Reese, Race, Roads, and Riding

Hey everyone!  Thanks for your patience on this post, that blog-a-day business a couple weeks ago needed some digestion.

After our Peru/Bolivia trip a friend of mine from Notre Dame came down for a visit.  Marisa and I both majored in math and she's now working for ND Admissions.  She was looking to travel somewhere far away before all her school visits start and Chile fit the bill!  Right off the plane we went salsa dancing at Maestra Vida.

We headed out to the coast for the weekend.  We stayed at my usual hostel, La Valija, right over Color Cafe.  Delicious hot chocolate and a little ultimate tic-tac-toe.
 

On Saturday we went to Los Molles which is still definitely in the running for my favorite place in Chile.  The coastline is just so incredible.

That's where I'm going to live when I retire.  Marisa said the house reminds her of the one perched on the cliff in Paradise Falls in the movie "Up".

Can you think of a perfect song for sitting and watching waves crash against rocks?  I'd suggest John Butler's guitar instrumental "Ocean".

On Tuesday Reese came to school with me to see all my little angels.  She read a book to the kindergarten kids and we danced the cha-cha slide with the 7th graders.  It was great!

She left on Wednesday and my life began to return to normal after what seemed like a month of bouncing all over the place.  Then Saturday evening a friend said he needed a partner for the "Three Mountains" race which is exactly what it sounds like.  We started at Valle Nevado, crossed over to La Parva, and finished at the base of El Colorado.  Some injuries and mixed ability levels held us back a bit but it was awesome to see all three resorts in an hour!

Later that day I met up with the American teachers we've been hanging out with to ride at El Colorado.  Ciara grew up in Colorado so she's been riding her whole life.  She's actually going to be filling in at my school for some of the preschool English classes as well until she goes home to get married in December.

After another week and a half of school and another trip up the valley with a group of friends to El Colorado, we had a much-needed long weekend (for those keeping track at home, this was last weekend, the 15th-18th of August).  I wanted to see some more variety in the Andes so I rented a car and drove up these dirt road switchbacks to find a backcountry snowboarding experience.

I had originally rented a 4WD Suzuki something-or-another but mistakenly made the reservation in Santiago, Dominican Republic.  Oops.  Luckily they had this little compact Kia.  Not really made for traversing these rock-covered switchbacks but boy was it ever a champ.  I would never have considered driving a Kia until this trip.  4 times over this road and not a scratch!

Ski Arpa is a very special place.  They have 2 snow cats (the things they use to groom ski runs) that take you to one of two drop-off points from which you can ski pretty much in any direction down the best snow of your life.  It's like a big playground.

That's Aconcagua in the background, the highest mountain in the Andes and the "thickest spot on Earth".  Everest wins because they measure from sea level, but if you went down to the base of the crust this guy would come out on top.

This was one of the exciting moments of day 1: the Monjas Chute.  2 meters at its narrowest, there wasn't a lot of room for error.  Check out the untouched snow!

Day 2 brought a fun chute called Entrance Exam.  You have to be there to appreciate the scope of these runs.  For scale, you can see a tiny skier in the middle or this picture.  The total run was over 1000 vertical feet.  What a blast.

You can see some of our group on the right here hiking to the top of Cornisas.  This was our last run of day 1 dropping into that face on the left.

I hope to make it back to Arpa on a perfect powder day in the future.  I'm certain it would be the best day of my snowboarding career.

I also found some paved switchbacks near the town of Los Andes.  I drove up to Portillo, right on the Argentinian border, for one day.  This place is unique.  Most skiers are there for a week of all-inclusive skiing.  I've never seen more gringos in one place in Chile!  Most people were families coming down for summer break from the states.

The setting here is spectacular.  There is a glacial lake at the base of the valley colored a brilliant blue.  Supposedly an Inca princess fell to her death during a hunting ceremony and was lowered into the lake in white linen.  The mountains remain ever white like the linen and the lake blue to match her eyes.

I found some fantastic tight chutes here too.  The snow coverage was pretty light in some places, the rocks did a number on my base, but it was totally worth it.  I found some of the best snow I've seen in Chile here.  Lots of walking and traversing was required, but I'd do it all again in a heartbeat.

The on-mountain restaurant Tio Bob's is something of a legend.  Helicopters from the surrounding heliski operations drop their patrons here for lunch and the views definitely merit the trip.

When the lake freezes solid you can hike across it to get to the really good stuff on the other side.  Unfortunately it hasn't frozen in a few years.

Other than these little side trips life has gone on as usual.  The kids all seem to have Spring Fever and it's understandable--the weather has been gorgeous.  A couple more weeks of snowboarding I think then hopefully I'll get to try surfing.  Watch for pictures!