First day in Peru

Marilyn, May 20, 2015

Welcoming though it is, Uruguay, like most countries, expects its visitors to leave after a certain period of time. Within 90 days of arriving, we were required to renew our visas, which was accomplished with a simple visit to an immigration office. With those additional 90 days about to expire at the end of May, if we intended to comply with the law, we needed to exit and reenter the country. Apparently, overstaying one's visa, unlike in the United States, doesn't carry much risk beyond a modest fine, but wanting to be law-abiding visitors, we obediently made plans to fly to Peru.

Why Peru, when Argentina and Brazil are just across the border? One reason is that both Argentina and Brazil charge U.S. citizens hefty "reciprocity" fees, reciprocating for the high price their citizens must pay to apply for visas to visit the U.S. Another reason is that all of us have long dreamed of visiting Machu Picchu, the ancient Incan city high in the Peruvian Andes.  

So, at 4:30 a.m. last Wednesday, we found ourselves walking down our silent road under a beautiful moon to the bus stop. Always wary of the unreliability of bus schedules, we were relieved when the second bus that came down the highway was indeed going to the airport. Dozing just a bit on the way, we arrived in plenty of time to check in and get to our gate. Our tickets were on a Colombian airline, Avianca, which I had heard great things about. We were not disappointed! The extra courtesies shown to the children were especially appreciated. I also loved that this was my first flight captained by a woman.

When I mentioned to an Uruguayan friend several weeks ago that we were planning a trip to Peru, he told me, "Peru is South American, not like Uruguay." At first, I thought that was a strange comment, but immediately after stepping off the plane in Lima, I understood exactly what he meant. Even in a bustling airport full of travellers from everywhere, I could tell that we were in a place entirely different from Uruguay: much more brown skin, a more familiar Spanish dialect, and not one person drinking mate. It was disappointing, but not too unexpected, to find McDonalds, Papa John's, and Subway in the airport's food court. They served InkaCola, though, so I guess that redeemed them a bit.

After the boys ate their Subway sandwiches and I drank the InkaCola that they rejected, we boarded our plane to Cusco. Once over the snowy Andes, our next task was to find transportation to Ollantaytambo, where we had hotel reservations for the night. The advice we had gotten from internet resources was that starting out in Ollantaytambo, 2000 feet lower than Cusco, was a good way to avoid altitude sickness. We had also read that we could find very inexpensive busses from Cusco to Ollantaytambo. Just after disembarking, we passed a desk in the airport advertising private transportation, and with two tired boys and a couple hours of travel still ahead of us, we abandoned our noble plans to travel as the locals do. The impulse decision to hire a private car and driver for $60 was one of the best decisions of our trip. It turns out that a 2-day "strike" was in progress, and the main road to Ollantaytambo was closed, so busses weren't running. I asked a lot of questions about the strike, trying to understand what was at issue. I finally figured out that it wasn't a strike as we would think of it as much as it was a protest. People upset about an increase in public transportation costs had blocked the highway and train tracks with boulders, logs, and their own bodies, and shut down virtually all regular movement for thousands of tourists and other travellers. Our driver took us on the only alternate route, a narrow dirt road that added about an hour to our trip and took maybe a year off our lives. He tore around mountain curves, ignoring the "beware of landslides" signs, and brought us to the edge of more than one precipice. Halfway through the drive, he told us he had never been this way before; nevertheless, he seemed confident in his ability to get us where we wanted to go without killing us. It wasn't until we were almost there that I realized that he was facing the return drive in the dark, and then understood better his hurry. We did pass one area where large logs were blocking the road, and local folks were hanging out watching the show as cars and trucks going in opposite directions aggressively and loudly vied for the narrow passage around the barriers. I suppose it would not have been a wise thing to get out and try to clear the obstacles out of the way.   

Reaching Ollantaytambo, our driver was eager to deposit us on the street and start back toward Cusco. We weren't sure where our hotel was, but found refuge in a lovely restaurant overlooking a river. There, we happily tucked into the best food we've tasted in South America. I had traditional Peruvian lomo saltado, and Gene had an alpaca dish. It was enough to make me consider a permanent move to Peru.

