charcuterie (not terribly common in San Francisco, extremely common in Prague), and thought it could be great to try making some house-smoked meats, and hand-pulled cheeses (maybe even pickled) with fresh condiments like pickled mustard seeds and fresh grated horseradish.  

A country that I did expect to have amazing food and it lived up to all expectations was Israel.  I have always loved Israeli food - hummus, eggplant, tabouli salad, falafel and shawarma - and it was even better in the homeland.  Everything in Israel is served with pickles and a salad, either a cucumber-tomato salad or a very lemony tabouli salad (basically bulgar and parsley), which makes the act of eating all of the small plates extra enjoyable.  All of the flavors are distinct, separate and mix perfectly well together.  It made me think, what if you made a salad out of perfectly fried falafel, fresh heirloom tomatoes, summer cucumbers, parsley and lemon, served it alongside a bed of smooth lemony hummus, added some grilled eggplant or chicken, then topped it with fried chickpeas?  Wouldn't that be almost everything I loved about Israeli food on one plate? Maybe a drizzle of tahini and a sprinkle of chili pepper?  My mouth waters just thinking about it.

South America has a food culture that I was/am most excited to explore.  In Argentina there are empanadas and chimichurri, in Brazil there are pasteis, fruits I've never seen before and a strong African influence that I'm hoping to see more of as we work our way north.  Empanadas and pasteis got me thinking about how much the world likes stuffed pockets.  It seems like you can take almost anything and wrap it in a crispy dough, and people will be happy.  In Argentina the pockets are baked, in Brazil they are deep-fried, elsewhere in the world they are boiled, pan-seared, served cold, hot or somewhere in-between, but the idea is always the same.  The problem with serving something like that in a nice restaurant is that pockets are a bit…well…plebean.  They're street food.  Can those be translated to an upscale restaurant, or are they best left for the street venders?  I'm interested in giving it a shot.  Afterall, the French have done pretty well with wrapping things in a crust, calling it 'en croute,' and selling it to high society.  Why not in California?

I've obviously skipped a lot.  There were small things - the impossibly crisp fish and chips in Australia, the grilled ground meat served with fresh sheep's cheese and onions in Bosnia, braised lamb and potatoes cooked underground in New Zealand and everything else in-between.  But this is what this trip has been about for me so far.  Broadening my horizons, thinking of ways to twist those new ideas into usable prototypes for the type of restaurant I love in California, and planning ways to become better at my job.  So far so good.  One month left and I'm still learning.  Next up?  Northern Brazil and Mexico.  My mouth is watering already.

-EC

Ah, home again. no matter that I've only been here one other  time, there is something about going to a parents house that breeds that homey  feeling - mainly that of lethargy and reverting to having decisions made for  you. We are traveling lions that turned into little lambs, needing shepherding  most of the time. 

For example, in  all of the cities we visited so far we had never taken a tourist hop-on hop-off bus (special thanks to Rick Steves), but ok, we'll try it (I don't recommend it in B.A.s). Then we have a day touring the city on our own and realized halfway  through the day we'd forgotten my mom's recommendations, and wandered around somewhat helplessly. This is followed with my mom asking, "did you do ____?" uh, no, we couldn't remember the name of the place you told us to go. "Oh, jeez. Well I'll just have to take tomorrow off then to show you around or you won't see anything." (Can't be mad about that)

 We went to the ballet, getting all dolled up in my mom's clothes, and almost wearing high heels, although it was lucky we didn't because even mom's fancy flats gave us blisters. We also had an amazing dinner with my mom's friends, who are a riot and if we hadn't been such grandma's they probably could have stayed there all night gabbing away.

Besides having a comfortable place to stay, a personal tour guide, gaining 5 pounds each due to overconsumption of empanadas and steak, we also had ample internet on which to plan our trip to Patagonia and Brazil. We had planned to go to Iguazu falls on our way into Brazil, but because Patagonia is so far away from the rest of the world, we were having a rough time figuring out how to get back up there and have enough time to visit the planned route of Brazil. Ok, we'll figure it out later, now we're going kayaking in Tigre (how cool would it be to say you were from "Tiger"?).  

While kayaking, admiring the little houses that lined the numerous canals, and trying to keep up with the boat containing my mom and the guide, who could paddle faster than Erin and I by himself, we chatted with a guy who tagged along with us. Oh you plan on going to Patagonia? Did you hear that some hiker started a forest fire and they're evacuating the whole Chilean side of the park? Nuh-uh. Yeah, you might want to rethink that.

So we got a workout keeping up with mom, all while worrying whether a) our friends were ok (they were) b) if our Patagonia leg was going to happen and c) what was going to happen with the flight that we'd bought down there.  We begrudgingly decide to cut out Patagonia and try to change our flight Iguazu. It was a bit heartbreaking. So we call Aerolinas Argentinas and had a very pleasant experience changing our flights, and in the process we were going to get reimbursed $39! sweet.

