January 29, 2005

09:02:07 am Patagonia, Argentina & Chile  

Calfate, Argentina
Monday, January 24, 2005 - Friday, January 28, 2005
City population: 15,000

Torres del Paine National Park, Chile
Wednesday, January 26, 2005 - Thursday, January 27, 2005

Itinerary
Aerolineas Argentinas flight from Ushuaia to Calafate
Two nights at Picos del Sur Hotel
Van to Torres del Paine National Park, Chile (6 hours, including stops, border crossing, and bus change)
One night at Hosteria (Hotel) Las Torres
Van back to Calfate (4 hours, faster driver, quicker bus change and border crossing)
One night at Picos del Sur Hotel

Activities, all were excellent
Upsala Explorer, tour to Upsala Glacier and Estancia (ranch) Cristina
Tour of Torres del Paine National Park
Hike from Hosteria Las Torres to Campamento Chileno (halfway to the base of Torres del Paine)
Trekking on Moreno Glacier

Patagonia is the southern region of mainland Argentina. In English, Patagonia means "very beautiful, but too damn windy!" The name is popularized in the US through the Patagonia line of outdoor clothing and we now understand fully the merits of the jacket known as a "windbreaker." While we were there, wind speeds were commonly 30-40 miles per hour, with gusts in exposed areas of 50-60 miles per hour. At times, standing still was difficult. Apparently, 100 miles per hour wind is not unusual.

Calafate, like Ushuaia, is a frontier town, growing rapidly due to tourism. The frontier this time is Parque Nacional Los Glaciares. These are serious glaciers, worth a trip. Previously we had seen glaciers in Alaska (Nick) and Colorado (Deanna) that were a letdown. Rather than describe the Argentine glaciers, we refer you to the image gallery. We will add though that their dimensions may not be clear from the pictures. The Upsala Glacier is about 200 feet tall and extends about 500 feet below the water. It is about 2.5 miles wide and 35 miles long. In summer, parts of the glacier break off, forming icebergs in the cold waters of Lake Argentina. It is visually spectacular.

The Moreno Glacier is smaller, but more accessible and no less amazing. We trekked on this glacier with a group (you strap crampons to your shoes to walk on the ice), a fantastic activity we highly recommend. The crampons allow you to walk easily up or down the steep glacier ice (see the image gallery). The guides divided our tour into English speaking and Spanish speaking groups. Naturally, we were in the English-language group, but we were the only travelers from the US and there were only three other native English speakers from Canada. The rest of the group was from France and Italy. The French group was a wild, inclusive bunch of four couples who had been friends for decades. They were celebrating the 60th birthday of one woman in the group, and they provided champagne for everyone at lunch. "They are so friendly and nice, not at all like typical French people," one of the Italians joked. Even in the age of the EU, national identity remains prominent! (US citizens are often surprised to find that the abbreviation for US in Spanish is EU for Estados Unidos, or United States in Spanish. This seems like a wry, confusing joke now that the US and the EU are the two largest economic blocks in the world--that is until the Chinese take over.)

Strong wind and a rapidly growing Argentine town is a bad combination for someone who wears contacts. Our hotel while nice, was a few blocks off the main paved road. Dirt roads are common here, as the buildings are multiplying faster than the roads. "Ouch my eyes hurt" is all Nick could say, as dust and sand whipped into his eyeballs at high speed. Deanna thought this was a poetic payback for his Ushuaia meltdown.

Like Ushuaia, Calfate is booming. The airport was similar--relatively new and already quite crowded. The flights in and out were full. On the way back to airport for our flight out, our taxi driver happened to be an air traffic controller, moonlighting on a day off. He said the airport opened November 15, 2000, and the city population has tripled since then from 5,000 to 15,000. The old airport had short runways that did not allow for regular commercial aircraft. So tourists to this area had to fly into Rio Gallegos, and then drive three to four hours to Calafate. The glaciers are another 60 to 90 minutes drive beyond Calafate. Suffice to say, that far fewer people bothered to see the glaciers then.

The new airport in Ushuaia was built around the same time as the new airport in Calafate. We don't know, but we suspect the boom in Antarctica cruises probably occurred with the opening of the new Ushuaia airport. This airport allows Ushuaia to be reached now in two flights from major US gateway cities (e.g., New York, Miami, Los Angeles, Chicago) that have direct flights to either Buenos Aires or Santiago, Chile, those being the two international cities with flights to Ushuaia.

It's a common theme around the world. Build a new airport or road and commerce and people will come. (We owe a debt to Jim Rogers for making this point so clearly and repeatedly in his travelogue books Investment Biker and Adventure Capitalist. These two excellent books partially inspired us to take our world tour, although we won't quite match Jim's adventure-seeking method of travel through deserts and war zones.) The situation in Ushuaia and Calafate is similar to that in Liberia, Costa Rica. See our Costa Rica post for a description of how tourism is booming on the northern Pacific coast of Costa Rica now that an expanded international airport means you no longer have to fly into San Jose, a four-hour drive away.

Infrastructure such as roads and airports are one of the most useful things governments can spend money on, as the spending can open up entire new areas to development previously not feasible. That's not to say that every road project is a great idea. The Highway Bill proposed in Congress in 2004 and currently held up as the Bush administration finally shows a hint of spending discipline, is over the top in our opinion, but if a government is going to waste money, better on transportation infrastructure than on most other items. At least you are left with something useable once the money is blown.

Nevertheless, We cannot begin to describe how vast and empty this region is, even with the tourist influx. The thought of the earth being overcrowded seems farcical here. Parts of the continental US were probably this empty 80 years ago, but nothing in America outside of the less settled parts of Alaska remains this remote now. Go see Patagonia before it changes.

The southern third of Chile is not even connected with the largest part of the country by road, although that is beginning to change as the main highway is extended south gradually. To reach Torres del Paine
National Park from within Chile, you must arrive in the area by boat or plane and then drive several hours. You can also drive several hours overland from Argentina, which of course is what we did since we were already nearby on the Argentine side. The border crossing itself is a remote outpost on a dirt road.

Spending two days and one night in Torres del Paine was the most difficult part of the trip to book so far. It would seem that it would be easy to travel less than 200 miles from the town closest to arguably the most beautiful national park in Argentina to the arguably the most beautiful national park in Chile. It probably would have been easy to do this locally, but we did not want to risk no availability in high season when tourists seem to be growing faster than capacity. So we booked this trip from Chicago. It was like the old Yogi Berra saying about a restaurant, "It's so crowded, nobody goes there anymore." Travel agents for Calafate and Torres del Paine are so busy at this time of year that they do not have time to book anything for you. We should explain that daily high temperatures in Patagonia may reach only 50 degrees in the summer (although the 60s and low 70s are also common), so summer is the only good time to visit--at other times it is just too cold, especially when you factor in the wind speed. So everyone goes here in the summer. Even in summer, the wind chill can drop below 30 degrees mid-day, as the winds kick up. Thus, Deanna broke down and bought a winter hat, the one piece of true winter gear we now have.

We tried about half a dozen travel agents over the Internet before achieving success, success defined as taking three weeks to book a tour from Calafate to Torres del Paine and one hotel night in Torres del Paine. We had to wire most of the money ahead of time, pay the rest in cash in person in Buenos Aires in a transaction that took one hour, and then make another in-person visit to the agent's company in Calfate, just to reconfirm everything, which took about an hour.

Argentina is largely a cash-based society--credit cards are accepted at some higher-end places, although not always willingly and occasionally with a punitive surcharge that incentivizes you to pay cash anyway. Other parts of South America such as Bolivia and Ecuador are also like this (requiring us to wire money for tours and hotels ahead of time), but we suspect that is do to those countries' relatively unsophisticated financial systems. In Argentina, the issue seems to be more a distrust of banks and a desire to avoid them wherever possible, rather than primitive financial systems. That's not altogether an illogical reaction to a situation where you couldn't get your money out of your bank for several weeks in 2002, while the value of your currency dropped 75% against major world currencies. Or to situations in the late 80s and early 90s where inflation was over 1000% per year. Given this string of financial crises, people tend to have a lot of cash lying around. Sadly, there are reports every day in the paper of home robberies where large amounts of cash are stolen.

Credit cards seem more accepted in Brazil and Chile. We are not sure about Uruguay, as during our brief stay there we encountered different results--accepted some places, not others. Uruguay has been more stable than Argentina, so this surprised us a bit. We wonder if less than universal acceptance in Uruguay reflects the preponderance of Argentine customers wanting to pay in cash or possibly the businesses being owned by Argentines.

