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Our home away from home was the lovely Posada de la Laguna, which is pictured here. For an all inclusive rate, we were given 2 excursions a day, breakfast, lunch, dinner, and tea. As if that’s not enough, they also would deliver water and caramels to each habitación every afternoon. The latter was a favorite feature for the Zs, who would race back to their room, fling open their door, and inhale the buttery confection as quickly as possible.

The main lodge/dining area was homey and, during meals, there was usually an interesting mix of music playing. We heard everything from Pink Martini (we told the proprietress that they heralded from our home city in the States) to arias from the Verdi opera Rigoletto.

The property hosts a small unheated pool, which was suffering a bit. Half way though our stay, they decommissioned it to lay some tile and institute repairs.

The rooms were quaint and generously sized with fabulous light, patios, hammocks, and screened windows. They were impeccably clean — you could walk around barefoot in the room or on the patio and pick up nary a dust bunny. There is a picture of our bedroom below.

The food was surprisingly good. There were several lunch menus sin (without) meat. (No that’s not a typo folks — vegetarian meals in Argentina!) Unusual fare included soups (not containing squash), a stir fry, some sort of carrot timballo, and a homemade al dente ravioli stuffed with spinach. They also made a wide selection of very yummy tortas (cakes) which were available for breakfast and for tea. Lastly, our personal favorite, was their homemade white bread that toasted up a la delish French bread. Boy, did we go through some butter on this trip.

Their excursions were varied and the guides were great, but if you don’t speak any Spanish, you’ll be out of luck.

Service was deft — subtle and gracious. When I became violently ill on day 3, they would bring green tea and toast on a lovely tray to my room while Tom and the kids were out on the lagunas.

Our five days were relaxing, calm, scenic, and perfectly scheduled!

Apologies for my posting gap — we have been traveling in locales sin Internet.

Yes, that means we have taken to the road again, a change for us because we haven’t done any significant roaming since our summer sojourn in Dec – Feb of 2008/2009.

This last Sunday evening, everything started on a fabulous note as we trekked out to Libertador to catch a cab to Retiro — Zoe spotted a Kangoo cab, which meant we could all fit in one car! (Four people plus luggage is a lot for your standard taxi to absorb.)

Upon our arrival at the Terminal de Omnibus, memories of being on the bus during the Christmas season came rushing back to us. At that time, as you can imagine, the terminal was a zoo. In contrast, it felt deserted this last Sunday. Pictured here is the abandoned first class lounge; for awhile, we were the only people there.

The next item to really catch our attention was the length of the trip — nine hours of overnight travel. After experiencing much longer stretches during our previous stint of vagabonding, the nine hour haul seemed like a short jaunt.

Our last item of note was the usual disappointment with “breakfast:” salt-free (meaning flavorless) crackers, cookies, and some sort of cereal bar flavored with artificial chemi-peach.

Despite our lack of morning nutrition, we made it, no worse for the wear, to Mercedes in the province of Corrientes by about 7:00 am Monday morning, an hour behind schedule. There, we were met by Ariel, who was to take us via 4 x 4 to our posada (lodge) outside of Carlos Pelligrini, where adventure awaited us in the Esteros del Iberá (marshes of the shining waters).

The ride to the lodge was actually an expedition in itself. Our driver seemed to believe we were in a Dakar rally because he drove about 110 kilometers per hour over the deep grooves and gigantic bumps that are worn into the orange ribbons of clay. I sat in between the two girls in the back of an extended cab Toyota truck while they tried to nap on me despite the thrill ride we were taking, during which we seemed to catch air every few minutes. I admired their persistence.

To add to the adventure, Zoe was sick and had a fever and Zelda was combating her usual motion sickness.

Never a dull moment!

We heart travel socks.

The magical foot coverings pictured here are really compression garments in disguise as ordinary cotton socks. They squeeze your little ankles, getting progressively looser as they run up your calf. We decided to experiment with them on our return trip to the US, and needless to say, we were very impressed!

Before: When we flew to Buenos Aires in October of 2008, I was 4 months into my recovery from ACL replacement and other clean up on my right knee. Not surprisingly, my right ankle and foot were Michelin Man-esque by the time we arrived in BA. Tough to get the shoes on. Stiff and swollen.

After: Fast forward 9 months to my trip home with the handy dandy travel socks — nada, nothing, zip, zero. Not really any detectable swelling at all. My feet fit in my shoes completely normally at the end of 24 hours of traveling.

