Argentina and Chile share many obvious cultural traits. The most obvious of these is the 
Spanish language itself. There are many others. People are thin in both cul
tures. Dress in the cities tends towards fashionable European styles. There are however interesting, if subtle, differences between Argentina and Chile. While people were clean and fashionable in both countries, this was especially true of the Argentinians in Buenos Aires, where even those out jogging sported carefully coordinated exercise outfits and expensive hair cuts. Also, while both cultures are reserved in public, the Argentinians are a bit more boisterous, especially the young.
The cities look quite different too. Whereas sidewalks in Santiago were clean and level, in Buenos Aires they are chaotic and cracked
and absolutely mined with dog shit. In Santiago, the architecture is for the most part functional and utilitarian, in Argentina much of it is grand and el
aborate. Buenos Aires' wide boulevards, nineteenth century apartment blocks, and mansard roofs are deliberately reminiscent of Paris, albeit a Paris after 100 years of literal decay. In Chile, graffiti is rare, outside of Valparaiso's artistic district. In Argentina's cities ama
teurish tagging covers every structure at ground level.
Argentina's national debt is about 50% of GDP. In Chile, where there are explicitly anti-cyclical policies, it is 5%. Amazing. In the U.S. this figure is about 45%. Moreover, U.S. household debt (credit cards, mortgages, etc.) now stands at about 100% of GDP. Chile's experiences with 500% inflation caused by excessive government spending without taxation to pay for it clearly helped their politician
s do the right thing. Meanwhile, Argentina is likely to default on its debt obligations for the second time in
ten years. Sadly, it looks like Americans may have to learn our lessons the hard way. We seem to be headed for a debt and inflation spiral and there is no public interest in making the tough choices of higher taxes or large spending cuts.
Spanish language itself. There are many others. People are thin in both cul
tures. Dress in the cities tends towards fashionable European styles. There are however interesting, if subtle, differences between Argentina and Chile. While people were clean and fashionable in both countries, this was especially true of the Argentinians in Buenos Aires, where even those out jogging sported carefully coordinated exercise outfits and expensive hair cuts. Also, while both cultures are reserved in public, the Argentinians are a bit more boisterous, especially the young.The cities look quite different too. Whereas sidewalks in Santiago were clean and level, in Buenos Aires they are chaotic and cracked
and absolutely mined with dog shit. In Santiago, the architecture is for the most part functional and utilitarian, in Argentina much of it is grand and el
aborate. Buenos Aires' wide boulevards, nineteenth century apartment blocks, and mansard roofs are deliberately reminiscent of Paris, albeit a Paris after 100 years of literal decay. In Chile, graffiti is rare, outside of Valparaiso's artistic district. In Argentina's cities ama
teurish tagging covers every structure at ground level.Argentina's national debt is about 50% of GDP. In Chile, where there are explicitly anti-cyclical policies, it is 5%. Amazing. In the U.S. this figure is about 45%. Moreover, U.S. household debt (credit cards, mortgages, etc.) now stands at about 100% of GDP. Chile's experiences with 500% inflation caused by excessive government spending without taxation to pay for it clearly helped their politician
s do the right thing. Meanwhile, Argentina is likely to default on its debt obligations for the second time in
ten years. Sadly, it looks like Americans may have to learn our lessons the hard way. We seem to be headed for a debt and inflation spiral and there is no public interest in making the tough choices of higher taxes or large spending cuts.3-12-2009
Hotel Vilafranca
Providencia, Santiago, Chile
Chileans are a sedate bunch. Over two days in Santiago and another in Valparaiso, I rarely heard a Chilean shout or raise his voice. In fact the only exception to this was a preacher in the main plaza shouting fire and brimstone in Spanish at the top of his voice. Even on crowded streets during rush hour ther
e was little noise from the crowds of well dressed young people heading to and from work. Moreover, in the afternoons and early mornings almost nothing happens. The city doesn't seem to stir itself awake until about 9 or 10 AM. Add to this that most busine
sses, including restaurants, are closed on Sundays and the place feels downright sleepy.