Torres del Paine, like the glaciers around Calafate, is stunningly beautiful to the point where it's just best to refer you to the image gallery rather than to try and describe it. Though not that high, the main peaks are sharp, jagged, and rise nearly straight up. This makes them a challenge to climb, although by 1970 humans had scaled all of the peaks. The park itself is much bigger and less developed than we expected. All roads are dirt or gravel and can be quite bumpy. After a day of riding in the van, we felt like a layer of dust had settled on us.

There is one immediately noticeable difference once you cross the border from Argentina to Chile--the prices are much higher, generally at US levels, sometimes less, sometimes beyond, depending on the item. Since our knowledge is limited to the area from the border to the tourist spot of Torres del Paine, we don't know how authentic our experience is. Prices could be inflated by the confined area we are in--there is nowhere else to get a meal, so a buffet dinner at the hotel cost US$95 for the two of us, about what we paid for dinner for five our first night in Buenos Aires. Prices could also be inflated by it being peak season. We'll see what prices are in Santiago in about one month's time, although travelers we were with during our tour said that Chile is an expensive country. Some premium seems justified as the country has been probably the most stable financially in the Americas over the past 15 years outside of the US and Canada. Still, $10 for two 8-ounce Cokes at lunch with that charge again for refills might make even a New York hotelier blush.

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09:00:33 am Ushuaia, Argentina  

Ushuaia, Argentina
Saturday, January 22, 2005 - Monday, January 24, 2005
Southernmost city in the world
City population: 55,000

Itinerary
Pluna flight from Punta del Este, Uruguay to Buenos Aires, Argentina
Aerolineas Argentinas flight from Buenos Aires to Ushuaia
Two nights at Hostal (Hotel) Del Bosque

Activities
Museo Maritimo, Museo Penitenciaro, and several other museums all in the same building, the former prison, located in the Presido
Tren del Fin de Mundo (Train to the End of the World, skip)

Ushuaia is the southern most city in the world, at least according to Argentina. It's a fair descriptor, even though Chileans might object as Puerto Williams, Chile is further south. But with only 2,500 people, Puerto Williams isn't a city, so Ushuaia wins the southernmost-city moniker. Ushuaia is a frontier town, the frontier being Antarctica. Cruises to Antarctica are quite common now during the summer months, so passengers from all over the world fly into Ushuaia before boarding their mammoth cruise ships.

We heard more English spoken on the plane and in the town than we have anywhere else, both by Americans and by Europeans whose native tongue is another language but who use English as the common denominator to communicate with other foreigners. Cruise ship ports of call around the world specialize in kitschy souvenirs and tacky T-shirts and Ushuaia can hold it's own with the best of them. Its downtown shopping area reminded Nick some of the area around the Anchorage port in terms of its who-actually-buys-this-crap appeal.

We also encountered a number of rugged outdoorsy types, some probably just camping in the area, but others headed on to Antarctica for scientific or exploration purposes beyond simple tourism.

We had wanted to go to Antarctica so that we would visit all seven continents during our trip. We generously apportioned four days for this on an early schedule, before we found out that the minimum cruise is 10 days, since it takes three or four days by boat from Ushuaia or Punta Arenas, Chile (the other major Antarctica departure point to the north and west) to reach Antarctica. We considered also the extra packing required--neither of us has a hat, gloves, a scarf, or a coat other than a fleece--and decided to save Antarctica for another trip. Even in a year, you cannot see it all and many desired destinations would have to wait for the future. Later once the schedule was pretty much set with flights and hotels booked, Nick found an air service that offers one- or two-day trips to Antarctica from Punta Arenas. Had we seen this earlier, we might have booked and planned for this, but since the schedule as it was did not have us going to Punta Arenas, it would have taken a major schedule overhaul to accommodate this. Because of weather, you have to plan to be in Punta Arenas for several days, since a flight to Antarctica is always contingent on conditions, even in summer. There are no flights outside of summer.

As a frontier town, Ushuaia is growing rapidly, as tourists descend upon it. A relatively new airport has replaced the former airport, yet it was completely overwhelmed during our arrival and our departure. Our flight in and our flight out were the first completely full flights we encountered on the trip. New houses are being thrown up quickly and sidewalks and paved roads end and then suddenly begin again one block later. It is not a particularly pretty place in our view, although that does not explain the lack of pictures in the image gallery. There are water and mountains and when the sky is clear it can be attractive enough, but it doesn't match the Patagonia region where we visited next in its visual appeal. It's a cool place to say you've been to--the southernmost city in the world, Tierra del Fuego--but our advice would be to skip Ushuaia if you are not on going on to Antarctica and be sure to visit Patagonia instead.

And now a geography lesson. You hear about all of these places in school or growing up, but until visiting it was not clear in our mind. Tierra del Fuego is a large island, immediately south of the South America mainland, but part of South America. Part of the island is Chile and part is Argentina. Ushuaia is one of several cities on Tierra del Fuego. There are actually numerous islands south of South America, but Tierra del Fuego is by far the largest, probably in size greater than the others combined. The Straits of Magellan, discovered by Magellan around 1520 as a shortcut passageway between the Atlantic and Pacifica Ocean, is the narrow body of water between the South American mainland and Tierra del Fuego. The aforementioned Punta Arenas, Chile sits on the Strait of Magellan, on the South American mainland. South of Tierra del Fuego between it and a smaller island is another water passageway, the Beagle Channel, named after the ship Darwin sailed on in the 1820s. The Beagle Channel separates Ushuaia and Puerto Williams, Chile. Still further south is Cape Horn, the tip of the southern most island that is part of South America. So sailing from the Atlantic to the Pacific, you could choose one of three common routes: through the Straits of Magellan, through the Beagle Channel, or around Cape Horn.

Our arrival in Ushuaia began auspiciously when an announcement on the plane once we landed informed the passengers that the airline had left most of the luggage behind in Buenos Aires, due to too much weight on the plane. Ironic, in that this domestic flight on Aerolineas Argentinas had the lowest weight restriction that we've ever encountered--15 kilograms per person, about 33 pounds, definitely below the 20-kg restriction we packed for. That such a restriction existed did not surprise us, but that it was actually enforced did. Rules tend to be more advisory than mandatory in South America. For example, Pluna, the Uruguayan carrier we flew out of Uruguay, had numerous signs informing passengers of a rather ridiculous 5-kg carry-on restriction. Most people shuffled right by it, as the flight crew watched them schlep two or three bags on the plane. Our Aerolineas Argentinas check-in agent must be new we thought, and it turns out he was. So we had to pay about $17 extra to not get our bags until the next day.

We handled this quite well, after all such things happen. Nick did not mind walking around in 50-degree weather in a short-sleeve shirt, nor did Deanna, for she had the foresight to wear, not check, her fleece. But like a child throwing his toys out of the playpen, Nick had an unexpected meltdown when unable to make a satisfactory purchase of a sweater in downtown Ushuaia. Oh, they sold sweaters all right. But skipping over the inexpensive locally made items that all had some naff logo or saying on them, and the overpriced imported items, left a narrow range of goods with a price and design optimized to Nick's fashion sense for the remainder of the day. Except that in every case the price marked on the bin or the rack was not in fact the price of the sweater Nick wanted (guess which price was higher). Muttering obscenities that questioned how anyone could shop in such a disorganized environment, he decided rashly to damn the sweater purchase, he would tough out the cold weather. While this move risked permanent non-delivery of the bags, all worked out okay, primarily due to Deanna's patience with her temperamental, whining husband.

Deanna liked our hotel room as much as the one in Punta del Este, so she decided to spend much of Sunday, January 23 in the room. It seems that beef is not only on the menu breakfast, lunch, and dinner, but also is used (animal fat) to cook one of Deanna's favorite foods, French fries. So no more papas frite for a while. We were reminded of a story Rich Miller told us in Buenos Aires about a vegetarian friend he had in Paraguay. Unlike Deanna, this guy ate no meat whatsoever, which was hard to register with Paraguayans. They tried to serve him chicken, and when he said no, he could not eat meat of any kind, they corrected him, "It's not meat, it walks on only two legs."

So using the Paraguayan standard, Deanna had a new way to explain her eating requirements. Instead of saying "no red meat and no pork" she could now say "no four-legged animals" or to a Paraguayan, simply "no meat."

