The Traveling Judeas

Since our last post we have finished our awesome roadtrip with Shawn and Mike and we are back in Santiago. So let's rewind a bit and go back to right after the trek. We were pretty exhausted after the W so we hung out in Puerto Natales for a few days, relaxing, eating good pizza and empanadas, going on long walks and enjoying wearing shoes other than our sneakers that we trekked in. Mike was finishing the circuit (longer version of the W) and we wanted to wait for him. After leaving Puerto Natales we decided to stop at the Perito Moreno Glacier which is close to El Calafate.

Ali had seen the glacier a few years ago with her family and seeing it for a second time was just as awe-inspiring. We got to the glacier on the later side just before sunset, and it was wonderful because we almost had the place to ourselves. Walking up to the glacier is incredible it has a huge face that is about 200 feet tall and about 97 square miles. It is very cool because there are probably a few miles long of metal sidewalks with railing that you can explore and get all different kinds of views of the glacier. One of the coolest things we saw was the gigantic building size chunks of ice falling off of the glacier or as it's called, calving. Seeing the massive pieces fall off and the huge splashes and effects they have on the lake is incredible. It is definitely something we were grateful we had a chance to see.

Sarah at Perito Moreno

Sun setting on Perito Moreno

Massive glacier

Glacier views

After Perito Moreno we continued driving to El Bolson, a cool, kind of hippie, spiritual town close to Bariloche. We enjoyed the market in El Bolson and stayed at a campsite for a night before driving back to Bariloche. Mike was going to Bariloche to rock climb and although we were planning on staying the night we decided to keep going and try to make it back to Santiago after going up to Cerro Otto (an incredible gondala ride to view all of Bariloche).  We got to Santiago in the afternoon the next day after a lot of driving by Shawn. We stayed with Shawn and his roommate Beth for a few days as we started our exploration of Santiago.

Ali with a dog that reminded us of Sarah's dog, Max

Eating Figs in El Bolson

Cool bus at our campsite in El Bolson

Ali and Shawn in El Bolson

Going up the gondala in Bariloche

Fun fact: Sarah does not like gondalas

At the top of the overlook of Bariloche 

Meditation

Sunset

Ali's passport had only one more space to stamp so she had to go to the American Embassy to get an insert of extra papers. While Ali was at the embassy she saw a young woman with her 5 year old son (Ali learned this later she didn't know his age at the time) who looked like religious Jews (the woman was dressed modestly and the boy was wearing a kepah)  Ali decided that she would go and talk to her because we didn't have a place to have Passover and she thought the woman would have a good suggestion. This is how the conversation started.

Ali walks over "Hi, wait do you speak English?"
"Yes"
"Hi, my name is Ali, this might be weird but are you Jewish?"
"Haha how could you tell?" (Obvious sarcasm, Ali liked her already)
"Haha well I saw the kepah. So I have a question, my friend and I have been travelling for the past 5 months and we are going to be in Santiago for Pesach and I thought you might know a shul or place that we could go to..."

Her name turned out to be Ivonne and she ended up inviting us to her house for Pesach. We had such an incredible time with her family, she and her husband Jacob (both 28) have Moshe (the 5 year old) and Akiva (2.5 years old) and Jacob's parents Brigdet and Maurice, and 2 brothers, Mike (25) and Danny (23), Mike's wife Delilah, niece Tamar (18 months), Abuelo, and sister Sharon (17) were also there. Ivonne and her family were so incredibly warm and welcoming and we had the best time with amazing food and family. After 5 months on the road challah, brisket and matzah ball soup have never tasted better.

Also we will just say that you are supposed to drink 4 cups of wine at Passover and we experienced a lot of laughing until we couldn't breathe :) Ivonne's mother-in-law Bridget, is from Miami so we got a good taste of a wonderful Jewish mother. It was as you would imagine a close family Seder, lots of laughs, jokes on each other's behalf and love and warmth all around. The Seder was in Spanish/English/Hebrew which was definitely a different experience. For the second night of Seder we went to Bridget and Maurice's home for another lovely night.  Also both Seder' s ended at around 2:30 AM!! Note: sorry there are no photos of our Seder extravaganzas but out of respect for the family's traditions we didn't take photos.

To backtrack a bit when Ali was at the embassy Sarah went to a kosher restaurant with great falafel and met a friendly man named Yehudah who invited us to his synagogue for Shabbat (Sabbath) the Friday before Passover. We were planning on attending services and maybe staying at the synagogue for dinner, but instead we met another Sharon who is a year older in school than Ivonne's sister-in-law Sharon (they're friends). Sharon insisted we spend Shabbat dinner at her family's house. Again amazing food was eaten, laughs were had, and the warmth of the Jewish community was definitely felt by us.  We had some delicious home cooked meals and learned about the customs of the Jews living in Chile.

We have loved exploring Santiago and getting to spend time with some wonderful families here. Since we left Shawn's we have been staying with Antonella an amazing woman Sarah's Mom met while standing in line for Lion King tickets on Broadway in NY in October. Antonella offered for us to stay with her and she has been an incredible host. Tomorrow we leave for Valparaiso and Vina del Mar,  two beachy towns about two hours from Santiago. We will be there for a few days and unfortunately  after that we are going to be going on different paths.

Santiago street art 

Ali found her brother Ian's band! The Higher Concept (THC)

Wallstreet Area of Santiago

Thirsty 

Tourist

Street Performer

Pretty flowers

At La Vega, huge open market in Santiago 

At Parque Araunco

Relaxing in the park

We see a giraffe, we have to take a photo. AePhi fo life. LML. 

In front of the President's house, raising the flag

La Moneda Palace, the Presidents crib

With our new friend Arturo who we met in the park.
 He took us to an interesting exhibit on textiles in Latin America

After some of the most amazing 5 months of our lives we have experienced everything we would have thought possible physically,
emotionally, and spiritually. We have laughed until we almost peed, learned, been open, experienced unreal experiences, seen gorgeous sites both famous and some you've never heard of, made great friends from all over the world and said goodbye to them, learned Spanish,  ate lots of empanadas,  connected, and we have done all of this together. As hard as it will be to split up Ali decided that because she only has two months left (she's in one of her best friend and former roommate's weddings, Shoutout Rach and Dani!) she is going to move to Buenos Aires, live with a family (her Spanish teacher's family) and volunteer. Sarah doesn't have a time limit on when she needs to be home and wants to experience things like working on a farm, learning to surf and possibly living in an Eco Yoga Village. It will be hard not to have our best friend there for support for our next part of our journey, but we decided it was best for us and our goals for our trip. It definitely won't be goodbye, it will be see you later as we hug and cry goodbye :) Also we will continue the blog but just will be writing separately. Thanks for all the love and support we have received as we continue on our journey.

Gustock, aka huge picnic with a concert. 

"Life is a journey, not a destination."

Love and Hugs,

A & S