Santiago is a pleasant, if nondescript city, shaded as it is by many Sycamore trees and full of prosperous, industrious people. The Mapucho River and a tributary rush off the surrounding mountains and down through town itself. This life-giving water is brown with silt eroded from the mountains and moves rapidly through the city even during these summer months. In Los Angeles and other Mediterranean climate regions it never rains during the summer. The same must be true here and yet the rivers flow.
I assume this is snow melt from the nearby Andes. How frightening to think that as the world warms this flow will initially increase as glaciers melt but then will essentially cease as the glaciers disappear. For the time being, however, Santiago seems to ha
ve access to water.
A fantastic metro system efficiently and safely shuttles thousands of people all about the city center on wide streets and More than 8000 buses complement the metro. The result is a city with few of the traffic problem I've seen all over the world, but with much air pollution emanating from the thousands of buses, diesel trucks, and old cars. Architecture in Santiago is for the most part unremarkable. Many of the largest buildings are of the bleak modernist industrial sort. Large apartment blocks from the 1960s and 1970s dominate the skyline in the Providencia neighborhood and the center of the city. The p
rincipal street through the area is a broad high traffic street named Avenida 11 de Septiembre (September 11th Avenue). This is a reference to the day that Salvador Allende's presidency was ended by Augusto Pinochet's U.S.-backed military coup. Few Americans know that the CIA was so involved in this illegal overthrow of a democratically-elected government that U.S. planes actually bombed the capital. After a few days of fierce fighting around the Presidential Palace, Allende took his own life as the rebels took control.
There are scattered large houses of the wealthy in Providencia, the neighborhood of our small hotel. Bellavista has somewhat more interesting low structures and a number of interesting restaurants and shops. Earthquake
s are a real problem in this part of the world and I get the impression that most historical structures were destroyed at one time or another. As a result, the city seems to have been built largely in the 20th century. In fact, the largest earthquake ever recorded was here in Santiago in 1960. It registered a massive 9.5 on the Richter scale. This is nearly 1000 times more shaking than the Northridge quake brought to Southern California in 1994.
Chillenos are materially better off than the residents of any other Latin American country I've yet visited (Mexico, Costa Rica, Ecuador). Houses, cars, and clothing all suggest that the basic needs of the people are generally met. Moreover, over three days we were never approached by a beggar of any sort, a statement I could not make if I was traveling in a large U.S. city or in most less developed countries.
I am pleased to see that, as in Ecuador, there are many people who use bicycles for both transportation and recreation. In this neighborhood is not uncommon to see a well-dressed young woman casually biking home from work in the evening along a quiet side street lined with sycamores.
We visited the Presidential Palace, which is currently occupied by Michelle Bachelet. Both Chile and Argentina currently have women in the top political positions. Banners hung from a government building near the palace announced the celebration of the "Dia International de la Mujer" (International Day of the Woman). In a grand plaza in front of the palace there is a statue of Salvador Allende, wearing his signature square black framed glasses. The broken remains of the actual glasses, a single shatte
red lens and half the frames, are on display at the National Historical Museum just a few blocks away.
People seem to like the current president, Senora Bachelet. A website claimed her popularity at 62% and Alexander, a young bartender at the airport, told me that Bachelet is "muy buena.". Among other things she has pushed incentives and aid to those who want to buy homes and has increased spending on education. He has three young girls so these initiatives are important to him. He has managed to buy a house and his job at the airport is a good one. Moreover, Chile's economy is by law anti-cyclical. Money is set aside by the government during boom times and when copper prices are high, copper being the most important export in Chile. When times are rough, as they are sure t
o be in the next few years, these accounts are drawn down. It will be interesting to see how Chile fares in the recession now that I understand something about this policy.
We arrived in Valparaiso by public bus. The buses in Argentina, as I've found in many countries, are excellent and are used by everyone. The trip takes about one and half hours in each direction and the cost was less than $5 each way. The trip takes you from t
he dry, almost desert climate of Santiago over low forested mountains and then winds steeply down to the sea just as you arrive in Valparaiso. Thick fog enveloped the bus at about the halfway point.
