Foz de Iguaçu

Yesterday we went to Iguazu Falls. Over 250 waterfalls within the national park. The river seaparates Brazil and Argentina. The Argentine side is called Cataratas de Iguazu, but I have been looking for a good excuse to use the ç letter, and why not in the title (that is the name of the Brazil side). All of the falls were extremely impressive, but Garganta de Diablo (Devil´s Throat) was mind blowing. The size and the amount of water going over the falls was just incredible. We were able to get very close on a cat walk and look over at it. It is shaped like an enormous semi circle, making it all the more impressive. There is a species of bird that lives behind waterfalls and they could be seen flying around in the mist in what appeared not to be a search for food, but just a way to have a really good time. There were also thousands of butterflies in the park. They constantly landed on us and would stick out their long tongues to drink our sweat or the water from our shirts or back packs. There is a theory that waterfalls cause negative ions which bring about extreme happiness in humans. I believe we can call that theory confirmed.

We have found an internet shop here with a fast connection, so we will try to share some photos in reverse chronological order:

This is Garganta del Diablo. There is no way to do it any justice with a photo, but it is still impressive. The land you see in the distance is Brazil.


The forest fire prevention representative in Argentina is an Owl. I was trying to look like the owl, but I believe I was mostly unsuccesful. I believe this Owl could probably share better information than Smokey the Bear regarding forest fire prevention. However, he may be less likely to do so because as a bird, he will be less effected by the forest fire than Smokey, who is unable to fly.


Tracy with just a small part of the beautiful landscape. We were able to get pretty close to the falls thanks to the really nice trails and catwalks at the park.


BIG CITY BUENOS AIRES
Here are a few photos from BA.

This is the Casa Rosada. It is the same function as the White House.


The parrilla is the popular and customary food of choice in Argentina. It is quite a lot of meat.


This is Tracy in front of a part of the centro of Buenos Aires. You can see the old architecture in the foreground with the new building in the background. There was lots and lots of both in the huge city. Somewhere around 12,000,000 people live in BA and the urban neighborhoods surrounding it.


We had a good time on the farm and are looking forward to our next farms here in Argetina. We especially enjoyed becoming friends with Hector. We have said a lot about him in other posts, but we cant say anough about what a cool guy he is. This is Hector and I working to spread chicken poo over a field. The spreader was designed to spread chemicals which come in handy little pellets that do not stop up the machine. The chicken poo, which was shoveled from the floor of chicken houses was complete with feathers, dirt, and other various pieces, so it stopped up the old spreader pretty bad. So Hector designed a seat so he could continuously shove the organic fertilizer into the spreader and then he trusted me to drive him around the field.

Meat, Tango and Trains

This country, just like Uruguay, is crazy for meat. We got a ´parrilla´for dinner last night and it was literally a pile of meat. Sirloin, sausage, chicken, liver, intestine, and other stuff that I am not sure about, graced the giant mound o meat. We have since been trying to balance it out with empanadas containing a variety of veggies.

Tango is huge here. Many bars and restaurants feature tango shows, which is where a couple dances on a stage as a dinner entertainment. Our was OK and the tango is certainly captivating to watch.

Yesterday we got a special treat. A friend from North Carolina has family here in Buenos Aires. Yesterday we connected with her brother and sister in law. We got an excellent tour of the city with explanation of various parts and historic sights. We also got to see some of the urban barrios that arent acessible by subway or foot and it was a lot of fun to see and a lot of fun to meet and hang out with locals. We also got to eat a fantastic lunch at a really unique little cafe. (Thanks Laura and Danny!) We also learned from them, as they were preparing to go to a wedding at night, that typical weddings last from 9pm until about 6am. That is a serious party.

We tried yesterday to take another form of transportation in taking a train. Different from the subway, this is actually what you think of when you think of Amtrak or the likes. Unfortunately, the train broke about 15 minutes in and after waiting about a half hour, we decided to hop off and make our way back into town.

We plan to lounge around in a cafe or two today and relax until time to head back across the city to our bus to the north. For those trying to follow on a map, we will be at the top northeast corner of Argentina, on the border with Brazil and very close to the border with Paraguay.

Apparently USB ports were more popular in the rural area we were previously in, as we havent come across any here (though we havent sent any time looking). This means no pictures for a while.

On to Agrentina

We we finished off Uruguay with a bang and a day earlier than planned. We left the farm on Thursday morning and headed into Colonia de Sacramento. It was a nice day and we got to visit several museums and eat some good food. The highlight of the day was when we were sitting on some steps near the water and relaxing when an elemtary school class on a field trip came up to us (I am talking about 15-20 children) and surrounded us shooting off questions and practicing their English. A few of them knew someone living in the US and had to ask if we knew them. As you can imagine, we disappointed them by not knowing a single person.