During her recovery time in Ushuaia, Deanna finished The Da Vinci Code, which she had happily found in paperback form in Porto Alegre, Brazil during a layover. It's still only in hard cover in the US. Earlier in Punta del Este, she completed its predecessor, Angels and Demons. So due to her sensitive stomach, she was able to finish two books and 1100 pages in a week, while also visiting three different countries. Deanna also decided that Imodium was her new favorite product.

In pop music news, The Eagles surprisingly continue to be 0 for South America, with the globally overplayed favorite Hotel California still not heard once on the trip. Rod Stewart seems to be all the rage in Argentina, with his American Songbook and Greatest Hits receiving a full airing during visits to two different restaurants and various other songs of his being played in other public locations. Chris Isaac is making his presence felt on the southern continent with Wicked Game heard multiple times.

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08:58:18 am Uruguay  

Montevideo, Uruguay
Tuesday, January 18, 2005 - Wednesday, January 19, 2005
Capital and largest city in Uruguay
City population: 1.4 million in metropolitan area

Punta del Este, Uruguay
Wednesday, January 19, 2005 - Saturday, January 22, 2005
Nicest beach resort destination in South America
City population: less than 50,000

Itinerary
TAM flight from Brasilia, Brazil to Porto Alegre, Brazil
Aerolineas Argentinas flight from Porto Alegre, Brazil to Montevideo
One night at Hotel Europa, Montevideo
Bus from Montevideo to Punta del Este (140 kilometers, 2 hours)
Three nights at Hotel Remanso, Punta del Este

Montevideo Activities
Walking around downtown
City tour
Visiting downtown museums: Museo Historico Nacional, Museo Torres Garcia, Casa de Gobierno Historico

Punte del Este Activities
Walking around town
Viewing real estate
Relaxing

Country Background:
Population: 3 million
Per capita GDP: $13,000
Size: slightly smaller than Washington state
Currency: peso, 25 per dollar
Independence: 1825 from Brazil
Language: Spanish

Uruguay has been called the Switzerland of South America because it is small, relatively prosperous, and welcoming to foreign investment with a pro-market government. Its economic policies give it the highest standard of living in South America. Like its neighbors Argentina and Brazil, it too had troubles in the 60s and 70s with the military in charge from 1973 until a democratically elected president took over in 1984.

The taxi ride from the airport to downtown Montevideo along the coast of the Rio de la Platte/Atlantic Ocean reminded us a bit of the California coast. That's not a great comparison as the cliffs of California were not present, but in a foreign place you come up with closest analogies that you can.

Arriving from Brasilia meant a language switch back to Spanish from Portuguese. Nick continued to have trouble mastering hello in a new country. After his arigato/abrigado confusion in Brasilia, a strange new derivation of hello/hola emanated from his mouth: "alo," as in "hello" spoken by someone from England with the "h" clipped off. He justified this malapropos to himself by observing that "alo" was simply "ola" (the phonetic pronounciation of "hola") with the "a" and the "o" reversed. A very understandable error, he reasoned to himself, not registering the utterly befuddled look on the face of everyone he spoke to with his new made-up greeting.

After a day seeing the sights in Montevideo, we took a bus to Punta del Este. We previously posted out of sequence on Punta del Este on January 20. The danger of writing on a place in the first 24 hours of arriving is that you have to correct much of what you wrote initially as you learn more. So here follows our Errata on Punta del Este.

Contrary, to our initial impression, Uruguay does not have its own proprietary network cable. While Nick was talking to an English-speaking real estate agent, he explained the difficulty described in our earlier post and asked if she knew how he could connect our notebook to the Internet. She explained the situation to a colleague, who said something in Spanish like, "what does this idiot mean?--it's a worldwide standard, of course!" He then invited Nick to try his network connection, which similar to Nick's earlier experience, did not fit securely in our PC (no click), but this time there was a good enough connection begin transferring bytes to the Internet. So that is how Nick found himself in the office of the manager of a local real estate firm, updating our web site, while the manager took phone calls in Spanish, his PC temporarily useless as Nick hogged his bandwidth. These situations happen abroad, with most foreigners very eager to help clueless Americans, even while their own productivity is idled. They think nothing of it, while if the situation was reversed, we would probably be hovering impatiently, wondering "are you done yet?!--I have work to do!"

Further, wireless networking has made its way this country. It was present both in this real estate office and ironically in our very own hotel lobby, although we are not sure whether it was provided by the hotel or a business or condo next door, unaware they were providing a conduit for padgetthome.com to update its image gallery.

As detailed in our earlier post, Deanna was wiped out on Thursday. After the first post, Nick returned to the pharmacy, this time procuring a mercury thermometer, the kind we all grew up with but which seem to be no longer available in the US, in favor of the digital kind which cost two or three times as much and work for about a year before the battery goes. Progress. Deanna checked in at an impressive 38.1 degrees Celsius, or 100.6 Fahrenheit on Thursday afternoon. But by Friday morning, her temperature was normal again.

Thus, she set out gingerly with Nick to view the real estate scene in Punta del Este. The prior afternoon, between stops at the pharmacy, Nick visited the office of Intermedio, a local real estate broker and property manager. Their handwritten "Yes we speak English" lured him into the office like a moth to a flame.

Inside he spent about an hour speaking with Jimena Rodriguez, the designated English speaker (see image gallery for an action photo of her closing a deal). In addition to solving Nick's Internet connection troubles, she agreed to show properties to him and Deanna the next day. With her multiple talents of technical troubleshooting, translation, and real estate brokerage, she should go far.

So on Friday, she graciously spent several hours with us showing us different condos. We had wanted to see some houses as well, but they were all currently occupied with renters, this being the high season for tourism, and thus not available for viewing. Still, we had no complaints, as we were happy to get to see anything. Our prior post on Punta del Este commented on the excellent value in prices available, and our excursion only reinforced this view.

Like everywhere, prices can vary widely depending on location and quality of the property. So we would amend our prior post only to say that we found some properties even less expensive than previously mentioned and other properties also more expensive. Houses a few blocks from the beach in a good location actually start around $100,000. We looked a high-end condos right on the water, priced above the range cited in our earlier post, but still a bargain by US standards. The first property was a 2200 square foot condo on the 17th floor of one of the best-located buildings in Punta del Este. See the pictures labeled "Tip of the Peninsula" and "Marina" in the image gallery for the views. While advertised as 3 bedrooms, 2.5 baths, this does not include the standard maid's quarters, with has another bedroom and full bath. If you didn't have a maid or otherwise need the bedroom, you could use the bedroom as a den or office. So, in US terms, this really was a 4-bedroom, 3.5-bath unit. While the décor was a bit dated, reflecting that the building was 25 years old, we felt that was adequately compensated for in the $320,000 asking price, which according to Jimena, could probably be reduced to $300,000 or less. Again, this is for one of the best-located buildings in the top beach resort on the continent of South America!

Another notable unit we looked at was in what was likely one of the nicest buildings in the city. It was a very high quality building by US standards, featuring floor to ceiling marble in the lobby, a private elevator to your unit, a gym, a theater room available for private use, indoor and outdoor pools, supervised children's activities, daily maid service, and more. A brand new 5-bedroom, 5.5 bath (this includes the maid's quarters), 2900-square foot unit, with incredible beachfront views (see pictures Punta del Este looking North and Punta del Este looking South in the image gallery) on the 17th floor could be had for $590,000. There are a few extra fees not included in the selling price of new units, so tack on 6% to make this comparable to a US price. Also take note that the agent's commission is split by the buyer and seller instead of being paid solely by the seller (obviously, relatively to the US, this works against you when buying, and for you when selling, a wash in the end). Still for less than $650,000, you could own one of the nicest units in the Trump Tower if you will of Punta del Este. Oh and did we mention that Uruguay has the enlightened policy of no capital gains tax and direct ownership of property by foreigners? Now you may be beginning to see why wealthy Argentines invest their money in Uruguay.

Nonetheless, the better investment opportunities are probably in Montevideo. Punta del Este is a vacation destination that peaks December to February. The Trump apartment just described might command as much as $1,000 per day in rent at the very peak time of the last week in December through the first half of January, but then it might also sit idle for nine months of the year. In contrast, Montevideo is a year-round town, which as the capital and largest city has a constant stream of diplomats and business people assigned to it for a few years at a time. Property there costs about the same, but could be rented year round, perhaps for several years at a time. And while not considered a vacation destination, Montevideo has the same weather as Punta del Este and some great beaches also. You won't get the peak rents that Punta offers, but you should have a steadier investment.