Valparaiso, Chile is a crusty old port city at the base of small mountains that force it against a foggy bay. The city's downtown is in the narrow strip, no more than a few hundred meters
wide, between the ocean and these hills. Numerous old acensors, or funiculars, make access to the hilltops surrounding the center easy. Just as a less sophisticated person can sometimes be more outgoing, Valparaiso, while less polished than Santiago, seems more vibrant. The sidewalks of the main street were packed thickly with Chillenos shopping and going about their business. We walked briskly with them, weaving thro
ugh the crowd as one must in any busy city. Prior to the construction of the Panama Canal Valparaiso was one of the most important ports in the world. Evidently it lost stature and importance as shipping traffic moved northward, but it remains a functioning port. Most people seemed well off enough, but these were not the wealthy that I'd seen casually biking and strolling in Providencia back in Santiago. Most of the grand stone buildings lining the bay are coated with a veneer of grime and decay, but 
they are still functioning. Sailors in uniform and crewman from merchant ships are mixed into the crowds of pedestrians. Off to the northwest lies the new beach resort of Vina del Mar. Inland the coastal mountains rise, covered in forests of Eucalyptus and pine.
We rode an ascensor to the nearest hilltops where great old mansions and colorful old apartment blocks cling precariously to the slopes packed tight tog
ether. Narrow staircases and winding roads lead up and down the mountains. The area has experienced a revival as a hip artists colony and the evidence of this was everywhere spray painted on the walls. A number of fine restaurants reminiscent of Europe gaze down
upon a fine broad view of the town, the port, and the bay. We had a relaxed lunch in one of these, gazing alternately at the view and at a beautiful infant boy at the next table.
3-13-2009
Hotel Bohemia, Mendoza, Argentina
Very little happens here between about 1:30 and 5:30 PM. It's a true siesta. Shopkeepers pull closed the heavy iron bars that guard their wares. Pedestrians disappear. Auto traffic becomes primarily
taxis. Things don't get really rolling again until 7:00 or 7:30 PM when the traffic returns and the streets are full of workers and uniformed students rushing home or to one of the many parks or street side cafes in town.
Mendoza feels very southern European. Fashionable people e
at at street side cafes under colorful umbrellas along lovely one way streets lined with sycamore trees. The heat is tempered by the evaporation of water from thousands of irrigated trees and plants and by the shade created by the same. Like in the Mediterranean the air is very dry and the heat not so oppressive. People are slim and fashionable and smoke too m
any cigarettes. Uniquely, canals called Acequias line most every street. These deliver life-giving water from the nearby Andes to the trees and fountains that are everywhere in town.
Parque San Martin, named for Argentina's liberator, is nearly a third of the city. It's a beautiful grassy park filled with massive trees, pedestrian walkways, a large artificial pond, a gymnasi
um, an Olympic pool, a number of stadiums, and a large hill. Throughout the park, more acequias flood the land bringing lush vegetation to life. This in a place that averages about ten inches of rain a year, an amount that's roughly similar to San Diego or San Antonio. We walked through the park on a Saturday. Many of the locals were out doing the same. Others were riding bicycles or walking their dogs or rowing racing boats in t
he lake. It's a pretty idyllic place, really, though all these trees seem to be wreaking havoc on my allergic sinuses.
When I first moved to California, I found it chock full of gracefully aging automobiles no longer seen in Rh
ode Island. However, California has nothing on Argentina. Here French and American cars from every decade back to the 1960s are common and proudly cruise the streets. Peugeout, Citroen, and Ford dominate but there are Dodges and Mercedes and BMWs of all these eras still running here and most are proudly polished.
