Estuve Enfermo

After a long weekend and a beautiful run on Sunday afternoon, I woke Monday morning with a pretty good fever and a really achy body. I think with the full on one week rage in Thailand combined with the trek down south to the winter climate combined with non-stop action once I arrived (that I hadn’t planned for) my body finally told me that I needed a rest. So a rest I took, to the tune of 14 straight hours of sleep. Much needed, I feel great today and am ready for what is quickly feeling like the last leg of my trip. From here I have about another week in Bariloche and then onto Buenos Aires and Rio. All signs point to Buenos Aires being a pretty great time and Rio, well, its Rio.

This has been a really nice trip so far and I feel very distant from my first days in Managua. In some ways it has been hard to grasp all that has occurred this summer and all that I have experienced. From kicking around Managua with myself to getting chased by a man with a machete in Chaing Mai to cooking huge lunches with new (and old) friends in Bariloche; this has been all that I bargained for and more in many ways.

The addition of an old friend has suddenly placed Bariloche in a much different context; almost instantly more familiar. Mikel Bova and I met on separate ladders on the side of a house one day and I would say we have been friends since that day. We ended up living together in Colorado and had some real fun skiing together from late October powder days in Wolf Creek to late June avalanches in the Colorado backcountry. Now the possibility exists to hit up a few runs south of the equator in late July; something I would say has somewhat caught both of us by surprise, I think all we are missing is the month of August and we’ll have it all racked up, luckily that’s right around the corner.

Today we cooked a monster feast at our friend Kim’s house – a man with a positive attitude almost as big as his appetite. It was a great thing in itself to sit and have a fantastic meal with people from all over the US and the world yet made even better by the fact that Mikel was there to join.

A storm has finally rolled in that appears promising as I write this; I might even skip a day of school if it is true. I moved up to a new level this week and it is proving to be a little tougher, but not much. I would say that my Spanish has improved a decent amount, but even after just a few hours of constant English speaking I feel myself losing a little bit of my speaking abilities. I suspect that this is what will go first when I return, but hopefully I will retain my ability to read and write in Spanish.

Time has seemingly picked up speed and I am in the “enjoy every moment you’ll be in Connecticut soon” mode. I look forward to my return and even to the daily routine of life. I needed an extended break from that for many reasons and I am confident that I will return to CT stronger and more content that when I left.

P.S. It rained all day today on the mountain and to top it off a cable broke on one of the main lifts, so its completely closed for the next few days. Old equipment and Latin America don't make for a high degree of efficiency. Oh well...