Finally, a few social observations. Punta del Este is a beautiful sunny place where sunscreen is readily available but apparently rarely used as the leather skin look is still in vogue here. So is smoking and it is allowed everywhere we have been so far in South America, except in airplanes. It is sometimes hard to remember that just 15 years ago you could still smoke on US flights. The first movement to ban smoking in some public places is occasional in the news in Buenos Aires, although it is considered something of a curious thing to want to do. It will be interesting to see if in two or three decades smoking becomes the anathema in other cultures that it has become in the US. We think it will--if the Irish can ban smoking in their pubs, which they just did, it can happen anywhere.

It is also fashionable in Punta del Este it seems to cover the back windshield of your vehicle with as many advertising and slogan stickers as possible (see image gallery). Apparently, the goal is to minimize completely the visibility you have out the back window. Cars from Uruguay, Argentina, and Paraguay all liberally decorated their rear windows.

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January 24, 2005

11:27:04 am Brasilia, Brazil  

Brasilia, Brazil
Sunday, January 16, 2005 - Tuesday, January 18, 2005
Capital of Brazil since 1960, city did not exist prior to this
City population 500,000; 2 million in metropolitan area

Itinerary
TAM flight from Buenos Aires, Argentina to Brasilia, stopping in Porto Alegre (no plane change)
Two nights at Kubitschek Plaza Hotel

Activities
Morning city tour
Afternoon tour of outlying areas
These two tours cover most of the sites to see (there is a third tour that hits the remaining sites), so we saw most everything in six hours total, although a few places (not most) we would have spent a bit more time if we could have.

Country Background:
Population: 184 million
Per capita GDP: $8,000
Size: slightly less than US
Currency: real, 2.70 per dollar
Independence: 1822 from Portugal
Language: Portuguese; Spanish common

The most amazing thing about Brasilia is that it exists. Imagine if Dwight Eisenhower during his 1956 run for the US presidency, proposed that the nation's capital be moved to an empty spot in the middle of Wyoming, where no one lived. Then imagine if--once elected--he made good on that campaign pledge and actually oversaw the move of the capital to newly built city in remote Wyoming during that term of his presidency. Preposterous? That is exactly what Juscelino Kubitschek did at the same time. Granted he was elected to a five-year term instead of four years a US president has, but nonetheless it is a remarkable triumph of imagination and willpower. He later said that he thought the city had to be finished in one term, otherwise the next administration would never see it through. Fifty years of progress in five was his motto.

The new capital was not without its cost. Inflation and a balance of payments deficit followed as Kubitschek relentlessly pressed on with his economic development program of the nation's interior. He left these financial problems to his successor, who didn't even last a year in office and by 1964 the military had taken over from the politicians, a common theme throughout South American in the 20th Century.

But today, Kubitschek is lauded throughout Brasilia, for if not for him truly the place would not exist. His place in history is secure because his great accomplishment outweighs his greatest negative. Leaders of any country or in any situation are remembered in history for one or two key things, whether good or bad. That's it. No matter how much a person accomplishes, one or two things is the epitaph you have in posterity. Lincoln: freed slaves and kept the country together. Washington: father of our country, won Revolutionary War and was the first president. FDR: New Deal during Depression and winning World War II. Reagan: restored country's confidence and won the Cold War. Nixon: Watergate. Kubitschek: built Brasilia.

The look of Brasilia reflects the period in which it was conceived--the late 50s. Cars were big, everyone wanted one, gas was cheap, freeways were the way to go (after all Eisenhower may not have moved the capital but he did build the interstate highway system), and environmental concerns did not exist. Brasilia looks like it was underwritten by General Motors. It's a pre-space age city that the ancestors of the Jetsons would feel at home in. It is spread out, with multilane roads and interchanges connecting everything. Present day environmentalists and city planners criticize the city for its over reliance on the automobile, but unlike Los Angeles, the amount of open, green space dwarfs the amount of built-upon land. The vast amount of open land is ironically an attribute that requires a spread out automobile-friendly design. The designer of the city meant it to resemble a bow and arrow, but a plane or a bird is what most people see when they look at a map (see city maps in the image gallery).

Nick had read about Brasilia for years and had marveled that it existed. It's a great political accomplishment anywhere, but especially in South America which has such a poor record of political accomplishment. Because it is isolated in the interior of the country, 600 miles from the former capital Rio de Janeiro, we did not have time to visit it on our New Year's trip to Brazil two years ago. This trip we skipped the normal Brazilian stops of Rio, Sao Paulo, and Iguasu Falls that we visited two years ago to make time for Brasilia. Brasilia was built to be a seat of government, so there's not a tremendous amount to do there, two or three days is enough time (we were there just under two days). But if you have any interest in urban design, architecture, or politics, it is worth the trip. It's such a unique place, and a living monument to what humankind can achieve when willpower follows the setting of an inspirational goal. It's a modern city built out of a jungle.

While there, we discussed what would Brasilia look like if it were designed today instead of nearly 50 years ago. We are not sure it would look the same. It is an excellent reflection of period in time of when it was designed. Today, such a sprawling design is not politically correct, even as it dominates American suburbia. In Asia, today's building boom reveals what a new capital in that part of the world would look like. In the past 15 years, China has essentially built a new financial (not government) capital in the Pudong area of Shanghai (across the river from what was existing Shanghai). In Beijing, the political capital of China, the government is building vast new parts of the city in preparation for the 2008 Olympics. These areas have a futurist architectural look for our time, just as Brasilia did for its time. We are not sure, though, if a South American capital built today would resemble the Asian model. We wonder if it might actually look more like the past, an updated post-modern version of Buenos Aires, the Argentine capital. Buenos Aires has wide streets and boulevards and big parks that are desired for a capital city, but it also has the grid design of a traditional city, and traditional Spanish-style architecture that seems elegant, classic, and timeless. We'll never know the answer to this question as there aren't any new South American capitals on the drawing board, but this is the kind of question we amuse ourselves with as we live this year in different countries.

If Kubitschek were to see his city today, he would undoubtedly be proud to see what it has become, but there is one aspect that he probably would not be so happy with. Like many South American cities, graffiti mars an otherwise Disneyesque order to the place. Why the city tolerates this, we just cannot figure out. There's no lack of government-employed labor tidying up the place. We saw work crews using power floor cleaners to wash outdoor granite plazas, fields of green space being regularly mowed, and flowers being planted and maintained all over the city. Much of this activity seemed overkill and even make-work. But there was scant evidence of removing graffiti. There is an obvious civic pride about Brasilia and a desire to keep its appearance up, but the lack of focus on graffiti is a complete blind spot. We'd redirect 80% of the work crews to graffiti removal and let the acres of empty, unused green space go unmowed for a while. Overall the place would look a lot better with this reallocation of labor. We imagine Mayors Giuliani or Daley would do the same. It's just common sense, at least to us.

During our tours of Brasilia, we met another couple from the UK who are doing a trip similar to ours (see Space Age Shoes from the Future picture in Image Gallery). Being slightly younger and not being American, they are naturally more adventurous than we are, spending five months in South America, part of the time camping. We are going to many of the same places, although we will generally be there a few months before them as they linger longer in South America. These chance encounters when you run into people with different backgrounds, but doing similar things, with whom you can exchange ideas and information are an enjoyable aspect of travel outside of your own country. You meet, instantly bond, and then a short time later you say goodbye, your paths most likely to never cross again.

Most people assume that Spanish dominates South America, and it does in a way, but there are actually roughly the same numbers of Portuguese speakers as there are Spanish speakers. All of the Portuguese speakers are concentrated in Brazil, however, which by far has the biggest population on the continent. Thus the perception that Spanish dominates South American is legitimate in that it is an official language (we think) in every country but one and it is common in Brazil as well. (For simplicity, we've ignored for the moment that native Indian languages are commonly spoken in Bolivia, Ecuador, Peru, and other places.)

So the trip to Brasilia meant a change from the Spanish we had begun to grow accustom to. Nick, displaying his latent language skills from the 2003 Brazil trip, immediately began using "arigato" to say thank you, until he realized that was Japanese, and the correct Portuguese word was "abrigado." The hotel staff, being too polite to correct him themselves but knowing Japanese when they heard it, did have a good laugh when he realized his error and began using the right word.