Mendoza is of course mos
t famous for it's wines and wineries. The same water that makes the city a garden allows nearly 1200 wineries to flourish
, some for well over a hundred years. Today the area is producing some very high quality wines, particularly of the Malbec variety. We spent one charming day touring a few wineries with a hired driver, Marcello. Marcello, a middle aged man with two young girls, lived at one time on the west side of Los Angeles, but returned home to Mendoza to raise his family. Achaval-Ferrer was our first stop. All of the wines at this very young winery (it was started in 1999) have received Wine Spectator reviews of over 90 points. Nearly the entire production is s
hipped out for export so we were able to taste only wines that were in various early stages of maturation. None of them were yet ready to bottle and yet they were all excellent even when premature. They claim to use more than twice as many grapes per bottle as is typical and I don't doubt it. The wines they are sell
ing now, the 2006 and 2007 vintages, will not be ready to drink for about five more years. None of their wines are filtered. An unusual step in the production process involves aerating and mixing the maceration to allow excess alcohol to evaporate since the density of grapes can send alcohol to 18%.
While we were in Mendoza, we also visited a number of other fine wineries. At Hacienda del Plata met Chrissy, a young woman from Canada who has reinvented herself in Mendoza. Lunch was at La Cava de Cano, a unique restaurant in the renovated basement, "La Cava," of the former governor's home. I was able to easily practice my Spanish with Diego, who attened Ohio State for three years before returning home to Argentina. The first course was a classic and massive assortment of Italian-Argentinian antipasta. In additon to the traditional Italian assortment of cured meats, olives, roasted garlic, mushroo
ms, anchovies, artic
hoke hearts, and various cheeses, there were roasted nuts, various breads, sausages (including blood sausages), and dried fruits and fresh vegetables. After all this then they bring you pasta. All the while, Diego poured bottomless glasses of a very nice 2004 Cava de Cano Syrah. If you can still manage it, desert and a liquer and, if you choose, a cigar. We passed on the cigars but tried the desert and Pisco.
After lunch, we visited Carmello Patti's one man winery operation. Carmello and his family moved to Mendoza decades ago from Sicily. He raises few, if any grapes, and instead focuses on winemaking. He personally showed us his winery and signed my bottle of 2003 Cabernet Sauvignon.
3-15-2009
The Central Andes and Aconcagua
3-19-2009
The Secret Garden B&B,
Puerto Iguazu, Argentina
The falls are truly remarkable, but much of their spiritual luster is lost amongst the hordes of tourists and the carefully manicured footpaths everyone walks to wind their way around the various viewpoints.
Hotel Vilafranca
Providencia, Santiago, Chile
Chileans are a sedate bunch. Over two days in Santiago and another in Valparaiso, I rarely heard a Chilean shout or raise his voice. In fact the only exception to this was a preacher in the main plaza shouting fire and brimstone in Spanish at the top of his voice. Even on crowded streets during rush hour ther
e was little noise from the crowds of well dressed young people heading to and from work. Moreover, in the afternoons and early mornings almost nothing happens. The city doesn't seem to stir itself awake until about 9 or 10 AM. Add to this that most busine
sses, including restaurants, are closed on Sundays and the place feels downright sleepy.Santiago is a pleasant, if nondescript city, shaded as it is by many Sycamore trees and full of prosperous, industrious people. The Mapucho River and a tributary rush off the surrounding mountains and down through town itself. This life-giving water is brown with silt eroded from the mountains and moves rapidly through the city even during these summer months. In Los Angeles and other Mediterranean climate regions it never rains during the summer. The same must be true here and yet the rivers flow.
