Random thoughts 1 week in

I can´t believe I left only a week ago. Right now last Sunday I was eating guac at Papasito´s in the Houston airport waiting for my connecting flight to Buenos Aires. One week and I´ve been to 3 cities already. Not bad! I´m already getting antsy thinking about all of the travel over the next few weeks. After Argentina I don´t think it´s too awful, but looking at what´s coming up -
Tomorrow I go to El Chalten to hike for 2 days.
Then I have a 29 hour bus ride to Bariloche on Rt 40, which I heard is the most awful road ever. 
After Bariloche it´s a 20 hour bus ride back to Buenos Aires. I´m there for a week with a few day trips to visit Montevideo, Uruguay (I deserve a beach after all of this cold weather). Then Iguazu falls, 18 hour bus. Then Salta, 23 hour bus. Then Cordoba, 13 hr bus. Then Mendoza, 10 hr bus.  Some won´t be bad if I can catch night buses, but the 20+ hour ones sound torturous unless I make a new friend that will make it more bearable.  I wish flights were cheaper like in SE Asia or Europe, but the flights are all crazy! And with all of the traveling and excursions, I´ve spent WAY over budget for my first week. So bad that it´s making me nervous that I´m going to go through all of my money too quickly. I bought yogurt and fruits from the supermarket for dinner twice now to save money on food to make up for the astronomical bus fares. I´m hoping I can find better flight fares to avoid some of the time spent on buses.
My lesson of the day was that you really can´t pretend you´re in NY in a lot of these places and do things like go for a leisureley morning jog.  After waking up to find there were 2 men in my all-girl dorm, and realizing I slept in only a sports bra and underwear because it was so hot in the room and the laundromat was closed and I´m already out of clean clothes to sleep in, I decided to go for a run to not have to be there when they woke up. It was beautiful out and I was so happy to be running just after the sun came out when the streets were so empty. But I had forgotton that this town is full of stray dogs that like to follow you down the street, pop up behind you and scare you half to death.  When I went for my run, the entire dog population of El Calafate decided I must be a thief or criminal since I was running, and they all came chasing after me barking. I was scared to death and ran up to the main avenue, where some local teenage boys were out and thought it was the funniest thing ever (it was not!) One of them started running next to me joking around, and the dogs ended up staying back after my countless attempts to yell ´Cerrado´ (stop) since I don´t know how to stay Stay, or Go Away. I tried to continue but another giant dog found me and started to chase me too, so I gave up and went home after only 15 minutes. I was very disappointed, and hope I´ll be able to run in other towns because I´ll definitely miss it if I can´t for 5 months!!
Today I found a new favorite ice cream place. They had an ice cream/gelato mix that had M&Ms in it, and chocolate with pieces of these chocolate bars that are native to the Patagonia region. Only $2.50 too, which is cheap for this very tourist-priced town.  My one friend left today, I tried to go to the next town but there was no space left in the hostels so I putzed around here today. We found a lagoon earlier that led out onto the Lake, laid down and listened to the waves crashing on the shore. So peaceful. Even for someone like me that has no clue how to relax (I´m learning!)
The next 2 days I´m staying in a town that only has about 4 hostels so I´m not sure if they will have internet. I might be off the map for a couple of days. I love that I´ve gotten to go on this first week. It´s helping the transition period. I know there will be points when it´s completely unaccessible (San Pedro de Atacama, the salt flats, Cuidad Perdida) so I will have to taper off. But it´s still the beginning so I need to be able to still have one convenience that reminds me of civilization!!