The Ski Resort of Cerro Catedral

Today we decided was a driving day but it ended up being a bit of a hiking day. We hopped in the car with a bit of a plan and headed up to the ski resort of Cerro Catedral (Mount Cathedral). The road was a wonderful winding mountain road. I love driving those roads and always remember them. High above the lakes, the land is a desert with wide open vistas. We took the gondola and then a chairlift up to near the top. At the bottom, we ran into Ashley, the property manager and his girlfriend. So we waited for them at the top and we hiked up to the ridgeline with them. It was nice to have some people to talk with about the area. Ashley has lived here for 4 years and doesn’t appear ready to leave. He kayaks and hikes and skis and somehow makes a living on managing 6 properties.

The entrance to the ski village.




All the flags of the world. You can just see Canada’s at the left.




The gondola ride up.




Then we ride the chairlift.




But first, I have to take a picture of Brooke – she looks cute.




Ashley and his girlfriend riding the chairlift up.




You can’t tell how windy it was from the photo but if you look closely, brooke’s hair is decidedly going left. And, she’s bracing with her right leg against the wind.


I love the tops of mountains……such great views.




Here we are on Mars. It kind of felt like that, but with better oxygen.




You can kind of see where they got the name of this ski hill and mountain from. Catedral or Cathedral in English.



Pretty awesome peaks.




My Patagonia shoes in Patagonia. They’re finally home….




The fields going up the gondola were full of these beautiful orange flowers.



It was a touch windy – made for a good photo of the flags though.




Brooke and the sign are the same – Blue and tan!

After our little hike we had earned some chocolate so we went into Bariloche to visit one of the dozens of chocolate stores there. I have no idea why some things get popular like this. One town doesn’t need 25 chocolate stores but for some reason tourists believe this is the place to go and they buy tons of it. One chocolate store was so big that it felt like shopping in a Safeway, it was astonishingly big. We went to the small but delightful store called Mamushka. It was fun, they kept just giving you free chocolates as you walked around musing which ones to buy – quite an effective promotion.

Cool chocolate store! It looks like a lame concept but it’s awesome.




Look at Brooke’s grin – heaven!




The pictures don’t do the shop justice.






We left the store and out on the street was a parade of children and drummers all dressed up. It took a few minutes but Brooke finally clued in that this was for Carnival. It didn’t appear that many people expected it. The dancing and the drumming were all kind of unpracticed but charming.  We were lucky to just happen to be there.

 
I want to make one of these flag things for Halloween and scare the little kids with it. It freaks me out just looking at the photo again.



All sorts of people were in the parade. Some with full costumes, some with just  a hat.



But everyone was very excited to be dancing in the street!




Everyone was dancing but there wasn’t a very good coordination. Most people were just moving to the beat.



The drum playing was pretty good.




She looks a little uncertain about this whole thing.




He was really into it.




I needed a beer break.




The parade kept going and the sun came out, lucky for these girls.









Yeah! Vegetables. You have to work to find these in Argentina in a restaurant. Everyone wants to fill your plate with meat.