Good bye Luncheon

The Nido school year is winding down fast and that means the mass exodus is about to occur.  Sniff Sniff.  I've decided I don't like this part about being an expat.  I may have mentioned it before...

 Maybe we are all just looking for reasons to see each other more now because we know things are going to change really soon.  Why not get together and eat?  So a goodbye luncheon was planned :) 

 Grace Swain (off to Korea)

 Kristy Miller (back to Danville), Laura Hamilton (back to Iowa) , Kiersten Murnane (staying with me!!)

 Tracy McQueen (already in Florida), Karen Whitt (back to Utah)

 Anne Johnson (staying with me!!!), Connie Hiten, Missy Ryan (back to Illinois)

It's been fun, ladies!  Really, really, fun!  You will be so very missed!

Celebrating Rita's Baby Bump

Jake has a boy in his class who moved to Chile just a few months ago.  When I met Manuel's mom, my heart went out to her.  They moved to a new country with a new language and she was pregnant with her third boy...due in just 2 months.  Not exactly ideal.  It was time for a little celebrating...

A few mom's from K2C, my neighbor, and a couple of ladies that Rita met while they were living in the hotel when they first arrived, got together for a great morning.  

Rita Gomes is right in the middle and she doesn't even look pregnant here.  How is that possible?!

What a great group of women!  I'm so happy they made it to celebrate Rita.  Thank you for coming!

Aysen 24 K Run...Northern Patagonia

When we got back to Coyhaique, we checked into our hotel and went right in to gather our things for the race.  Let's be honest, we hadn't trained like I would normally train for 15 miles...but we went into this purely for the fun of it.  We got to see what the course would be like for the first time...

and even did a little mental prep on the winners stand :)The thing that made my armpits itch was when they told us to bring an extra pair of EVERYTHING on the day of the race.  There would be a tent to change in afterwards, if the snow and rain was so bad that we were soaked through.  But one look at where we'd be running, and I almost forgot about Patagonia weather.  This was going to be amazing.

And I had at least 4 layers on, so things were good.

 It was so fun to see Nicci and Anne down there with us!  We were 4 of the 6 Americans running the race.  Because this was the first year for the race, there weren't that many people!  Felt like maybe 30 or 40 for the 24K.  It was hysterical, because they called us all up to the starting line and we all counted down in Spanish from 10.  When we got to zero...we just took off--no gunshot or bell or anything!  I loved it!  

Glad I had my phone with me...I couldn't pass up some of these shots!

 WE DID IT!  And it only started raining the last 10 minutes or so.  The hills were some of the biggest I've seen, but the beauty and the company made up for it.  We had SO MUCH FUN.  

Here are a few pictures that the photographers captured of this unforgettable day:

 What we did the entire time.  Love that they got this.

What a run!  Truly loved every second of it. 

Girl's Weekend Continues...

After spoiling ourselves with a visit to the Spa and soaking in the natural "termas" that surrounded Puyuhuapi Lodge, we packed our things and continued on our trip.  The relaxing part was over :)  It was time to drive back to Coyhaique in preparation for our race...

 ...and to visit some of Karen's old stomping grounds on her mission.

 As she tried to orient herself to find out where the chapel was and the main streets she used to walk up and down in the cold, smoky, air, we literally ran into a pair of missionaries. 

 They caught her up on the latest and I just kept thinking, "Man, it's cold down here. I'm so glad our car has heat!  PLEASE don't snow tomorrow when we are running..."

Missionaries are tough.

 We visited Puerto Aysen as well and I got to meet some of the warmest people who were extra special to Karen when she was there.  

They greeted us with lots of hugs and squeals and plenty to eat.  

What a moment for Karen!  Witnessing the love these people had for her after 20 years was so incredible.  And they treated me just like family too!  Inviting me to back their homes with my family even after she is back in the USofA.   

Made me re-think for a bit that maybe we should go to Paraguay and hike through the jungles and see the chapel that Joe built on his mission.  But then again...when the taxi driver wouldn't even drive us into the country when we were on our Iguazu Falls trip because it was so dangerous,  I'm not quite ready to jump on any plane tickets.  We'll see what we can do, Joe :)

Time to Do a Little Hiking

We woke up the next morning to this:

How incredible is this?!

After breakfast, we boarded the boat back over to the other side of Dorita Bay and found our car.  

It was going to be a gorgeous day.

Time to find a glacier.  One of the perks of getting up and out "early" (9am), was that we were the only ones on the trail!  That is one thing I love about Chile.  Early is never what it is back home.

Had a close call.  Came to the first beautiful vista and with my gloves on, went to take my lense cap off and down it fell, below the bridge.  Sooo grateful it wasn't into the glacier river!!!!  A successful retrieval and lesson learned.

There's the glacier off in the distance...

And off we went.

WOODY WOODPECKER!  During a brief moment of silence on our hike, we heard knocking.  Then we heard it in the other direction...and then above our heads.  We stopped, and realized we were surrounded by woodpeckers!  All but one were black.  And I caught him!  Check out the color on this guy!  

It was a little muddy, with all of the waterfalls coming down onto the trail, but we couldn't complain :)

Finally made it to the vista to see and hear the hanging glacier.  We sat there long enough to witness huge pieces break off and hit the rocks below.  The sound never got old. 

A little more wildlife...

What a hike!  The terrain was incredible.

First time I think I have ever seen a family of purple mushrooms.  It reminded me of a book I loved when I was little... "Lisa and the Grompet."

One more peek at the glacier from down below before we had to hurry back to catch the boat across the bay again. 

What a perfect way to start our day in Puyuhuapi!