So run, don’t walk, to your nearest store and buy some travel socks if you have a long car/boat/train/plane trip planned. They are truly amazing.

(I’d like to thank my model, Tom Offermann, for being willing to pose for this blog, yet again!)

So, what are the ramifications of leaving Argentina and returning to the US for a vacation nine months into our 14 month sabbatical?

We wondered, would we go back to America and feel we didn’t want to return to Buenos Aires? Or, would we confirm that we didn’t want to live in the US anytime soon? I was going to participate in an intense professional conference, how would I feel about working again? Would the kids have an even harder time coming back to Latin America after a taste of Portland?

The answers to these questions were surprising.

After being home for a bit, it almost seemed as if we had never left. Yet, when we returned to Argentina last weekend, it seemed we had never left as well. We are happy and comfortable in both places. So much for a resolution on that front.

Going home and participating in the Mayor’s Institute on City Design completely re-energized me in terms of work. I was pretty burned out by the time we left, so it’s nice to know that this sabbatical has recharged my intellectual batteries.

And the kids. Going home was very valuable, which was counter-intuitive. I really didn’t expect it. When we first landed in Argentina, whenever they were unhappy, the Zs would compare their experience against what I call “idealized Portland.” In other words, everything suffered in comparison to “idealized Portland.” But, going back at 9 months allowed them to have a good time at home, but cement a more “real Portland” in their heads. And, after starting back to school this week, where they received a warm welcome, they both felt a sense of happiness, familiarity and comfort. They were the “new kids” no longer.

For that alone, it would have been worth the trip!

Tom and I were poster children for doing everything wrong when it came to recovering from 24 hours of traveling.

One of my first rules for avoiding fatigue after a long trip is to eat meals while traveling only during times when I would normally be dining at my journey’s end. I find that eating appropriately is a very effective way to synchronize my body clock to my destination time zone. Unfortunately, we did not do this when returning to BA.

The flight from Atlanta to Buenos Aires is an overnight flight. We should have slept during the flight and stayed up all day upon our arrival. As you might suspect, we did the exact opposite. We stayed up during the entire flight and then took several naps during the day we landed. Predictably, we had a hard time sleeping our first night home — what a surprise!

As a result, I have managed to reverse my body clock so that I desire to sleep all day and stay up all night. Since I am prone to this, I really should have been more careful.

The road to switching back starts today with no napping! *Sigh* Wish me luck.

Our return to Buenos Aires did not disappoint in the barrel-of-laughs department!

It started with Delta canceling our Thursday flight to Buenos Aires a few days prior to our departure. We hastily had to rearrange all of our plans so that we could decamp 24 hours later than we anticipated, leaving us with some seat shuffling that would need to be completed at the airport on the day of travel.

We flew uneventfully from Portland to Atlanta, even touching down 5 minutes early. Unfortunately, there was nary a gate at which we could park. So we hung out on the tarmac for awhile, causing us to be rather late. (This is foreshadowing, in case you were wondering.)

We sprinted off the plane and took the airport tram to the international gates (farthest away from where we landed, of course) and made it to our gate with just enough time to buy an enormous bag of junk food before we had to board. (Whew!)

I went up to the ticket counter to deal with the aforementioned seat shuffle and encountered a very rude gate agent who wouldn’t listen to our tale of woe and informed us that she couldn’t possibly be of assistance. In response, I asked for her full name and to talk to her supervisor. She then refused to give me her pen so that I could record her name and turned her name tag from me so that I couldn’t see it. The final nail was when she called me, “nuts.” Our reasonable mien in the face of her incredible rudeness eventually prevailed after we talked to a nice supervisor who apologized profusely and shuffled our seats around so that we had 5 seats for 4 people. An extra seat on a 9 1/2 hour flight is a lovely thing!

Upon landing, Zelda’s stomach felt queasy, so we had to wade against the traffic of disembarking passengers to make it to a bathroom. Thankfully, she didn’t throw up. As we made our way forward though, she changed her mind and blew pink chunks all over the floor in front of the first class lavatory.

When it was over she said, “I feel much better now…I’m hungry.” *Sigh*

Because of the upchucking, we were literally the last four people to make it through immigration and into the baggage claim area, where we were greeted by the happy news that NONE of our five bags had made it to Buenos Aires.