I assume this is snow melt from the nearby Andes. How frightening to think that as the world warms this flow will initially increase as glaciers melt but then will essentially cease as the glaciers disappear. For the time being, however, Santiago seems to ha
ve access to water.A fantastic metro system efficiently and safely shuttles thousands of people all about the city center on wide streets and More than 8000 buses complement the metro. The result is a city with few of the traffic problem I've seen all over the world, but with much air pollution emanating from the thousands of buses, diesel trucks, and old cars. Architecture in Santiago is for the most part unremarkable. Many of the largest buildings are of the bleak modernist industrial sort. Large apartment blocks from the 1960s and 1970s dominate the skyline in the Providencia neighborhood and the center of the city. The p
rincipal street through the area is a broad high traffic street named Avenida 11 de Septiembre (September 11th Avenue). This is a reference to the day that Salvador Allende's presidency was ended by Augusto Pinochet's U.S.-backed military coup. Few Americans know that the CIA was so involved in this illegal overthrow of a democratically-elected government that U.S. planes actually bombed the capital. After a few days of fierce fighting around the Presidential Palace, Allende took his own life as the rebels took control.There are scattered large houses of the wealthy in Providencia, the neighborhood of our small hotel. Bellavista has somewhat more interesting low structures and a number of interesting restaurants and shops. Earthquake
s are a real problem in this part of the world and I get the impression that most historical structures were destroyed at one time or another. As a result, the city seems to have been built largely in the 20th century. In fact, the largest earthquake ever recorded was here in Santiago in 1960. It registered a massive 9.5 on the Richter scale. This is nearly 1000 times more shaking than the Northridge quake brought to Southern California in 1994.Chillenos are materially better off than the residents of any other Latin American country I've yet visited (Mexico, Costa Rica, Ecuador). Houses, cars, and clothing all suggest that the basic needs of the people are generally met. Moreover, over three days we were never approached by a beggar of any sort, a statement I could not make if I was traveling in a large U.S. city or in most less developed countries.
I am pleased to see that, as in Ecuador, there are many people who use bicycles for both transportation and recreation. In this neighborhood is not uncommon to see a well-dressed young woman casually biking home from work in the evening along a quiet side street lined with sycamores.
We visited the Presidential Palace, which is currently occupied by Michelle Bachelet. Both Chile and Argentina currently have women in the top political positions. Banners hung from a government building near the palace announced the celebration of the "Dia International de la Mujer" (International Day of the Woman). In a grand plaza in front of the palace there is a statue of Salvador Allende, wearing his signature square black framed glasses. The broken remains of the actual glasses, a single shatte
red lens and half the frames, are on display at the National Historical Museum just a few blocks away.People seem to like the current president, Senora Bachelet. A website claimed her popularity at 62% and Alexander, a young bartender at the airport, told me that Bachelet is "muy buena.". Among other things she has pushed incentives and aid to those who want to buy homes and has increased spending on education. He has three young girls so these initiatives are important to him. He has managed to buy a house and his job at the airport is a good one. Moreover, Chile's economy is by law anti-cyclical. Money is set aside by the government during boom times and when copper prices are high, copper being the most important export in Chile. When times are rough, as they are sure t
o be in the next few years, these accounts are drawn down. It will be interesting to see how Chile fares in the recession now that I understand something about this policy.We arrived in Valparaiso by public bus. The buses in Argentina, as I've found in many countries, are excellent and are used by everyone. The trip takes about one and half hours in each direction and the cost was less than $5 each way. The trip takes you from t
he dry, almost desert climate of Santiago over low forested mountains and then winds steeply down to the sea just as you arrive in Valparaiso. Thick fog enveloped the bus at about the halfway point.Valparaiso, Chile is a crusty old port city at the base of small mountains that force it against a foggy bay. The city's downtown is in the narrow strip, no more than a few hundred meters
wide, between the ocean and these hills. Numerous old acensors, or funiculars, make access to the hilltops surrounding the center easy. Just as a less sophisticated person can sometimes be more outgoing, Valparaiso, while less polished than Santiago, seems more vibrant. The sidewalks of the main street were packed thickly with Chillenos shopping and going about their business. We walked briskly with them, weaving thro
