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As expected, our time in Cholitown disappeared with the blink of an eye. Next thing we knew, San Carlos de Bariloche was welcoming us with open arms and lots upon lots of chocolate.
But our mere 2 weeks back on the farm only helped reinforce our love for Cholila, a simple pueblo with a buena onda. Our two weeks were full of especially fun adventures (Laura didn't have to work alll of Easter week), including a headlamp rave party or two.
While Sarge and Dario fished one Saturday, a bunch of us ladies got together and we made natural creams and oils (which included eating a lot of goodies and me listening in on the town gossip). It's amazing how much Mother Earth has to offer, and even more startling when you realize how often we ignore those offerings. Each plant has it's own, unique medicinal qualities- sage, for example, can help with nicotine addiction while rosemary gives you energy. Ciao, CVS, I'm starting a pharmacy right in my own backyard.
We also spent a lot of the week going on day-trip adventures... We first went in the Billaca (Dario's truck which is the same age as him) to Lago Cholila and picked a ton of fruits and vegetables. While Sarge and Dario were catching 21 trout to fry for dinner, a group of us were finding the treasure: apples, chaura (a bush fruit), and (most importantly) pine mushrooms. The second best part to picking fruits and veggies is making delicious food with them... That we did the rest of the week...
To make a great visit even better, Dario and friends took us rock climbing near leleque. In typical Patagonian weather (freezing cold wind with a constant chance of rain), we set up on 2 sides of a giant boulder and had a blast. When the time came to take your jackets off and harness-up, you lost all thought of being cold and just started the climb, hanging on the tips of your fingers and balancing on the centimeter edge of your shoe.
The next day we went deep into Dario's land to do some winter work. We cut down firewood and found oregon pines to transplant at the hostel. We did the transplant job, working with our favorite material, horse poop, to make sure the trees had a comfortable, fertile new home :)
Our week in Cholila flew by too fast, but also gave us enough time to do a lot of thinking, idea throwing, and talking about things, making some smart and ridiculously good plans for the return trip...
It's at those certain times when you find yourself alone, searching for mushrooms in the middle of a Patagonian forest, that it's hard not to look around and feel like you're living in a fairytale. And our fairytale continues as we take on another Argentine national park, Nahuel Huapi... With a box of Bariloche chocolate in both hands.
- comments
Pree Emmy, this sounds amazing! Especially the chocolate part!!