With dinner gratefully eaten and eyelids drooping, there was not much left to do but find our hotel. We asked a few questions, shouldered our backpacks, walked down the road a bit, asked more questions, crossed a bridge, and finally arrived at the hotel, called Tikawasi Valley. The inn was warm and inviting, and the staff exceptionally helpful. The boys were especially thrilled by the towels folded into swans that greeted us in our room.

We did our best to get a good night's sleep, as we had to be up early the next morning for breakfast and a walk to the train station. If the altitude was not enough to take our breath away, the view we got from the hotel balcony when we walked out the door in the morning was. Besides the beauty of the mountains, we loved the little bull statues on the next-door roofs. Traditionally, these statues are given to new homeowners by friends and family to ensure good fortune to all who dwell under them. The cross is often added as a nod to Catholic tradition as well.

   

Walking to the train station in Ollantaytambo

The 90 minute train ride from Ollantaytambo to Machu Picchu Pueblo was as spectacular as PeruRail had advertised. The sides and roof of the train cars were mostly windows, providing amazing views as we made our way through the Andes. 

As we had been promised, we were met at the Machu Picchu Pueblo train station by staff from Inkaterra, the resort hotel where we were staying. From this point on, our trip had been arranged for us by my friend Beth's agency, Lost World Adventures. We have never traveled with help from an agency before, but after this trip, we may be spoiled for life. It was such a gift to not have to worry about the next day's transportation or directions or itinerary, knowing that someone with infinitely more experience than we had was planning it all for us.

Our bags in the care of the helpful Inkaterra porter, we were escorted the short distance through the small town and over a bridge to the resort. We were given warm washcloths to freshen up, served organic tea that had been grown right on the property, and invited to wander the extensive grounds or relax in the beautiful lobby area until our room was ready. An unexpected delight was meeting a California family including two friendly boys and their parents and grandmother, with whom we immediately hit it off. Teo and Javy, long tired of having only Gene and me as companions and audience, were thrilled to have new friends who not only invited them to join them in the hot tub and pool, but even loaned them swimwear. It seemed to me that we had found a paradise, even before we started off on the adventures we had come seeking. The next few days were ones that we'll never forget, and that we will report on in upcoming posts!

Thoughts on Studying Uruguayan History

Marilyn, May 10, 2015

Friday, I had big plans for an educationally-loaded trip into Montevideo with the boys. Among the things on our agenda was a visit to an art museum to see the most famous work of one of Uruguay's most famous artists, Juan Manuel Blanes. We had read about the painting and the event it commemorates in our history book. It seemed like something we should lay our eyes on, and this was as good a day as any to get that experience checked off our list.

I could detail our many hurdles in actually getting out the door of the house, and I could describe the tedious bus ride into Montevideo. I could explain how several frustrations piled on top of one another once we got to the city, and I could expound on the interminable bus ride to the museum. But I will limit myself to admitting that 40 minutes into the second bus ride, I reached the point of incredulity that I was dragging my kids through all of this just to see a painting. What painting could possibly be worth all this effort? My boys remained remarkably patient up until almost the end, but even before they started kicking each other across the bus seats, I was sinking into despair over one more failed educational outing. I began to consider cutting my losses, wondering how I could justify the cost of a taxi home.

Luckily, it was right about then that we arrived at our stop, or at least close enough that I could push my kids off the bus before they caused any real damage to each other or anyone else. We walked a few blocks along a crowded street that looked like an unlikely location for a museum. And then, kind of all of a sudden, there it was, a stately old building in the middle of a lovely park-like setting, very warm and welcoming. I could feel the anxiety start to lift. We walked in, were greeted by friendly guards, and soon were in the gallery housing the painting we had come to see.

And it was simply glorious.

Breathtaking. Magnificent. Profound.

