Patagonia - Argentina (3)

The last part of the Patagonia trip: El Calafate!!

The first time we saw the Perito Moreno glacier... no words...

how beautiful & impressive nature can be!

 We stayed at Hostéria Los Notros (Los Notros), just opposite the Perito Moreno, what a pleasure to wake up every morning!! Los Notros is situated about 80 km from El Calafate in the Perito Moreno National Park. It's such a peaceful place, totally relaxing.

 View from our hotel room... every morning I quickly checked if the Perito Moreno was still there ;-)

 Hiking on the Périto Moreno, quite an experience!

 Apparently it's not enough to only see the glaciar, Thom also wants to feel it!

After the hike some whisky on the rocks was served... 'rocks' freshly cut of the Perito Moreno...

 On Lago Andino, on our way to the Upsala glaciar. We expected a quiet boat ride... we were completely WRONG! It was WIIIIIIILD!! Glad I took some medication against motion sickness... I would not have 'survived' without!! But again, I've said it more often, the beauty of nature we saw was all worth it... and even more!

I really hope you can see the gorgeous blue colour... no tricks, no photoshopping, just nature... breathtaking!

The Upsala glacier

The Upsala Glacier forms a tongue of ice which is 50 km long, 10 km wide and many hundred meters thick. In its central part there is a dark area, a consequence of the accumulation of rocks, sand and clay brought by smaller glaciers (tributary to the Upsala) which got trapped within this glacier after two ice tongues converged.

The Perito Moreno glacier: 5 km wide, 35 km long and 70 meters above the lake... there are hundreds of meters below the water, can you imagine??

Time to leave Patagonia... luckily we still had some days left in Buenos Aires, absolutely one of my favorite cities in the world!!

The virtual tour of Patagonia is finished... I hope you liked it. The digital album is finished too :)

Time to move on to the next one (still quite some work to do!!).

Bisous,



Les Puces de Saint Ouen

After two episodes of our Patagonia holiday, something completely different today (but don't worry, the last part of the holiday (El Calafate) is coming soon too!).

It's been on my to-do-list for over a year and finally, last Monday, a very sunny day, we visited the 'Puces de Saint Ouen', THE flea market under the Parisian flea markets, only open on Saturday, Sunday & Monday.
We chose to go on Monday as we expected the crowds during the weekend. Well, Monday turnt out to be a good day: few people & lots of sunshine, the only disadvantage is the fact that quite some shops were closed, but as there's so much to visit & see, that didn't really matter!

Les Puces de Saint Ouen are located at the Porte de Clignancourt in the north of Paris, right under the famous (& most of the time congested) Boulevard Périphérique!

They consist of 12 different markets: Antica, Biron, Cambo, Dauphine, Jules Vallès, Malassis, Malik, Michelet, Paul Bert, Rosiers, Serpette and Vernaison. If you'd like to know more about the flea markets in France, then I can advice you the book The Flea markets of France, there's a lot of information available in this little book, easy to take with you on a trip & covers the major touristic regions in France and the most interesting flea markets to visit.

 Marché Paul Bert

Marché Vernaison

As you can see, there's a huge diversity available. We only visited marché Paul Bert (absolutely my favorite!), marché Serpette (indoor), marché Vernaison (this is probably what most corresponds to what visitors imagine when they thinkof French flea markets) and marché Biron. And even on this quiet Monday, there was not enough time to see everything, you can easily spend a whole weekend here.

 Marché Vernaison

For the record: no, I didn't buy anything... although we did consider this SUPER sofa:

A beautiful facade, covered in ivy

Vintage Vespa?

We definitely enjoyed the visit & for sure I'll be back here to see the markets I've missed this time!
Bisous,

Patagonia - Argentina (2)

As promised, some more pictures from the Patagonia trip in January 2007.
After spending some relaxing days in Bariloche, playing golf, enjoying the famous chocolate, swimming, sightseeing & indulging in food & argentinian wine, we continued our trip to Ushuaia, the most southern city of the world.

 Arriving at Ushuaia...

Tierra del Fuego

Tierra del Fuego, Spanish for "Land of Fire", is an archipelago off the southernmost tip of the South American mainland, across the Strait of Magellan. The archipelago consists of a main island Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego divided between Chile and Argentina with an area of 48,100 km² (18,572 sq mi), and a group of smaller islands including Cape Horn. Initially discovered by Ferdinand Magellan's expedition in 1520, the islands were not settled by people of European descent until the second half of the 19th century at the height of the sheep farming and gold rush booms.

 

 A cruise on the Beagle Channel

The Beagle Channel is a strait separating islands of the Tierra del Fuego Archipelago, in extreme southern South America. It separates Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego from the islands Nueva, Picton, Navarino, Hoste, Londonderry, Stewart Islands and other smaller to the south. Its eastern portion is part of the border between Chile and Argentina, but the western part is completely within Chile. The west end is the Darwin Sound and the east end is Nueva Island.
The Beagle Channel, the Straits of Magellan to the north, and the open ocean Drake Passage to the south are the three navigable passages around South America between the Pacific and the Atlantic oceans. The Beagle Channel and the Straits of Magellan are both very narrow passages which severely limit the size and types of ships that can safely use them, hence, most commercial shipping is through the Drake Passage.
The Beagle Channel is about 240 kilometres long and is about 5 kilometres wide at its narrowest point. To the west the Darwin Sound connects it to the Pacific Ocean. The biggest settlement on the channel is Ushuaia in Argentina followed by Puerto Williams in Chile, two of the southernmost settlements of the world.

 The fauna

   Funny guy...

   In the Martime Museum

Down Town Ushuaia

Seeing al these pictures surely brings me in the holiday mood... luckily we have a skibreak coming up (something complety different!)... off to Austria in a couple of weeks!

Bisous,

Patagonia - Argentina (1)

 Browsing through the photo folders on the computer & realizing how far behind I am with making photo albums... One that's still on my to-do-list is the Patagonia photo album. We took the trip to the Argentinian part of Patagonia in January 2007... ages ago... but so many sweet memories & just a wonderful, amazing holiday.

We visited Bariloche, Ushuaia & Tierre del Fuego and El Calafate. All so different yet equally beautiful!

Some (many!!) pictures as evidence, but I'll show you the ones from Bariloche first, will be too much all at once!! Bariloche is THE place to be in winter for skiing, but I have to admit that the landscape in summer time is gorgeous too!

 Lago Nahuel Huapi

 Llao Llao hotel... a lovely place to stay

Patagonian lamb, the regions specialty!

We played golf at one of the most beautiful courses I've ever seen, at the Llao Llao golf club. I remember that is was quite a windy day, the results were bad... but the scenery was really marvellous.

Well, it's clear that I have some work to do this weekend (photo album!!) & I'm sure I will be re-living some lovely holiday moments!
Enjoy your weekend too!!
Bisous,