We planned to leave for Buenos Aires on Friday, but only expensive fast boats and First class seats on slow boats were avilable, so we ended up taking off on Thursday night. We headed west as the sun set, which made for a beautiful way to see Bs As for the first time. We have been filling our bellies with empanadas and rushing about the city all day today.

Buenos Aires is an excellent city that I would easily put in the category as NYC or DC. Huge, but busy on every street. Great architecture, lots of arts, museums, cafes, historical locations and a great vibe. After being in Uruguay for a month, which is one chill, laid back country, we are excited about the change of pace given us by this monstrcity of a city. We have mastered the subway system in under 24 hours and are hoping to see what Bs As night life is all about tonight (Tango and hopefully some salsa is on the docket).

On Sunday we leave on a 17 hour bus for Iguazu Falls and then we will be heading west across the country to see as many places as possible, eventually landing at our next farm.

Hopefully some fotos will be forthcoming.

Food on the Farm

As mentioned in a previous post, our food options on the farm consist of greens, cabbage, lots of cheese, and some citrus fruits. In wanting to keep with the local season, we don´t want to go out and buy a lot of vegetables that were shipped in from other locations, so we have lately had to be creative with what we have. This has resulted in one of our favorites: greens/cabbage pizza. So in case any of you want to try out this recipe in your own house, here it is:

whole wheat crust (yeast, flax seed, wheat flour)
boiled greens and cabbage
four types of sheep and goat cheese


Let the crust rise, and spread it out on your frying pan (cause that´s what we have). Put the greens mixture on top, and add the ricotta, pepper cheese, soft sheep cheese, and parmesan/romano type sheep cheese. Light your dangerous gas oven (or build a fire in your equally as dangerous outdoor oven- according to Adam´s finger) and cook until you think it is done.

It is actually quite tasty.



And I know you all are dying to see pictures of us milking sheep (it´s not a common thing here either- the guys at the local store make fun of Hector for milking sheep), so here they are:





A new WWOOFER arrived yesterday. She is from New York and goes to college in Wisconsin. We have been showing her around before we head out on Thursday. As we prepare to spend 100s of hours on Argentine busses to traverse the country, we will likely think back to the relaxing life at the farm.

¿Photos Perhaps?

We spent our day off today going to a city called Colonia San Francisco. About an hour away it was a nice little break from our daily social life with the 60 sheep, 2 goats, 2 chickens one dog and lots of fleas. We will have to go back through another day because it is the way to Buenos Aires, Argentina and we look forward to going back and hope it is not rainy and messy for most of the day as it was today. Colonia is kind of the historic museumy city of Uruguay and many of the area were quite nice. Lots of tourists appear to be there, though most of them appear to be from Latin American countries.

OK, on to the photos.

This is our humble little room. We didnt get much sleep last night because a storm came through and kept blowing that back window open. Rooms do not connect on the inside and you have to go from room to kitchen to bathroom by going outside.


This is our house. There arent any other houses around within view. It is 2km to the other part of the farm we work on and 4km to get into town. The milking house and cheese making facility as well as a large barn is in our back yard.


On of the last days that the Belgians, Ana and Dominique were at the farm, we grilled out some steaks. Tracy is on the left (of course) and beside her is Hector who we work most closely with on the farm. He is 22 and lives nearby and is brilliant in every aspect of farming and just being able to fix anything that breaks. Fortunately, he is also a good motorcycle driver as he and Adam went to buy some things at the store requiring Adam to ride on the back with his hands full (my mother will love that part!).


This is what laundry day looks like every few days (since we didnt have room for too many clothes). Tracy does most of the washing while Adam hangs it all up on the line to dry. Our work days are from 730-1030 and then from 2-5, so it is nice to have a lot of time to do things (including laundry or especially napping) during the afternoon while there is plenty of sunlight. We do have electricity, but the only things it serves is a refrigerator and one light bulb in each room.



In the evenings we have to round up the sheep from the pasture and put them into a smaller pen for the night. Part of this is helping the baby sheep that you can barely see here to eat. He can graze as he is old enough to digest grass, but he also gets milk with our help. We haven´t clarified the story, but suposedly his mother rejected him and so now it requires one of the sheep to be held in order for him to eat. This is me (Adam) holding the sheep for the baby to drink.