Almost alone in the gallery, kneeling between my boys, taking in this masterpiece of art and treasure of history, I knew that this is exactly why we home school. We have the freedom to invest ridiculous amounts of time and energy into experiences that drive deep into our emotions and infuse our learning with meaning, that cut across all sorts of subjects and curricula, and help us touch and feel and taste and understand what's real in the world and in ourselves.

Of course, this image doesn't do the painting justice, but you get the idea.

Our whole study of Uruguayan history has at times seemed like a ridiculous investment of time and energy for questionable payoff. Early on, I recognized a few obvious benefits, including the language practice it was giving me as I painstakingly translated each word of our history book. Too, the boys really enjoyed the artwork component as they drew pictures of what they imagined each upcoming chapter to be about. But, really, I asked myself more than once, how valuable is it for Americans, and Guatemalan Americans at that, to have such an in-depth knowledge of Uruguayan history? And since much of the history we were reading was battle after battle, war after war, conflict after conflict, there was little content that we found very uplifiting. We were invested, though, and I was determined to plod on through.

Teo with a few of the many drawings of Uruguayan history that adorn our walls

And then the aha! moment occurred. We had just read about Uruguay achieving its independence. We learned that soon afterward, the leaders of that independence movement, who had been friends and allies, became bitter enemies, each vying for power, and throwing the young country into civil war. As we read this history, our conversation immediately turned, and we weren't just talking about a small South American country 5000 miles away from anything that seemed pertinent to our lives at home. We were talking about something much broader, about what has happened and what continues to happen in country after country after country when fighters become leaders and only know how to lead through continued fighting. We got to talk about how the U.S. more or less avoided a similar fate, because its leaders were not limited to fighters, but included scholars who knew history and philosophy and rhetoric, who could write and persuade and compromise. We got to honor the contributions of the slaves who were back on the plantations doing all the work so that the Washingtons and Jeffersons and Madisons were free to devote themselves to thinking about how the new country could be peacefully governed. Once again, we got to cut across subjects and ideas and uncover new meaning and new insights.

Not long after, we learned about labor uprisings in Uruguay in the late 1800s. Much of what we read sounded very similar to the history of the labor movement in the United States. Again, we realized how universal many of these issues are, and how connected people can be across borders. We learned that the workers in Uruguay felt a deep relation to labor protestors in the United States, and organized annual events to honor the "mártires (martyrs) de Chicago" who were executed after the Haymarket Affair. We learned that the history of struggle for an 8-hour workday was international, and that the U.S. was just one player, one partner, in a shared history. I found myself reflecting not just on the history, but on how I learned history, how I teach history, and how I want my boys and my students to study history. I've always given lip service to the importance of studying U.S. history in the context of the wider world, but it took this venture to this little corner of the wider world for me to really understand how very connected our histories actually are. My teaching from here on out will reflect that connection in a more meaningful way, I am certain.

Besides reading, drawing, and venturing out on field trips, our study of Uruguayan history has included identifying places in Uruguay named for the people and events we've learned about. From our first days in Montevideo, I noted how very many of the streets were named for people or dates. And as we've traveled to other areas, we've noticed how so many of these names are repeated in every little town or village we come to. One obvious explanation for this is the same explanation we hear for so many differences we notice: "It's a small country." It's a small country, so everyone knows everybody else. It's a small country, with not much need for professional childcare, because everyone has an available family member nearby.  It's a small country, so the president can continue his medical practice while in office. And so on. Well, it would be easy to say that it's a small country, with only so many heroes and important dates to go around, so each place uses the same ones over and over and over to name their streets, plazas, and parks. 

