Ok. This is too much. In a way one thing I have found out during this trip, or should I say I had no choice but to fully accept it, was that I "can't talk the talk". It wasn't easy to acknowledge and accept that, but... I think I'm there now. It just that in the last 2 days...I can't talk at all! Mechanically! ahem.
Fuck "The talk", I can't talk AT ALL! Can not release one single word from my mouth and not sound like Freddy Krugger trying to talk while being squashed by one very big oto zevel (bo vekakh oti itkha). The cold I caught in Ushuaia, that in a way stayed with me for the whole time, re-attacked...this time took my voice as a hostage.
So the last 48 hours I spent mostly by not talking to anyone. Which..isn't a big change to most of the other days I spent in BA, but...not having the option isn't very nice. Well...since I can't talk, there's not much left to do but..WRITE!
I guess this is a good chance to complete some of the stories that run through my head in the last days since I came down to Buenos Aires and left behind Patagonia...
Since my photos aren't available in this Internet Cafe I will go back again to jiggle with the net and try to find photos that will do best to serve my fonts.
Hmmm..I guess I'll start with Puerto Madryn..the "most fresh memory that doesn't involve BA" in a way.
Well...I visited Puerto Madryn right after Bariloche and right before BA... back in those days, around 8 days ago, I was in grande dilema... as I had such a good time in Bariloche (can't believe I didn't write shit about that yet...) and didn't wanna leave for something that isn't great great great...the question was whether P Madryn can fit the "greatX3" description.
Here's what Madryn is famous for: Whales (they got lots of them) and the 2nd biggest Penguin resort in the world. Well... big-ice-cream-lover me got a weakness for dulce de leche, intelligent cute girls with short black hair and lucious breasts, Mr. Jasikevicius, The amazing steak of Alberto (in Bariloche...) and... well... Penguins.
Ok, I missed some more items on the list, but this works I guess. Penguins might not be in the same level as the ones before, but after the "clumsy Penguins" they showed me at Ushuaia, and thinking the next chance to see Penguins not in a cage will be god-knows-when, It was clear Madryn got a chance to be greatX3.
One thing... Penguin season at Madryn starts in Sep. I wanted to be in Buenos on the 2nd of that same month, which meant I had one day of September to spend in Madryn... Now here comes a riddle. Is Penguin season start somewhen in Sep or the same day Sep starts? Several emails across this big land resulted the following info: The damn Penguins are the ones to decide! if there are enough penguins back from the holidays in Brazil they open on Sep 1st. If not... they wait.
So... after some more thoughts, and an akhot yoter that claimed whales should be pretty amazing by themselves...I took off...left Bariloche behind (god is my witness..I SHALL BE BACK!!!) and... took a 13 hours bus drive to Madryn.
Just like the days before Bariloche I had little time to do alot of stuff...Bus "landed" at 7:20, I checked in the hostel at 7:45 and 30 minutes later I was already minus 150 pesos and on a small van going on a tour to see whales...and this other animal they call sea elephant.
well...gotta share it with u guys... whales was kinda of a disappointment. This mamal is HUGE...ummm...well...it's very very very H U G E. The females can reach 15 meters and I don't wanna mention the weight. Lo Na'im. Ok, I just can't remember exaclty how much they can weight, but...it is a ""Lo Na'im" number...
The thing is... they kinda forgot to mention the mamal lives in the sea. Ok, Ok, Ok, I knew that before...still... going on a boat to see whales..u expect to see some more than just their back and some tail once in a while...u know... If Willie could jump out of the water (don't worry..I didn't see the movie... but the poster was well tattooed in my head on that boat), u know these beasts can do that too.
But...well...no. Not my whales... they were too lazy I guess. It's not that I asked them to jump through a hoop...just come out enough to get a full view of this giant. It came down to several whales...one of them was a mommy and a baby whale, but...all I got to see was like...maybe 5% of the whale itself.
That led me to a-not-very-fun-vision-in-my-head. hmmmm...if what I came for was to see a big black thing moves inside the water and once in a while sprinting water upwards... well......I guess a floating naked Jackie McKayten fed with lots of beans (for the water sprint effects) would have done the same job...
Got a bright future as a whale
The thought that I left the beloved Bariloche and drove 13 hours by bus, paid 150 pesos and fight with tourists on a boat for a glimpse of a Jackie look-a-like... was annoying as ...well...Jackie itself.
Just when I was about to do something drastic (like falling asleep for example), came the salvation! It was none other than the Sea Elephants kiddos... turns out P. Madryn is also the only place on earth which isn't an island and get to host these cuties when they are not in the water.
U know how sometimes in life u meet someone with lots of annoying questions and one of them is "which animal you are most similiar to?" well... hmmm... I believe Sea Elephants are fighting for the top when it comes to..me.
Other than the fact they spend most of their life in a place where I can't survive more than several seconds, and that they don't spend so much time on the internet when they are on the surface of this planet, we are pretty much alike.
My boys!!!
Some Sea Elephant facts (as told by the guide of course... I'm not responsible for his fuck ups).
They are born around 40 kg -
After less than a month they double their size -
Then, once big enough, their mom says "Sayonara" and goes off to take care of herself -
- Until they develop skills to dive deep (this is how they get their food), they live on their...fat...-
so after 3 weeks they are back down to 60kg. -
In adulthood they reach 3-4 tons. -
They can dive like hell... record of a sea elephant dive is...2 hours!-
They can dive down to 1.5 km under where people like me wave their hands in cry for help (aka sea level).-
Well...once in a while they come out of the water to rest..and...just...lay around like in the photo. do nothing... sometimes stretch...sometimes yawn...they save their energy for the big task..to go back to the water. Apperently they got no legs, so their way back is done by crawling slowly. Very slowly...
So you walk on the beach... and then u see this huge pile of something that turns out to be a quite interesting animal. Until it moved I was sure it's...something very big on the beach, just not sure what it is. But these boys are truly a good reason visit P. Madryn even if the Jackie look a likes dont do any effort to act like dolfins. Hmmm...I would go very far and say that it might be worth leaving Bariloche 2 days sooner, but... i'm not 100% sure about that one.
Oh...just on the way back from the beach turns out some penguins did come back sooner than the others, yet they didn't quite made it to their resort (200 km southern morons!). Right on the beach I met 2 dead penguins...laying side by side... obviously dead for several days now. But to think of the effort they have made just for me to make it back to the resort so maybe these penguin rangers will open it in time for me... really touched me.
Out I go. Hopefully tomorrow another update... Hopefully by tomorrow I will have my voice back.
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