Bliss.

After Pichilemu (last post) we continued our jouney south. Straight to Temuco to the Sandvigs. A comfortable bed and yummy food. A good time with *sorta* family (sister-in-law´s husband´s family). The Sandvig´s were amazing to us, they picked us up from the bus station at midnight (thanks Eric and Tim!) and brought us back to their place, fed us, and we slept in their guest cabin. The perks of having missionary family is that they all seem to have guest cabins on their property. They took us on a tour of Temuco, let me shop to my hearts content (and wallets pain) in the plaza, and found us white gas for our camp stove. Then they took us to Parque National Huerquehue, where we did a 7km hike upto tres lagos (three lakes). On route we saw a male and female red headed woodpecker, two parrots (Chile has parrots!), and tons of lizards. It was a great hike, sort of like hiking in BC, but all the flora and fauna is different. At the top we could see the infamous Monkey Puzzle trees. I´ve seen some planted in gardens in Victoria, but it takes upwards of 400 years for them to mature, so they look nowhere´s near as cool!

The Sandvig´s left after the hike, leaving Joel and I and our 7 days of food to chill out (we bought groceries in Temuco). We had this rad little private campsite, down from the trail where no one could see us. We spent 8 days there (grabbed some avacados and some home made bread from a provision store by the park for the extra day). We did lots of swimming - I have missed swimming in a fresh water lake soooo much, Victoria is definately lacking for fresh water. We suntanned, I actually have some colour to myself...but I´m still pretty white. Sometime mid stay we hiked up to the lakes again, swam and suntanned up there. Everynight we played Backgammon and Cribbage. Joel beat me almost every game. *tear* We also had to wash our laundry up there. It was the first time having to do all our clothes by hand. I suck at handwashing. My clothes still have a bit of a funk to them. Oh well.

We caught a bus from Pucon, Chile to San Martin de los Andes, Argentina today. The border crossing went smoothly (finally, hurray!) We´re just stopping through here for a couple of nights before continuing south to El Bolson. I think we´ll be spending a few weeks around El Bolson, it looks like a lovely little town of homemade bread and homebrewed beer. I would like to settle down somewhere for a bit. The bus has gotten tiring and expensive.

Oh - wait. I haven´t talked about how I LOVE that it´s fruit season here. Mmmm. I´ve been eating avacados, peaches, nectarines, and blueberries everyday. Bliss. Hopefully by the time peaches come into season at home I´ll be ready to can some....