But there's more to it than that. From the perspective of the history book that we read, Uruguayan heroes were pretty much manufactured through intentional campaigns to create a shared culture among the distinct groups that found themselves lumped together into one nation. Uruguay was carved out of the "Banda Oriental" in a deal between Argentina and Brazil, brokered by England, which was trying to protect its trading rights. Boundaries were drawn and indigenous gauchos in the campo learned that they were now countrymen with the rich Italian comerciantes in Montevideo. Descendants of African slaves were citizens just like new immigrants from Holland or France. Those who had fought on the side of the Portuguese, or the Spanish, or the revolutionaries from Buenos Aires, found themselves neighbors with equal stakes in the new nation. Someone realized that what was needed to draw these people together was a common culture, even if that culture had to be created for them. So statues were erected to whoever might qualify as a hero, preferably without riling one side or another. Storytellers and writers were called upon to breathe new life into old accounts of brave deeds. Contests were held to create poetry honoring the "fatherland." Magnificent works of art, like the one we viewed on Friday, were painted and sculpted to depict historic events not as they actually happened, but as a common cultural memory might envision them. Although no one has told me for sure, my guess is that it was at this time and for this reason that so many places all over the country were given names for military leaders like Artigas, Rivera, and Lavalleja, and for important dates like July 18, the anniversary of the writing of the Constitution. But also we have found places named for education reformers, for artists, poets, musicians, journalists, physicians; for indigenous leaders and former slaves and immigrants. More recently, the cultural net has cast itself even wider, and heroes from farther afield have been honored in names like Parque Roosevelt and Rambla Gandhi. There's someone for everyone to identify with, a reason for everyone, even a Yankee from Georgia, to feel included.

While the idea of manufacturing a common culture seems odd and uncomfortably disingenuous to me, I'm seeing its value in a society such as this one, where so many people with so little in common had to work out their differences and function as one. I find myself wondering if similar efforts were made in other parts of the world, for instance in the Balkan States, or in Middle Eastern countries, where lines drawn on a map resulted in nations made up of people with no common history or any investment in each other's traditions. I'm wondering if these efforts have been part of what led to Uruguay, once the fighting stopped, to rather quickly becoming one of only a handful of nations that are rated as free from conflict.

These are questions for another time, but questions that will stay with me and color the way I look at the history of my own country and of others in the future. There is much more Uruguayan history to learn, because as it turns out, our book only brought us to the beginning of the twentieth century. I am itching to dive into the more recent history, the dictatorship of 1973 - 1985, the rise of socialism, the life of President Mujica, who just left office. I don't know that we'll get to any of that before we leave here in just a few weeks. But I am appreciating how what we've studied so far has given me a new perspective, and for how much all of us are learning here in this fascinating place.

Flora and Fauna Adventure

Javy, May 1, 2015

Yesterday we went on an adventure to a place that was sort of like a zoo. When we got there, we got out of the car and we looked around. There was a little playground with a spinny thing, and there were peacocks all over the place. It was very neat.

We played awhile and then we went into an aviary with a lot of birds. There were flamingos, turtles, and interesting birds with a yellow face and feet that looked like leaves.

Next, we saw coatimundis. They are a mix of a monkey and a raccoon. Their tails look like King Julian's tail from Madagascar.

We went on to see monkeys on Monkey Island, but they were resting in the shade, so we didn't get a great picture.

Then we walked over and saw the reptile house. There were awesome-looking snakes and a snake that was shrivelled up that had two heads. It was a mutant.

After that, we walked over to the bunnies. There were five, all of different colors. My favorite one with the gray and white one.

We moved on to boars. They were disgusting creatures because they were so fat and luggy. Then came these animals that were like a bunny except that they had small legs, sort of like a gazelle, and the head of a dog. They were about knee-high to an adult person. They are called maras.

There were more colorful birds, and more colorful birds, and then we saw something so weird! It was a chicken. Why would a chicken be in a zoo?

So we next saw a wild cat. It was sort of like a cheetah, but really small and cat-like. There was a llama in the enclosure with the alligators, but alligators were just minding their own business.  We looked at some turtles that had fungi on their shells. It looked like moss.

Then we continued to the titis.  Titis are a form of monkey. They live in the rainforest of Brazil. They live in little family groups. They are about as big as a man's palm. If you have a baseball cap, a titi would fit inside it. They are known to live for about 12 years in the jungle, but in captivity, 20 or 25 years.