This is our bread oven. I am trying to build a decent fire inside in order to raise the temperature enough to cook the bread, which we add later after removing the coals. This photo was taken just before Adam sliced his finger wide open with a sharp knife.

We are still having a great time and have about 10 days left on this farm before we head off to Argentina. Hasta Luego...

Breaking Our Addictions

We have 10 days on the farm under our belt. We are still having fun and feel like we are learning a great deal. Early spring is a difficult time to jump into this, as we are learning. Having jumped in without the opportunity to have canned or frozen things from past seasons, greens are the only thing in our garden. Between some big leafy collard like plant and cabbage, we are eating a lot of greens. We have learned that a neighbor sells oranges from his yard and they are amazing. We are eating our weight in those. The cheese is also very good. The owner of the farm makes an amazing cheese from the sheep milk. Our goats milk makes good yogurt and our lemon tree gives us delicious lemonade. However, take all of this and add a single gas burner, some old pans, and a trip to the supermarket for some rice and pasta and some flour for bread and you still dont get the variety that we have become accostomed to in the US. The produce section of Harris Teeter doesnt really have too many seasons.

So this feels like it has been a time of breaking our addicitons. Our cravings for fast food or tomatoes go unanswered because there just arent any. Our time for relaxation is not consumed with television, internet, NCSU athletics (and the constant sorrow that comes with them), radios, or other forms of entertainment, but is spent sitting outside watching and listening to those things that surround us. Not because we choose to do this out of nobility, but because when you open our door (that doesnt really close anyways) that is what is there and there really isnt anything else.

I am not sure that we knew we would have to go quite so cold turkey, but here we are in `el campo`.

One thing that does bring great entertainment is realizing how mundane things sound way cooler when put into context of being where we are (at least in my head). For example¨"I am sitting in a chair on the porch" sounds pretty dull, but "I am sitting in a chair on the porch in Uruguay" sounds really cool. "I am listening to electronica music...in an internet cafe in Uruguay", see you are jealous aren´t you??



OK, so now it is letting me add some pictures, we will see how many actually happen.

This is me riding my bike on our beach excursion this past Sunday.

Sheep, Goats, Lemons and One-speed bicycles

Still having fun. We will try to put some more meaningful thoughts on here soon, but since using the internet (very slow internet) means riding a one speed bike 8 kilometers (mine has no brakes, but I havent really needed them yet), we just seem to run out of time. Photos are an impossibility today because this internet just will not cooperate. Oh well. We will try again soon.

Thursday we get to help in the cheese making process. This is what all of the sheeps milk is used for. We get about 30 Liters per day from the 60 sheep. This is supposedly one of the money making parts of the farm. The sheep and goat graze on grass all day and are not given corn or other things that industrial agriculture insists upon. They do eat a small amount of corn during milking. I dont think they love the milking process, but since they rush the milking room for the corn, it seems they feel it is a fair trade.

The goat is also milked daily and give us about a quart or so a day. It´s baby still also eats so that takes away from some of our milk, but we dont mind sharing. We made our first successful batch of yogurt from the goat milk. It is very tasty. We add either peach marmelade or fresh lemons for extra flavor. We hope to make butter soon once we skim enough fat from our milk to do so.

The lemon tree seems to be one of the only things in season right now in early spring. We are planting a lot and getting some greens from the garden. Lemonade is tasty. We are drinking the water now, but adding lemons helped us to get used to the idea after being told that the water was potable. I did not realize Lemons were a spring fruit, but I am happy with it. Oranges are also in season, but we have to buy those from a neighbor.

Yesterday we rode our one speeders to the beach, which is more like the bank of a large river. It was pretty and a nice ride (14km round trip). It is chilly here, so swimming was not an option. We also got to ty our first Mate. Not too bad and perhaps something we will try to aquire the taste for. This is a big part of the culture of Argentina and Uruguay. Google Mate if you are not familiar with it. It is kind of like tea, but you can only drink it with a special set with a gourd cup and a metal like straw. Apparently there is also lots of customs about sharing the mate and passing in certain ways and turning the gourd, but we havent figured all of that out yet.

Thanks for the comments, we enjoy reading them.

Cross your fingers for pictures next time.

Life on the Farm

We made it to the farm, after taking two busses, and being picked up by a guy named Hector in a 1950-something truck. Hector is who we work with on a regular basis milking sheep. That is our main task here on the farm. The house we´re staying at is about 4 kilometers away from ¨town¨ which is where there is a supermarket and internet cafe. We have two bikes to use to get there. We have also learned how to use an outdoor bread oven. We will post pictures, and more explanation next time as 4 kilometers is a long way to go back when you have forgotten your camera.