Finally, conservatives and champions of free speech everywhere will take pride to know that Fox News Channel is available in Brasilia. While Fox Sports and Fox Network are common outside the US, this is the first time we've seen Fox News. Usually, CNN is the dominant US news network overseas. So now Brazilians can watch what Canadians are not allowed to see.

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January 23, 2005

07:32:27 pm Buenos Aires, Argentina  

Buenos Aires, Argentina
Thursday, January 13, 2005 - Sunday, January 16, 2005
Capital and largest city in Argentina
City population: 13 million in metropolitan area

Itinerary
Continental flight from Tampa to Miami
American flight from Miami to Buenos Aires
Rich Miller picked us up at airport
Three nights at Recoleta Guest House

Activities
Touring city museums and neighborhoods by ourselves and with Millers: Plaza de Mayo, Museo de los Presidentes, Cemetary of the Recoleta, Museo de Bellas Artes, Museo Nacional de Arte Decorativo, Museo de Arte Latinamericano (MALBA), Museo de la Ciudad, La Boca neighborhood, San Telmo neighborhood, Museo de Arte Moderno, Recoleta neighborhood, Palermo neighborhood

Country Background:
Population: 39 million
Per capita GDP: $11,000
Size: slightly less than 30% of the US
Currency: peso, 2.95 per dollar
Independence: 1816 from Spain
Language: Spanish

Our initial stop out of the country was Buenos Aires, Argentina. Rich Miller, a former colleague of Nick's at Inforte, met us at the airport. Rich and his wife Mary, pictured in the image gallery, moved to Argentina in March 2004 and are planning to return to the US in March 2005. They wanted the challenge of living outside of the US for one year, in non-English-speaking country. They did not know much Spanish when they arrived, but they are now both fluent in Spanish, and it amused Nick to hear Rich converse as if he were a native. The Millers were attracted by the excellent purchasing power that Argentina has offered since its currency devalued at the beginning of 2002. More about that later. They estimate their total living expenses are around $2,000 per month for both of them, not including the new car they purchased for between $6,000 and $7,000.

The flight from Miami was at most half full, even less so in first class and business class. This contrasted with domestic US flights that are usually full these days as carriers have necessarily cut back flight schedules to try to stem their financial losses.

Our initial impression of Buenos Aires was one of mild disappointment. Having read multiple accounts of Buenos Aires being one of the great cities of the world, we just did not find it in that category. The longer we stayed though, the more we liked it. It is often called the Paris of South America, and that is a legitimate description as long as you remember that does not mean it is Paris in South America. Rather it is as close to Paris as you will find in South America. Nick characterized it as "a run down version of Paris and a not so run down version of Havana." On a relative basis, Buenos Aires, like Argentina itself, probably peaked 80-100 years ago. Its architecture from early this century up to the Art Deco style of the 20s is impressive. But many of those earlier buildings are not well maintained and have fallen into disrepair. Buildings are not literally falling down as they are in Havana, but they are crumbling slowly, an unfavorable trend.

Buenos Aires' positive aspects are its wide streets and boulevards and its nightlife. Restaurants and nightclubs are prominent. They open late and stay open even later. Peak eating hours are 10 PM - 1AM. Dinner is a social event, not a functional activity, which to an American can be occasionally refreshing and other times frustrating, for instance if you are hungry at 7PM, just want a quick meal, and can't find anything open, or anything quick. But when you want to linger, this is the place. Reserve a table and it's yours for the night--the waitstaff will never hover over you, looking to turn the table. The bill does not come until you request it, and sometimes not even then!

All discos in Buenos Aires are presently closed by city edict, due to a Christmas-time fire at a disco that killed approximately 200 people. The circumstances of the fire were eerily similar to the fire in a Rhode Island bar one year ago where a similar number of people died. In each case, a flare at the beginning of a performance by a live band started a fire, which immediately spread to flammable material on the ceiling. The speed of the fire, combined with a large crowd, locked exits, numerous code violations, gave the victims little chance to escape. The public reaction in Buenos Aires has been far stronger than in the US, with numerous protest marchers (complete with riot police, see image gallery), and calls for the mayor to resign. The thought is that safety inspectors were paid off to allow the disco to stay open despite the code violations. Given Argentines generally laissez-faire attitude about rule enforcement, the ferocity of the protests and the strength of the mayor's action (all discos still closed nearly one month later as they are all being inspected) surprised us. These actions are much stronger than those seen in the US in the Rhode Island fire or the E2 nightclub stampede in Chicago a few days earlier.

Protesting, though, has become a bit of a national pastime here ever since the military dictatorship fell in 1983. More about that later, but in general after years of living under strongly controlled military rule, people are very expressive in their demonstrations on all subjects and the government is quite unwilling to restrain them even when they are belligerently pelting police with rocks, lest the government be compared to the former military regime. Some citizens, who were unaffected negatively by the military regime, actually express a preference for the more orderly society that it produced, and would not mind a return to that more controlled environment.

A case in point is Buenos Aires' parks, which were another positive attribute of the city in the past, but they are generally not well maintained with most public statues today graffiti covered to the point of being more of an eyesore than an attraction. Graffiti in our opinion is too easily tolerated in South America, especially in Brazil, and it frequently mars what would otherwise be attractive public spaces. The state of graffiti in Buenos Aires to Nick resembled New York City in the late 80s pre-Giuliani. It is not present in the subway system (as it was not then in New York, that clean up having occurred in the mid-80s), but it is on most buildings and in most other public places. Twenty years ago in the US, graffiti seemed an intractable problem in major cities, but as cities such as New York and Chicago have cleaned up (not eliminated certainly, but reduced, the amount of graffiti), it has become clearer that it is simply a matter of willpower. If city government has more willpower than graffiti criminals do, it will be able to reduce graffiti. If not, it will stay or increase.

A relatively new attribute of Buenos Aires is that it is extremely affordable. The Argentine government pegged the exchange rate at 1:1 with the US dollar throughout the 90s, but it fell in early 2002, reaching as low as 4:1 before stabilizing around 3:1. So in less than 15 years, Buenos Aires has changed (from a US perspective) from an average-priced city (early 90s) to an expensive city (early 2000s), to a cheap city (last three years). For the amenities it offers in terms of restaurants, nightlife, and other attractions, it is one of the more affordable places that we have been to. Brazil is similar, but Argentina seems the better bargain to us. For example, our first night in town, five of us went out to dinner at a nice restaurant (see Dinner in Buenos Aires picture). We had appetizers, entrees, desert, several bottles of wine, and other drinks. Total bill came to US$100, or $20 per person. Most anywhere in the US, for the same quality you would have a bill double to triple that price.

For those who do not know much about Argentine history, it is a story worthy of a Greek Tragedy. If there were such an award, Argentina could have won the Most Disappointing Country of the 20th Century Award. One hundred years ago, on a relative basis, Argentina was one of the ten most prosperous countries in the world, and there was even a saying "as rich as an Argentine," which generally referred to the wealth the country generated through farming and livestock raising. A Midwestern farmer would feel right at home here, as beef is part of nearly every meal, actually more so than in the central US.

In short, though, that prosperity was squandered as the 20th Century saw a repeated cycle of corrupt politicians, financial crises, protests against democratically elected leaders, coups, austerity programs, military dictatorships, oppression, protests against the military dictatorships, transitions to democratic governments, followed by corrupt politicians, financial crises, etc.

The figure most in the US know best is Juan Peron who was president in the late 40s and early 50s. His charismatic wife Evita is probably even better known. However, the Kennedy-like aura around the Perons masks that, in Nick's opinion, he (and his wife) were just one in a never-ending series of terrible leaders who did more harm than good to his country. The military eventually overthrew Peron, and he fled the country, not to return for 17 years. Evita remains a cult-like figure in part because she died young at 33, while Peron was still in power. She championed workers' rights and no doubt some of these changes were necessary and positive. But greatly increased workers' wages led to inflation and subsidized food prices led to debt, and then came the inevitable financial crises and military coup. The story does not end there, though. Things were so bad in the early 70s that the then president invited Peron back to the country, and became president again, with his new wife (not Evita) as vice president, a position Evita wanted for herself, but never achieved. Well Peron died, his wife Isabel became president, and surprisingly her former career as a nightclub dancer in Panama had not prepared her for politics. Less than two years later, the military had seen enough, and it again took power from a Peron.