Then our mom and dad looked at some camels, and we stayed behind to play on the playground. Then we got into our car and went away. We thought that it was great fun to look at all those animals.

Javy's Adventures on Horseback

Javy, April 27, 2015

We went to an estancia last week. It was great! We went every day on horseback to round up sheep and cows!

In the  mornings, we went to the corral.  We got our helmets because the gaucho wanted us to be safe. If we fell off the horse, our heads could be mush. But the best thing was we got to wear gaucho boots!

We saddled up our horses, but we had to do it by ourselves. We first put on two layers of pads so the horse wouldn't feel uncomfortable. The gauchos helped us get the saddles on because, as you know, we are very short, and we had big horses. Then we put the bridle on by opening up the horse's mouth to make it bite the metal bit and then we put the straps on over the horse's ears.

We went with our horses and started to ride. It was a good feeling, and it was fun when the horse started to move. I felt like I was very powerful to be riding a big horse. I could control where it went, when I wanted it to go, and how fast it went.  When I wanted to turn left, I would pull the reins left and it would go left. If I wanted to go right, I would pull right. If I wanted to go fast, I would tap  the horse's stomach with my boot and it would go fast. When I wanted to stop, I pulled back on the reins.

When we got off  the horse, we would take the harness off and then we would take off the two pads and the saddle. Then we would get a brush and start brushing the horse. Then we needed to pat the horse goodbye and set it free. I loved to ride and I hope to ride again some day!

Estancia Panagea

Marilyn, March 26, 2015

We've had some pretty amazing experiences in Uruguay so far, but this week's just might top them all. Teo, Javy, and I spent three days at a wonderful place called Estancia Panagea. Our friends the Gimnig family, who visited us last month, discovered it and highly recommended it to us after their stay there. It turned out to be all they had promised and more.

Estancias are large ranches, and in the pampas of Uruguay and Argentina, are usually home to herds of cattle and sheep, and also homes to their herders, the gauchos (and sometimes gauchas). Estancia Panagea is a working ranch that welcomes visitors to come and spend a few days, joining in as much of the work as they choose. Panagea's owner, Juan Manuel, is a third-generation rancher, as well as a veterinarian. He's also a great teacher, travel advisor, and armchair philosopher. He and the gaucho who works for him, Bilingua (so nicknamed because he speaks both Spanish and Portuguese), possess what must be a pretty unusual set of skills that enable them to both run a productive and profitable ranch, and at the same time cheerfully shepherd a bunch of novices through all the work that the ranch demands. Bilingua's wife works as the cook, serving up hearty meals of gaucho food, including rich mutton stews and savory rice dishes. Juan's family also lives at the estancia, although we did not have the pleasure of meeting them, since they were traveling.

From all we had heard and read, we were anticipating a great experience at Panagea. What we could not have anticipated was our luck in being there at the same time as another visitor, Elin, a mechanical engineer and adventurer from Sweden. Her visit to Panagea came in the middle of a several-week trek across South America. She was wonderful, genuinely enjoying my boys and their antics, and happy to share her considerable horse knowledge with us greenhorns. We bonded quickly and shared meaningful conversation over meals and magical moments taking in all the estancia had to offer.

Our guesthouse, painted with the flags of previous guests' home countries

Our journey started on Monday afternoon with a 5-hour bus ride straight north from Montevideo to Tacaruarembó. Elin was on the same bus, sitting a couple rows ahead of us, but of course at that point we didn't know we'd be spending the next few days with her. Juan met us at the bus station, loaded us and our luggage into his truck, and drove us another hour into the countryside to reach Panagea. The sun was setting in all its gold and pink glory as we drove through the vast, empty grasslands, giving us a glimpse of the wonder that awaited us. We arrived at Pangea with a bit of daylight to spare, and were able to settle into our simple and comfortable rooms before supper. Juan joined us for the meal, and we all enjoyed getting to know each other, sharing travel experiences, talking politics, and exchanging perspectives on the world.