That settled we prepared for new years eve. One of the things I loved that my mom cooked for me growing up was shrimp pie. Sounds weird, like many of the more latinate things that I grew up with, it probably is, but it's delicious. So we went to the supermarket and had to buy everything for it, including the pie tin, because my mom doesn't really cook anymore (i love getting that reinforcement that it runs in the family). We couldn't find all the ingredients, but we went ahead with it  anyway. We came home, made it, put it in the oven, went to go hang out in the living room and 30 minutes later, bam, we'd burnt the crust. oops. Despite these setbacks, the pie tasted pretty good and I was told that a few days later (per usual), it tasted great.

Dinner over, we hung out together and watched an awesome impromptu firework display right in front of the apartment building. This was the second firework display we'd gotten to see and we enjoyed it much more than my 17 year old mini-schnauzer. Nike (named after the goddess of victory, not the shoe), survived a stroke earlier in the year and held on in order to see me (she obviously knew I was coming). I was worried she would have a heart attack with all the fireworks, but she just huddled in the back of the apartment and we able to comfort her when it was over.

After a few, brief hours of sleep, we headed to the airport to embark on our next adventure. Mom asked if she should come inside and help us, but no no, we can handle it, love you, mwah. 
 
Man, I wish she'd come in. We should've known that our experience had been all too easy, because when we went to collect our tickets, not only were we not going to get a reimbursement, they were CHARGING us to get on on our flight. Our inability to argue in spanish (even if we had studied it, I don't think they teach you "This is Bullsh…" in spanish class), and the closing flight time meant we ponied up the cash. So, unless you speak fluent spanish and enjoy litigating, try to avoid Aerolinas Argentinas. In their defense, we did have a lovely flight experience on Astral (their partner airline). 

Next time - Iquazu! Curitiba! Florianopolis! BRAZIL!

After being on the road for five months and staying with couchsurfers, camping camping and in random cheap hostels, arriving in Buenos Aires was a luxury almost beyond comparison.  After our redeye from Auckland on Aerolineas Argentinas (don't ever fly with them unless you're desperate and it is absolutely your last option), I was more tired than I can remember being in a long time.  I had gotten maybe two hours sleep on the 12-hour flight, was still painfully sore from the horseback ride, and desperately needed a shower.  All of these put together made it nearly impossible to concentrate as I fumbled my way through the passport control ($140 reciprocity fee. bummer), bag pick-up, customs and finally the exit.  Emerging into the sea of waiting people at the arrivals gate, I felt a bit drunk as I greeted Steph's mom for the first time.  

So where is all of this 'luxury beyond compare' that I was referring to earlier?  Well let me tell you.  First, as is the case when you're with your parents (no matter how old you are) you get to turn your brain off.  As soon as we were under Ms. Bruce's wings, I was able to look around and enjoy the scenery.  No worries about where we were, how we were going to get anywhere, how much it would cost, doing cost/benefit analysis of different options - all while trying to stay upright.  No, none of that for me.  Just relaxing in the comfort of knowing that I was with someone who knew where we were going, knew how to get there, and knew what to do if we needed to change plans at the last minute.  Luxurious.  Second, when we arrived at her apartment in Buenos Aires, we found that we had our own room, complete with comfortable bed, balcony, closets and private bathroom.  You would be amazed at how something as small as a private bathroom can make a difference after so much time without.  Third, she had already picked up some empanadas for us for dinner.  Again, I didn't have to worry about where we are going to eat, whether or not the restaurant we have chosen is a good one, if there is something better around the corner.  Just delicious empanadas already on my plate waiting to be eaten.  And finally, she had scheduled massages for us for the next morning.  Lux. ur. i. ous.

Our first two days in Buenos Aires I basically refused to leave the house.  We took a couple of trips out to pick up groceries (I got to make Christmas dinner), see a few things close by, and get some ice cream, but really, with how comfortable the apartment was, it was hard to find the motivation to leave.  Luckily, my lack of motivation was reinforced by the fact that it was Christmas and nothing was open anyway.  

After spending a glorious three days inside, lazing around, catching up on emailing and showering, the day after Christmas we finally emerged into the sun ready to explore.  Over the next five days or so we spent time navigating the many different areas in Buenos Aires.  I never knew it was such a big city.  We visited the Boca, a colorful old (now touristy) neighborhood with constant tango shows on the streets.  We visited downtown with its huge buildings and monuments, and the ritzier neighborhoods of Recoleta and Palermo.  We lounged in parks and rose gardens, and took long strolls down tree-lined streets.  We even paid our respects at the city cemetery where all the prominent Buenos Aires families are buried (we skipped Evita's grave due to the incredibly long line to take a picture with her tomb.  weird).