The ensuring military regime lasted from 1976-1983, a period known as the Dirty War, for the military murdered roughly 9,000 dissidents (that is the official number, some claim the true total is higher), through means such as drugging people and dumping them from planes into the Atlantic Ocean. People just disappeared overnight.

Mothers of the disappeared persons began marching in protest in the main city plaza, gaining popular support when the military did not have the heart to crack down on the mothers. Until these protests, many people did not know about the disappeared--the government-controlled press certainly was not reporting it. The protests continue once per week to this day--see Mothers of the Disappeared in the image gallery. The protests today are to have a full accounting of the unborn children of pregnant women who disappeared (i.e., the protesters want to know what happened to their unborn grandchildren--who were typically adopted by other families and raised as if they were their natural children. The grandchildren are now in their 20s and generally do not know they were adopted or who their parents were.) The final catalyst for the public to rise against the military was the ill-conceived attempt to distract public attention by contriving a war with the United Kingdom over the Falkland Islands. The press initially reported Argentine success, but when Argentina had to surrender a few days later, the public had enough and the military was through.

Argentina has had a democratic government since 1983, and was generally prosperous economically during the 90s. Nevertheless, the latest financial crises hit hard in 2001/2002 when the country defaulted on its foreign debt in December 2001 and the peso dropped in world markets from US$1.00 to US$0.25. Imagine if everything you purchased that was not made in your country suddenly quadrupled in price in a short period. Banks were closed for two weeks, currency convertibility from pesos to dollars was limited, and many Argentines who had bought homes with dollar-dominated mortgages found themselves overwhelmed with debt. Argentine GDP dropped something like 15%-20% in 2002, a Depression-like figure (US GDP dropped between less than 1%, if we recall correctly, in 2001, the year our last recession ended.)

More recently, growth rebounded sharply in 2003 and 2004, with Argentina likely to book GDP growth of 9% or better in 2004 if we remember correctly the figure we read in the newspaper (it may be higher). We did not see dramatic visual evidence of the 2002 collapse (other than cheap prices everywhere), unlike the half-day we spent in Argentina two years ago on our trip to Brazil. Then, in the Iguasu Falls area, we saw one halted hotel construction project after another on the Argentine side. Perhaps that was peculiar to that area, we don't know, but it was obvious there in early 2003 that something had gone wrong, and we did not see similar signs in Buenos Aires in early 2005 of halted business activity, other than the half-empty flight we arrived on.

The December 2001 government debt default was the largest ever by any country and remains an issue in world financial news today, as the government is trying to restructure this debt with a take-or-leave-it offer to bondholders of roughly 30% of the original face value. Only roughly one-third of the bondholders are Argentine, the rest are from countries such as Italy, Spain, the US, Japan, and others. Many of the bondholders are foreign retirees who invested a substantial part of their life savings (foolishly so) in Argentine bonds.

The roadshow kickoff for the government to sell this restructuring to bondholders took place as we were leaving Buenos Aires, so it dominated the local news. The leading bondholder group in Italy called for the Italian government to break off diplomatic relations with Argentina (which will not happen). Now it's a battle of willpower to see if enough bondholders accept Argentina's offer, or if Argentina must sweeten the offer. Results are to be announced in two months.

Interestingly, the Italian courts have ruled in half-a-dozen cases that Italian banks who negligently advised their retiree-age clients to invest in Argentina must make up the difference to their clients. While the banks do bear some culpability for recommending unsuitable investments, we do not think bondholders in every case should get full compensation. The world is full of risky investments and that risk is what--on average--provides higher returns. But higher returns are not guaranteed. Sometimes you win and benefit from the 9% higher-than-anyone-else interest rate that Argentina was paying, and sometimes you lose it all, or 70% in this case given Argentina's offer. To get an interest rate beyond what anyone else pays and then to get also full protection if the investment goes bust, is having your cake and eating it too. That's a too-good-to-be-true, no-risk investment, which ultimately creates a moral hazard for the public, as they will always prefer to make very risky investments if they think someone else will always bail them out. If that someone else is a government, then it's you and I who are really the ones doing the bailing through increased taxes.

Deanna was appalled at Argentina's brazen reneging on their obligations (when the president announced the default to the Argentine congress, they gave him a standing ovation), but this default, while larger than any that preceded it, is not unusual for Argentina, the other countries in South America, or emerging economies in general. Most countries at some point in their history have defaulted on debt, even established countries such as Germany and Japan. The US happily has not, but there is no rule of nature that says we cannot if we do not fix our spending habits and social welfare spending commitments. US politicians who ignore this looming problem are poor scholars of history and do a disservice to citizens by passing the problem on to the next generation. It takes courage to tackle problems before a crises hits, and Argentina and all of South America provide ample evidence of what eventually can occur if that courage is lacking. Talking honestly about future problems is hardly "scaring Grandma"--it's necessary moral leadership. Ignoring what's coming is a head-in-the-sand abdication of leadership worthy of a corrupt 20th Century South American head of state, but not worth of a higher office in the US.

Our description here of the country's history may make you think that Buenos Aires is a rather dreadful place, but that's not at all the case. People are quite friendly, and it is an enjoyable and extremely affordable place to visit. The government should promote tourism more actively both to Europeans--who would find it incredibly cheap given their strong euro--and to Americans, who are looking for an alternative to a currently exchange-rate unfriendly Europe. The country's favorable exchange rate could also help it increase exports, although Brazil is in an even better position here as its larger domestic economy (Brazil has 4.5 times the population of Argentina) puts it in a better position to export domestic goods for global consumption.

Argentina's 20th Century history, as tragic as it might be, is a story repeated throughout South America. Despite all of its missteps, Argentina still has the second highest per capita GDP in South America, slightly behind Uruguay. (Brazil is first in terms of total GDP given its large population). And its per capita GDP remains ahead of our North American neighbor, Mexico, even though Mexico has had a more stable political situation. Mexico has gained ground, though, on Argentina.

Note: there are probably small inaccuracies in our retelling of Argentine history, as we are doing much of this from memory and we don't have the time or the resources with us to extensively fact check what we have written. Nonetheless, we believe what we have written is all generally accurate to a higher degree than you would typically find if you were conversing with someone. Further, many figures we give such as our recollection of the US GDP change in 2001 are in the ballpark, but possibly slightly inaccurate, for the same reasons.
If you disagree with what we have written, we are sorry, but at least this reflects accurately our opinion.

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January 20, 2005

12:53:07 pm Punta del Este--Update on why no updates  

Punta del Este, Uruguary, January 20, 2005

We have pictures from our last three stops in our PC ready to upload, but alas in Uruguay the standard network cable is different from everywhere else in the world that we have been, and a wireless connection is uncommon here. So, the pictures are sitting on our PC, but we cannot connect our PC to the Internet in Uruguay! Hopefully, this problem is limited to this country, although our guess is that it is not. We had no problems in Argentina (wireless connection in our room) and Brazil (DSL connection in our room). It surprising that Uruguay would be different because it is a small country between Argentina and Brazil and actually more advanced than either of its two larger neighbors. Maybe we just got lucky in Argentina, and this problem will plague us as we travel through Tierra del Fuego and Patagonia. At a minimum we know that we will be able to connect our PC again wirelessly in Buenos Aires on Saturday, January 29.

We can obviously get to the Internet through an Internet cafe, which is what Nick is doing now. There are other challenges to that, such as all the special characters (!"·$% etc.) are not marked in their proper places on the keyboard--in other words, the keyboard is an American keyboard, but the symbols that appear on the screen do not correspond to what you type. Hit the key for @ and you get a " for example. Apparently, everyone here knows the code, but we do not! So this note will take measures to avoid punctuation--note the lack of contractions. It took Nick about 10 minutes of trial and error to find all of the special characters to enter the web site address to pay his credit card bill, but eventually he figured it out.

The incredibly witty and intelligent posts that you all love so much do take a long time to write and edit and that is best done on our PC rather than sitting in a cafe, so this post and any others from a cafe will be lighter on wit and shorter than normal (well maybe not so short). Later, when we can connect our PC, we will post on the places we have been to date--Buenos Aires, Brasilia, and Montevideo.

Punta del Este is a great place, the South (Miami) Beach of South America, but at half the price. It is the most civilized place we have found in South America, which makes it the vacation destination of choice for the continent. It is expensive enough (for South America) that it is not too run down or crowded, despite everyone telling us that everyone goes there.