ugh the crowd as one must in any busy city. Prior to the construction of the Panama Canal Valparaiso was one of the most important ports in the world. Evidently it lost stature and importance as shipping traffic moved northward, but it remains a functioning port. Most people seemed well off enough, but these were not the wealthy that I'd seen casually biking and strolling in Providencia back in Santiago. Most of the grand stone buildings lining the bay are coated with a veneer of grime and decay, but 
they are still functioning. Sailors in uniform and crewman from merchant ships are mixed into the crowds of pedestrians. Off to the northwest lies the new beach resort of Vina del Mar. Inland the coastal mountains rise, covered in forests of Eucalyptus and pine.We rode an ascensor to the nearest hilltops where great old mansions and colorful old apartment blocks cling precariously to the slopes packed tight tog
ether. Narrow staircases and winding roads lead up and down the mountains. The area has experienced a revival as a hip artists colony and the evidence of this was everywhere spray painted on the walls. A number of fine restaurants reminiscent of Europe gaze down
upon a fine broad view of the town, the port, and the bay. We had a relaxed lunch in one of these, gazing alternately at the view and at a beautiful infant boy at the next table.3-13-2009
Hotel Bohemia, Mendoza, Argentina
Very little happens here between about 1:30 and 5:30 PM. It's a true siesta. Shopkeepers pull closed the heavy iron bars that guard their wares. Pedestrians disappear. Auto traffic becomes primarily
taxis. Things don't get really rolling again until 7:00 or 7:30 PM when the traffic returns and the streets are full of workers and uniformed students rushing home or to one of the many parks or street side cafes in town.Mendoza feels very southern European. Fashionable people e
at at street side cafes under colorful umbrellas along lovely one way streets lined with sycamore trees. The heat is tempered by the evaporation of water from thousands of irrigated trees and plants and by the shade created by the same. Like in the Mediterranean the air is very dry and the heat not so oppressive. People are slim and fashionable and smoke too m
any cigarettes. Uniquely, canals called Acequias line most every street. These deliver life-giving water from the nearby Andes to the trees and fountains that are everywhere in town.Parque San Martin, named for Argentina's liberator, is nearly a third of the city. It's a beautiful grassy park filled with massive trees, pedestrian walkways, a large artificial pond, a gymnasi
um, an Olympic pool, a number of stadiums, and a large hill. Throughout the park, more acequias flood the land bringing lush vegetation to life. This in a place that averages about ten inches of rain a year, an amount that's roughly similar to San Diego or San Antonio. We walked through the park on a Saturday. Many of the locals were out doing the same. Others were riding bicycles or walking their dogs or rowing racing boats in t
he lake. It's a pretty idyllic place, really, though all these trees seem to be wreaking havoc on my allergic sinuses.When I first moved to California, I found it chock full of gracefully aging automobiles no longer seen in Rh
ode Island. However, California has nothing on Argentina. Here French and American cars from every decade back to the 1960s are common and proudly cruise the streets. Peugeout, Citroen, and Ford dominate but there are Dodges and Mercedes and BMWs of all these eras still running here and most are proudly polished.
Mendoza is of course mos
t famous for it's wines and wineries. The same water that makes the city a garden allows nearly 1200 wineries to flourish
, some for well over a hundred years. Today the area is producing some very high quality wines, particularly of the Malbec variety. We spent one charming day touring a few wineries with a hired driver, Marcello. Marcello, a middle aged man with two young girls, lived at one time on the west side of Los Angeles, but returned home to Mendoza to raise his family. Achaval-Ferrer was our first stop. All of the wines at this very young winery (it was started in 1999) have received Wine Spectator reviews of over 90 points. Nearly the entire production is s
hipped out for export so we were able to taste only wines that were in various early stages of maturation. None of them were yet ready to bottle and yet they were all excellent even when premature. They claim to use more than twice as many grapes per bottle as is typical and I don't doubt it. The wines they are sell
ing now, the 2006 and 2007 vintages, will not be ready to drink for about five more years. None of their wines are filtered. An unusual step in the production process involves aerating and mixing the maceration to allow excess alcohol to evaporate since the density of grapes can send alcohol to 18%.