Even though the boys and I have read in our Uruguayan history book about the electrification of the  campo or countryside years ago, such progress has not yet extended as far as Panagea. Electricity is available only for a few hours each evening, when the generator is turned on. Juan let us know that it would turn off at 10 p.m. sharp, with no warning given. Teo and Javy and I snuggled into our beds and began our bedtime reading (Secret of the Andes, in preparation for our trip to Cusco next month), and all of a sudden, in the middle of a paragraph, the lights went out and all of us were surprised by how very, very dark it was. We opted not to light the candles that were provided for us, and instead let the darkness and sleep overtake us.

After breakfast the next morning, we met Juan and Bilingua in the corral and were assigned our horses. With 74 horses to choose from, Juan has a horse appropriate for just about any rider, I imagine. I was given Rebelde ("Rebel"), Javy rode Infierno, and Teo was matched with Tormenta. Although their names were not very reassuring, they turned out to be gentle and patient animals, and we gained confidence as we rode across the grassland, following Juan and Bilingua to the paddocks where we would round up 300 of the ranch's 1800 sheep. Javy shares his thoughts on riding the horses here, and Teo has written more about our morning herding and vaccinating the sheep here.

Juan helps Javy get situated on his horse, Infierno

Midday is lunch and siesta time at the estancia, and we enjoyed relaxing in the hammocks that Juan hung for us in the trees near the house. In the afternoon, we saddled up new horses, giving the morning horses a break, and, per Juan's protocol, allowing us to get broader experience by riding different animals. After escorting the sheep back to their field, our next task was to bring in 200 of the 1100 cattle.  The cattle proved to be more cantankerous than the sheep, and required a lot of whooping and hollering as we rounded them up. Not surprisingly, Teo and Javy turned out to be pretty good whoopers and hollerers. 

After an hour or so of herding, we had them all back at the corral, and we guided them into a large holding pen. Next, Bilingua gave the boys flags made of long sticks with white bags tied to the ends. He had them help divide the herd into smaller groups, and then, with much flag waving and prodding, drive one group at a time into a smaller holding area. Additional whooping and hollering was involved. From that smaller area, eight or so cows at a time were led, pushed, prodded, shoved into a narrow chute where they would be more or less immobile and Juan could tag the ears of the young ones and castrate the male calves. Javy and Teo assisted by handing Juan the tags. Elin's job was to open and close the gate at the end of the chute as each cow was released, to allow access to one field or another, thereby sorting them and isolating a couple of older cows, who we later escorted to the old cow retirement field.

Tagging a calf's ear

Elin as gatekeeper

After a hard day's work, we enjoyed another delicious dinner and pleasant conversation. The boys took advantage of the evening's electricity and watched some Spanish cartoons on television. We got to bed with enough time to do some more reading, but before we had gotten through many pages, Javy was sound asleep. Too tired to get up and turn the lights out, I decided I'd just wait for them to go out on their own, but I was out before the lights were.

Wednesday was much like Tuesday, except that we felt a little more experienced and confident with the riding and the work. We were with cows all day, rounding them up, assisting with vaccination, bringing in mother cows with their calves, separating out young males that would be sold, helping with blood tests, and watching Juan check a few cows for pregnancy. He did this by inserting his gloved arm up to his shoulder into the cow's rectum and feeling for a fetus. Needless to say, this was a fascinating procedure for the boys to witness. We also painted a stripe on the backs of the cows that Juan planned to sell, and watched a bit squeamishly as he cut the horns off of one calf.

Painting cows

Our last job of the day was to escort some of the cows back to their new paddock. With that task completed, Elin, Teo, Javy, and I hurried our horses to a rise on the other side of the property to view the sunset. It was so peaceful, so breathtakingly beautiful, that it will be awhile before I can watch another sunset and not feel a bit of a longing to be back there on that little hill, overlooking the grazing sheep, waiting for the quiet, starry nighttime to descend.