While Nick has yet to accost real estate agents in person like in Costa Rico, the prices seem ridiculously cheap for a premier destination--much better than Tamarindo, Costa Rico (plus all of the first world infrastructure is in place, excect standard network connection cords!). Two bedroom oceanview condos start below $US100,000 and four bedroom condos can be had for $US200,000 - $US300,000. Houses 10 minutes from downtown, in a great location not far from the water, can be had for $US200,000 - $US500,000 (and up of course). A bit more than Macomb, but very reasonable for an ocean resort town, in our opinion. By the way, Nicks father informs him that farmland 15 miles north of Macomb recently fetched up to $5,800 an acre, nearly double the prices quoted in the Costa Rico posting. No doubt, Mr. Greenspan is concerned about the developing bubble in the west central Illinois farm economy.

Having lauded Punta del Este as the nicest place we have been, it is ironic that Deanna is sick today. We had the most expensive meal so far on the trip last night ($US63) and she has not made it out of the room so far today (3PM local time). Nothing to worry about, just the kind of thing that will happen to both of us several times on this trip. You cannot travel without it happening to you. Nick went on a mission to find Tums or Rolaids for Deanna and was quite pleased after an extended discussion with a pharmacist where neither person understood the other (English is not common here) to come back with Mylanta Plus. That is about as close as you get when you venture out to try and buy something. You never know exactly what you will find, but usually you can get something vaguely similar to what you want.

Punta del Este is a late night place, just like Buenos Aires and Spain. The earliest a bank opens here is 1PM, but some will be open until 8PM (others work a full four hour day!). Last night for dinner, we were hungry early, and we somehow found a place open at 7:15. This is like trying to get dinner in Macomb at 3 PM. When we left at 8:30, the restaurant was empty again, no one else having yet ventured out at such an unheard of hour. As we walked home, most restaurants were just setting up, still not open.

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January 13, 2005

12:25:04 pm Tampa  

Tampa
Saturday, January 8, 2005 - Wednesday, January 12, 2005

Itinerary
American flight from Chicago to Tampa (Deanna's parents)
Four nights in the Tampa area

After four days battling the cold of Chicago, we left 8 inches of snow behind and headed for Tampa to visit with Deanna's family. Tampa provided a necessary four beautiful days of 75-80 degree weather to help us acclimatize to the South American summer we would soon be grappling with. We stayed one night with Deanna's father in Dade City and three nights with Deanna's mom in Plant City. Greeting us in Dade City were Deanna's father Richard, her step-mom Lana, her grandparents A.D. and Bea, her older brother Darren and his wife Traci and daughter Morgan, and her brother Mark and his wife Lisa. Both Darren and Mark and their families live in Orlando, while Deanna's grandparents live in nearby Zephyrhills. Mark deserves much credit for creating this web site as our wedding present, a gift he may come to regret as he found himself constantly on call for technical support throughout Nick's time in Tampa, as Nick began using the site. "What must this guy be like when he's actually working for a living," Mark wondered.

Darren showed old 8-mm family movies that he had transferred to video a few years back. Through the miracle of time travel, a svelte 16-year-old Richard slalom water skied with moves he can now only dream of. Next came the baby videos, with first-born Darren featured in 30 minutes of extended footage. Second-born Deanna made a cameo appearance, and cried her way through a brief 2 minutes of video, four-year-old Darren torturing her the entire time.

The next day in Plant City, Deanna's mom had a brunch reception at her house that she billed as "just having a few people over." The few people included Deanna's mom Cheryl and her step-father Jim; Darren, Traci, and Morgan; Deanna's step-brother Steve with his mom Coralee and his girlfriend Keri; Deanna's step-sisters Tracey and Julie, with Tracey's 9-year-old daughter Jessica and Julie's boyfriend Keith; three of Cheryl's co-workers, including Joe and Celia Howe, who we had met several times before; and finally Deanna's best friend and maid of honor Stacy Carlson and her husband Bill and 2 1/2-year-old son Trey. It was quite a houseful. We really appreciated everyone coming over and Deanna's mom putting on her usual abundant spread of food.

The next day we visited and had lunch with Stacie Siebrecht, who read at our wedding, and her husband Karl, their two daughters, and Stacie's family. Stacie lives in Seattle now but happened to be in Tampa for the week, a nice coincidence. While Stacie and Deanna talked about their teenage years growing up in Tampa, Nick and fellow Tuck business school grad Karl caught up on the latest M&A activity in the professional services market. Karl's company aQuantive recently acquired Razorfish, a bubble-era competitor of Nick's former company Inforte, providing fodder for discussion.

Later that afternoon, Deanna and Nick entered the Tampa Grand Prix at a local go-kart track. We won't say who won, but a major Hollywood movie was filmed at the track and may debut soon on our web site. Later, Nick pumped tokens into the early-80s Cold War-era Missile Command video game as if he was playing with devalued South American currency. Nick closed his eyes, dreamed the Soviet Union was still intact and he was on the frontline for Ronald Reagan's Star Wars defense team. 99 Luftballoons played gently in the background, and as Nick hummed along to Nena, he considered the irony that some of the largest protests in human history in Western Europe over 20 years ago viewed Reagan a warmonger bent on thermonuclear destruction, yet he signed the first treaty ever to destroy nuclear arms and large-scale nuclear war was eliminated as a threat only a few short years after he left office. Still, the same nuclear hysteria that inspired The Day After made Missile Command a great video game in its day, and eventually Nick's never-ending stream of tokens allowed him to post his name on the machine as the third highest score. Probably someone had unplugged the machine the night before.

After another round of dinners and lunches with parents and grandparents, it was time to say goodbye. We had a final lunch with Stacy, Bill, and Jason Busto, who traveled with Bill and Nick in China last April. Stacy, Bill, and Jason may join us in Africa in December. Nick feeling sufficiently experienced in travel planning, happily put Bill and Jason in charge of Africa scheduling. No doubt, Jason will learn half the languages of Africa by then, as he was able to converse in some depth with non-English speaking cab drivers in Beijing after two weeks in China.

Finally, we left Tampa, took a short flight to Miami, and then began the main part of our world tour, by flying to Buenos Aires, Argentina. At the airport, Deanna was rocked with the news that Jen and Brad may be splitsville. That's what Us was saying, but the Star says it's baby time for the beautiful couple. Who to believe?! Nick's money was on an ending, not a new beginning. When it's Hollywood, always bet on the other woman, he said in a pearl of Buffet-like wisdom. Just before we left the land of ubiquitous wireless voice and data coverage and trashy celebrity news, Nick tapped out a couple of final heartfelt e-mails on his new Blackberry to two former Inforte colleagues discussing a Wall Street Journal article on the finer points of how recent changes in FASB option expensing rules were affecting company accounting policies. After all, such pleasures would not be available for the next six weeks or so.

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January 09, 2005

10:09:18 pm Chicago  

Chicago
Tuesday, January 4, 2005 - Saturday, January 8, 2005

Itinerary
Drive from Tamarindo Beach to San Jose, Costa Rica, 4 hours drive
American flight from San Jose to Miami
American flight from Miami to Chicago

After arriving in Chicago just before midnight Tuesday, we had a frantic three days of last-minute packing, before leaving for good Saturday morning. Deanna, as Nick predicted, did not go to bed Friday night. We left with two bags each, one to carry on and one to check. Nick's checked bag proudly weighed in at 43 1/2 pounds, about 0.2 kilograms less than their self-imposed 20 kilogram checked bag limit. On international flights, some airlines have a 20-kg limit on checked luggage, enforced inconsistently, mainly on coach passengers. While Nick was not certain that we would ever run into a 20-kg limit problem, as we would be in business class on our around-the-world ticket that formed the bulk of our long-distance travel, he didn't want to take any chances. If ever a small plane enforced this limit as an absolute, then prized possessions would need to be left behind. Deanna's bag did not fare as well, checking in at 51 pounds. She vowed to repack, discard, and ship home at her mom's house in Tampa. Nick believed the everyone-carries-their-own-bag agreement would further incentivize Deanna's repacking initiative.