While we were in Mendoza, we also visited a number of other fine wineries. At Hacienda del Plata met Chrissy, a young woman from Canada who has reinvented herself in Mendoza. Lunch was at La Cava de Cano, a unique restaurant in the renovated basement, "La Cava," of the former governor's home. I was able to easily practice my Spanish with Diego, who attened Ohio State for three years before returning home to Argentina. The first course was a classic and massive assortment of Italian-Argentinian antipasta. In additon to the traditional Italian assortment of cured meats, olives, roasted garlic, mushroo
ms, anchovies, artic
hoke hearts, and various cheeses, there were roasted nuts, various breads, sausages (including blood sausages), and dried fruits and fresh vegetables. After all this then they bring you pasta. All the while, Diego poured bottomless glasses of a very nice 2004 Cava de Cano Syrah. If you can still manage it, desert and a liquer and, if you choose, a cigar. We passed on the cigars but tried the desert and Pisco.After lunch, we visited Carmello Patti's one man winery operation. Carmello and his family moved to Mendoza decades ago from Sicily. He raises few, if any grapes, and instead focuses on winemaking. He personally showed us his winery and signed my bottle of 2003 Cabernet Sauvignon.
3-15-2009
The Central Andes and Aconcagua
3-19-2009
The Secret Garden B&B,
Puerto Iguazu, Argentina
The falls are truly remarkable, but much of their spiritual luster is lost amongst the hordes of tourists and the carefully manicured footpaths everyone walks to wind their way around the various viewpoints.
There's even a tiny light railroad that escorts everyone to the upper falls. This is better than a load automobiles driving about, of course,
but visiting Iquazu is more about checking it off of your international tourism checklist than about communing with nature. We did manage to take a long, sweating hike through the forest. The number of butterflies and moths of all colors we encountered on this trek rivaled anything I've seen in Costa Rica.
John Fernandes is the owner of the Secret Garden B&B. He's a witty, cynical man from India, despite his Latin surname, who was raised largely in boarding
schools in England. After I lamented to John that so many of my travels allowed me very little contact with local people, he 
took me to visit the property of a family of squatters that he has befriended. Gunter's homestead was fascinating. He's been living on the property for four years as a squatter. He's very proud of the fact that "all this was just forest" when he arrived. John explained that few, if any, people in town have a title deed for their homes. "As far as I know, I'm the only person in town to get an official title on my property." Gunter simply moved to the forest on the edge of town, cut down the forest and got to work collecting and cultivating orchids and growing fruits, vegetables, and 
chickens for his family of six. The two youngest boys followed us about and hesitantly pos
ed for pictures under their father's stern direction, slingshots sticking out of their back pockets all the while. The teen-aged son and daughter were more reticent. I suspect John has introduced them to many guests and I hope these young people didn't see our visit to their humble homestead as an indignity of any kind. Gunter is either very much older than his wife or years of hard work have weathered his skin. I suspect that he is about 15-20 years older than his wife.
but visiting Iquazu is more about checking it off of your international tourism checklist than about communing with nature. We did manage to take a long, sweating hike through the forest. The number of butterflies and moths of all colors we encountered on this trek rivaled anything I've seen in Costa Rica.John Fernandes is the owner of the Secret Garden B&B. He's a witty, cynical man from India, despite his Latin surname, who was raised largely in boarding
schools in England. After I lamented to John that so many of my travels allowed me very little contact with local people, he 
took me to visit the property of a family of squatters that he has befriended. Gunter's homestead was fascinating. He's been living on the property for four years as a squatter. He's very proud of the fact that "all this was just forest" when he arrived. John explained that few, if any, people in town have a title deed for their homes. "As far as I know, I'm the only person in town to get an official title on my property." Gunter simply moved to the forest on the edge of town, cut down the forest and got to work collecting and cultivating orchids and growing fruits, vegetables, and 
chickens for his family of six. The two youngest boys followed us about and hesitantly pos
ed for pictures under their father's stern direction, slingshots sticking out of their back pockets all the while. The teen-aged son and daughter were more reticent. I suspect John has introduced them to many guests and I hope these young people didn't see our visit to their humble homestead as an indignity of any kind. Gunter is either very much older than his wife or years of hard work have weathered his skin. I suspect that he is about 15-20 years older than his wife.