On a positive note, many other people’s bags didn’t make their tight connections in Atlanta either. Delta was very professional and had all of our maletas tracked and located, smothering us with assurance that the luggage would be delivered to our apartment tomorrow, thereby saving us from the task of figuring out how we would possibly pack all of our suitcases into Fred’s car.

The glass is half full. The glass is half full. The glass is half full!

You know the couple in your life that seems to have the perfect marriage with the perfect matching careers and the perfect children who live in the perfect house? The ones that you secretly think, “Hey, if I spent 24 hours with them, I would see the chinks in their perfect armor?” Well, for us, that couple is Brian and Melody, with whom we stayed on Saturday.

I am afraid that I have to report that after spending the night, we continue to think that Melody and Brian may be the nicest damn people we’ve ever met. Compared to them, Tom and I feel positively dark! Oh, and they don’t disappoint on the little people front either — the Zs had a wonderful time with the incredible kids of the house: Iris and Lilly. The four of them ranged through the nearby woods, swinging from ivy vines and rolling around in the dirt like frolicking elephants.

And what a house! If we ever have the means, we’ll be begging Brian and Melody for some dwelling design. In the meantime, I do believe that Tom and I could sit eternally on a warm summer evening enjoying their upstairs balcony, mesmerized by the flickering lights of Portland winking through the trees.

Our favorite Oregon fair to attend is the Tillamook County Fair. We love this event because 1) the weather is usually blissfully cool; 2) the proceedings involve the whole community with livestock and 4-H exhibits; and, 3) they are the only fair in the world with Pig N Ford Races!!

“What is a Pig N Ford Race?” you ask. Good question. First, you take four Model T Ford chassis that need to be hand cranked at the front of the car in order to be started. Next, you place these automobiles on a horse track next to four pens, each of which holds three pigs.

The drivers of these Ford cars must grab a pig, start their Model T with the hand crank while holding their squirmy swine, and complete a lap of the track with said unhappy pig in their lap. When a competitor completes a loop, they must stop and turn off their car and then return the first pig to the pen. After that, they get to do the whole thing again, two more times. The first one to complete three individual porcine laps, wins (you complete a lap when the pig in hand is returned to its pen).

You can see a car in the Pig N Ford Race from Thursday in the first photo below.

The Zs also got to hold a python on stage, eat elephant ears, scramble their brains on lots of rides with their friends, pet some tortoises, hang out with the pigs, goats, chickens, cows, bunnies, and sheep, and gaze at large farm equipment. It’s good to be a kid.

The girls have found yet another family they would rather live with than their own! This time, they wanted to stay with Robert and Lucy, old friends that recently moved to Portland, who graciously housed us for the last few days.

And really, why wouldn’t our children want to desert us after our stay?

At the Lucy and Robert B&B, the wee ones got to swim in a neighborhood pool (25 cent donation suggested), drink steamed milk with a hint of chocolate, eat massive amounts of cherries and blueberries, visit and hold a neighbor’s pet chickens (named Chloe, Daphne and Pete — but they’re all girls), attend the Hollywood Farmer’s Market (where they inhaled a fresh peach/raspberry crepe with whipped cream), lay (and squirm) in the house hammock, watch Mamma Mia!, and work on their juggling with lavender-filled stress balls.

Pictured above are the beautiful flowers that we picked up from the farmer’s market and Lucy’s lovely rocking horse, one of many wonderful pieces of her art which besprinkle their new home.

Departure checklist from Sin City:

• Room service breakfast. Check.

• Cab. Check.

• Go to Siena Deli and buy fabulous Italian sandwich to eat on the plane. Check. (This is an old-school Italian deli, grocery, and restaurant which has been a hub for the Vegas Italian-American community for years. This restaurant is the real deal with homemade bread and rolls enveloping imported meats resulting in a sandwich the likes of which you generally can’t find on the West Coast.)

• Hear horrible bankruptcy story from cab driver. Check. (He made six figures a year as a bellman at the MGM Grand, bought a big house, got laid off last year, can’t make house payments, can’t find a job, drives a taxi and effectively makes less than minimum wage since there are few fares and lots of cabs…tough. We bought him a Siena sandwich and gave him a big tip.)

• Make it to the airport really early. Check. (The joys of traveling with Tom!)

• Eat yummy Siena sandwiches on the plane and generate extreme envy amongst our fellow lunchless passengers. Check.

• Land safely in Portland, where it is still nearly as hot as Las Vegas. Check.