Buenos Aires was also an excellent place for us to get caught up on our culture.  At times during this trip we have blown through cities (and countries) so quickly, we don't have time to take in any of the local theater or music.  In fact, the most we can often hope for is for time to watch a movie on the computer before we fall asleep - and I don't think that counts as culture.  I mean, it's not like seeing the ballet.  Which, by the way, we did in Buenos Aires.  As a Christmas present to us, Steph's mom got us tickets to the Buenos Aires ballet.  The first thing I thought when I opened the envelope containing my ticket?  

'What am I going to wear?' 

By now, after wearing the same six t-shirts, two pairs of pants and ratty hiking boots - everything that I have is looking a bit rough around the edges.   Should I wear my jeans (with a small hole in them from climbing a fence) with my "best" t-shirt?  I imagined the cultured citizens of Buenos Aires all dressed up walking into the theater with me sneaking in behind them looking like I just rolled off a bus.  After a little discussion of my worries with Steph and Ms. Bruce, Steph and I did what you might expect.  We raided the available wardrobe.  Luckily, we're all the same size, and I found a delightful skirt suit with matching heels, and Steph found a green dress.  Now problem solved, we headed out for a lovely evening of music, dancing, fantastic set-design and good company.  I made it home that night feeling tired, but satisfied in knowing that I had seen something that I don't normally see while traveling.  

Aside from the ballet, we also caught a tango show - complete with the dancers playing the part of mafiosos, going through about ten wardrobe changes over the course of an hour.  They wore more different outfits in that hour than I have worn in six months.  And the dancing.  The dancing was pretty incredible.  Having spent a tiny bit of time trying to learn how to ballroom dance many years ago, I have some idea about how hard it is to make your body do all of those things - and let me tell you, these guys made it look like a walk in the park.  The men would pick up the women and throw them in every direction, and the women would land as gracefully as someone had just set them down in a cushioned chair.  It was pretty incredible.  

Spending the holidays away from home was one of the harder things about this trip.  It's one of my favorite times of year, going home to my mom's house and eating her special peanut clusters until I'm sick to the stomach, and then heading to my grandma's house for some of her famous coconut cream pie.  I don't think anything can replace the wonderful feeling I get when surrounded by the aunts, uncles and cousins that I have spent every Christmas with for the past 31 years.  That said, it was a pretty new experience to spend my first hot Christmas in the Southern hemisphere away from my family.  Though it seems that Christmas traditions aren't all that different whether you're in Buenos Aires or St. Louis.  I got to cook a nice Christmas dinner of braised beef and roasted vegetables.  We had a delicious bottle of Malbec.  We opened Christmas presents around the tree, and just generally enjoyed each other's company.  The biggest difference was the fireworks.  You heard me, in Buenos Aires at midnight on Christmas eve, everyone in the city sets off fireworks.  So the end of our evening was spent on the balcony, drinking a very good Malbec, watching various fireworks displays go off around the city.  Later that night, as I was drifting off to sleep, I could still hear the distant cracks from all around the city.

So what do the people of Buenos Aires do on New Year's eve if they've already set off all of their fireworks on Christmas?  I was told not very much.  Apparently the first New Year's eve that Steph and her mom spent in Buenos Aires they had sat expectantly on the balcony awaiting a grand show (after witnessing such a fuss over Chrismas eve, surely New Year's would be ten times better), and nothing happened.  A few cracks of stray firecrackers and not much more.  So as we sat around that night, drinking champagne and eating Ms. Bruce's delicous shrimp pie (Steph's favorite), we didn't expect much.  Boy were we wrong.  After a few modest displays across the city, a large group of people emerged on the street directly below our building, carrying more fireworks than I have ever seen.  As they set off their first few rockets, I was pretty nervous that one might veer off course, and wind up on our balcony.  Then pushing that fear aside, as they set off round after round of increasingly larger fireworks displays fifty yards from the balcony, we settled in for a good show.  Sitting there on the balcony with fireworks exploding dangerously close to us, I felt like I was back in at my Grandma's farm on the Fourth of July, setting off fireworks in the front yard with my Dad.  It was maybe one of the coolest New Year's eves I've ever had.

After only a couple hours of sleep, we woke at 4:30 the next morning to head to the airport, bound for Iguazu Falls.  We had originally planned on flying to Patagonia that morning, and had set aside eleven precious days to hike the famous Torres Del Paine National Park in Chile.  Fate, however, had a different idea, when a wildfire broke out three days before we were supposed to leave.  So far, the fire has burned about 8% of the park and killed seven firefighters.  400 hikers had to be evacuated.  We (somewhat grudgingly) changed our plans, decided that someday we would come back to Patagonia, and headed to Iguazu Falls.  And Iguazu is where I'll pick up the next post.  But I'll leave you with a picture just to whet your appetite.  It was amazing.

-EC