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09:58:47 pm Costa Rica  

Costa Rica
Thursday, December 30, 2004 - Tuesday, January 4, 2005

Itinerary
American flight from Chicago to Miami
American flight from Miami to San Jose, Costa Rica
Drive (rental car) from San Jose to Arenal Volcano, 3 1/2 hours drive
Two nights at Arenal Vista Lodge (2 rating, 1-10 scale, 10 is highest)
Drive from Arenal Volcano to Tamarindo Beach, 4 hours drive
Three nights at El Jardin del Eden (Garden of Eden) (8 rating)

Activities
Arenal Volcano hike (5 rating)
Arenal Observatory Lodge (6)
Tabacon Hot Springs (8)
Sea turtles tour (5)
Canopy (zip line) tour (7)

Country Background:
Population: 4 million
Per capita GDP: $9,000
Size: slightly smaller than West Virginia
Currency: colon, 460 per dollar; dollars unofficially a second currency, accepted everywhere
Independence: 1821 from Spain
Language: Spanish; English common

This New Year's trip with our friends Steve and Mi Mack and their nearly ten-month old baby Jessica could be thought of as a brief trial run for the world tour. This trip continues our tradition of traveling to a warm spot south of the US for New Year's. We traveled with the Macks to Acapulco, Mexico for New Year's 2002 and to Brazil for New Year's 2003, but they could not join us for our (legal) trip to Cuba and Miami last year due to Mi's pregnancy. Steve was chief operating officer at Inforte for nine years, leaving in December 2003, about three months after Nick did, so he and Nick have had a lot in common in the past year as they have adjusted to a pensioner lifestyle. Steve is presently on summer break from a one-year master's degree vintner program at University of Adelaide (Australia). We will visit the Macks in March and April when we are in Australia.

Costa Rica is a top ecotourism destination. Without going into details best left to tour books on the country, the country has an amazing variety of plant and animal life, along with one of the most active volcanos in the world (always hidden by clouds during our visit). We are probably mangling this statistic, by the country has something like one-half of all bird species on the planet. The volcano area is jungle-like, while the beach area on the Pacific side is very arid (at least during the dry season), like a completely different country, only a few bumpy hours drive away.

The first day of travel to our volcano destination featured a two-hour lost luggage delay (a baby car seat for which we had no choice but to wait), resulting in the long drive on narrow, winding roads mostly occurring in the dark, when thick fog set in, followed by rain. The last 10 kilometers (6.2 miles) of the drive occurred through a pothole field that on occasion resembled a dirt road. This part of the journey took a mere 40 minutes or so and resulted in the Mack Theory of Increased Speed to Skim Potholes. All agreed this was the single worst road they had ever traveled on in their lives, foreshadowing Costa Rica's Winning of the Worst Roads in the World Award later in the trip. The poor nature of the roads was quite surprising given the level of advancement of the overall economy.

Of course the hotel did not have the pre-ordered baby crib, but they did still have an open kitchen, which at 9PM, after a 3:30 AM wake up in Chicago, was a welcome surprise. Over dinner, Deanna and Nick discussed that this was probably a preview of a rather routine day of travel they could expect to face in the year ahead. Nick thought that many days would be much worse. While Nick carried the luggage from the car to the room in the rain, Deanna discovered that this rather Spartan hotel did have its own unique custom of chocolates on the pillow. Let's just say that while we never saw any rodents in our room, their presence was vivid in our dreams, and the evidence of their comings and goings was plentiful. Oh and our room never did have any hot water. Arenal Vista Lodge was memorable, but not in any good ways.

While dining at many restaurants, it became apparent that Air Supply rules Costa Rica much as the Carpenters dominate China. Hotel California was not heard once, a troubling development for the Eagles.

New Year's Day saw us leave the Arenal Volcano area, driving to Tamarindo Beach. The trip began well, with a record-setting 23-minute traversing of the 10-kilometer pothole field. The Mack Theory was applied liberally, as Nick passed multiple vehicles, including one piloted by a veteran tour guide. Still early in the journey around the huge and beautiful Lake Arenal, Steve spied a real estate development sign inviting passersby to drive up to a property site overlooking the lake. Let's investigate, he rather innocently suggested. Sounds good, Nick replied, still imbued by his record-setting driving performance through the pothole field. Front seat testosterone-laden groupthink set in, as Nick directed the 4WD vehicle from the pothole-riddled main road onto an impressive concrete driveway. After approximately 10 meters, the concrete gave way to the native road surface, dirt, which after 12-straight hours of rain for some funny reason seemed to have turned into mud. Not yet realizing that he had entered a Costa Rican Road to Abilene, Nick pressed on, undaunted, for it really did not seem all that muddy. "Is this such a good idea," a younger, but much wiser voice from the back seat inquired as the wheels began to slip. "Yes!" was the driver's reply, now knowing that it was a terrible idea, surpassed only in magnitude by the idea of backing up down a very steep and narrow mud road, with a deep ditch on one side and a large dropoff on the other. Fortunately, the car made it to the top, the occupants briefly had a Kodak moment recording the view, and then the descent began. Traction was desperately desired, but not much in availability. Halfway down the hill, with the car sideways in the road, the back seat occupants decided that watching in the rain beat taking their chances in the car. With the women and children safely evacuated, Nick and Steve somehow managed to the steer the Titantic to safety, and the journey continued, albeit with Nick banished to the passenger seat, Steve ejected to the back seat, and Deanna behind the wheel in a female-lead mutiny.

While shopping on the one main dusty road in Tamarindo, Nick marveled that his Spanish acumen was growing exponentially and would soon surpass his impressive 15-word Chinese vocabulary. That his halting one-word Spanish queries immediately resulted in shopkeeper's switching from Spanish to English suggested that his accent and pronounciation still needed some work. The prices quoted confirmed that he was not yet mistaken for a local.

Tourism is exploding in Guanacaste, the province that Tamarindo Beach is in. The catalysts are infrastructure. Guanacaste is on a large peninsula, isolated by a bay and a mountain range to the east. This used to require a long, circuitous drive from the capital city San Jose around the bay and mountains, or a ferry crossing. Minimum time from San Jose with no stops was at least five hours. The distance is not that great, but Costa Rica's roads are either terrible and require slow driving or good but crowded, requiring slow driving. Then a couple of years ago, a new bridge cut a path across part of the bay, cutting an hour off the travel time from San Jose. More importantly, in December 2002, US airlines began flying directly into the greatly expanded airport at Liberia, one hour away. It is now no longer necessary to fly into San Jose. Arrivals at Liberia doubled in 2004 over 2003, and further increases appear likely in 2005, as more flights have come on line. American now flies direct from Miami five days per week, Delta direct from Atlanta six days per week, and Continental direct from Houston every day (schedule varies seasonally). The ultimate sign that the area has arrived was the opening of a Four Seasons resort nearby in January 2004.

While locals may bemoan the loss of old Tamarindo, the state of development is relative. There is one main road through Tamarindo, a dusty two-lane stretch of pavement. You could walk from one edge of the town to the other in 30 minutes or less. You could probably do the walk in 20 minutes if sidewalks existed. The quickest route to San Jose still requires a stretch of gravel driving. Newly opened real estate offices sit next to backpacker hostels and Internet cafes. The place vaguely reminded Nick of Bali, Indonesia when he was there 15 years ago, although it is not as developed as Bali was then, so maybe it's like Bali circa 1980-1985.

Real estate speculation and development seems to be a major local activity and Nick spent an afternoon talking to real estate agents and gathering materials, which he and Steve devoured. Like anyplace, prices vary widely, depending on location. Large tracts of raw land in the less-developed volcano region can be had for 50 cents per square meter ($2,000 per acre). This is cheap compared to $100 per square meter ($400,000 per acre) along the beach, but not so cheap when you consider that income-producing farm land in rural Illinois can be had for 75 cents per square meter ($3,000 per acre), a price that has been rising recently. So land in Guanacaste seems a boom/bust proposition. Prices have risen rapidly in recent years. As a complete guess, Nick imagined prices are up 10-fold over the past seven years. Some prices seem overdone. Other prices still seem cheap. Invest in Guanacaste land, and a year later you are more likely to have either doubled your money or lost at least half of it, than you are to have fared somewhere in between, was his impression. Figuring out which land offers which prospect (doubling or halving) is an intriguing proposition, at least for Nick and Steve.

Steve, always on the lookout for a turn-$1-into-$100 proposition, thinks the ground floor opportunity may be in neighboring Nicaragua. We made an overexcited-likely-to-never-be-followed-up-upon pact to explore this with a visit in 2006. Nick thinks the risk of being one year too late on Nicaragua is outweighed by the risk of being 10 years too early, but you never know. Property taxes in Costa Rica are only 1/4 of one percent per year, so holding costs are low, at least in Costa Rica.

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