Teo took this beautiful photo of Elin at sunset

Thursday morning's job was to scour a very large and hilly field for the dozen or so horses who were running free there, and to escort them back to the corral so that they could begin their work shift and relieve those that had been ridden the past several days. They knew the routine and came obediently enough. When we later saddled them up and began riding, though, it seemed that they were having a bit of trouble transitioning into their workweek, maybe like many of us feel on Monday morning after a weekend free of restraint. My horse in particular seemed to have its own idea of where it wanted to go, but I eventually got it to follow my directions, and felt pretty good about that accomplishment. Mother cows and their male calves needed to be rounded up, but what with our wandering horses and our inability to confidently distinguish the male calves from the female ones, we weren't much help. Mostly we just enjoyed being out on the range on a beautiful morning while Juan, Bilingua, and Tarzan the dog did all the real work.

Over our last lunch together, Elin and I exchanged contact information and talked about future travel plans, then we loaded into Juan's van to return to the bus station. We arrived just in time for the boys and me to catch the next double-decker bus to Montevideo, and with an extra stroke of luck, were assigned the front seats on the top level, just where they had hoped we'd be. Though eager to get home and to see Gene, we all felt a little melancholy as the bus pulled out of the station, a little sad to say goodbye to new friends and to end such a marvellous adventure. Maybe we'll just have to go back!

Riding through a eucalyptus grove

This family of rheas, or ñandus, have made their home at Panagea.  Rhea dads take care of the chicks!

Another photo by Teo

My gauchitos!

Vaccinating Sheep

Teo, April 25, 2015

Javy and I have just come back from an estancia.  An estancia is a ranch that raises mostly cows and sheep.  Instead of cowboys, gauchos take care of the ranch.  Our mom will be writing about the estancia in a longer post.  One thing we did there was vaccinating sheep.

Javy and Mom and I woke up kind of early and got our breakfast and we went to where we would saddle up our horses.  There was a Swedish woman, Elin, who was there also.  After we saddled up our horses, we went out onto the paddocks with the gauchos and we looked for sheep to herd up.  It was kind of fun herding sheep.  The sheep were very easy to get because they would all squeezed together in a little bunch.  We could just yell and whistle and ride behind them.  There was a dog who helped out and barked at the sheep if they got out of line.

We brought the sheep back and we put them in three little pens.

One of the gauchos was checking for infections and if he found an infection, he would put pink stuff on it.

Next, Javy and I went into the second little pen and we yelled at the sheep and got them to move so that they would go into the first pen.

From there, the sheep went into a chute and the gaucho would take a needle and stick it in each one.

They baaaa-ed and they jumped sometimes if they were scared of the needle. Then Elin opened the hatch and they went out into a field. Awhile later, we got on our horses and herded the sheep up again took them back to their fields. I thought doing all of this was pretty cool!

Mueso del Mar

Teo, April 16, 2015

Three days ago, Javy and I and our mom went to Punta del Este for our surfing lesson.

After we were done, we got on a bus at the bus terminal and drove over an undulating bridge over to a town called La Barra.  It was very fun going over the bridge. (Photo from Wikipedia is here.)

We went to a gift shop to ask directions to a museum called Museo del Mar. The man who told us directions also let us keep our backpacks at the gift shop because we were going to have to walk a mile there and back. When we got to the museum, we walked through the door and we thought it was pretty cool because there were so many things to look at. Javy was kind of scared of a big stuffed sea lion.

We saw a moon fish, and we watched a little video that was in English about coral reefs and the animals there. We saw lots of shells and creepy old postcards. One showed a guy with nails in his head, and it said "Santa Maria." There were four big whale skeletons and there was a pirate room where there were lots of pirate things and some model pirates. The museum had about a thousand different things.  It was very fun to look through.

We crossed the road to the insectarium and we went inside. We saw thousands of bugs all in cases lining the walls. We saw preying mantises, scorpions, and butterflies, but mostly beetles. It was pretty cool to look at.

Then we walked back to the gift shop to get our bags. We got on a bus and it was fun going over the bridge again. When we got to the bus terminal, we got tickets for the bus home and bought sandwiches for the road. We got on the bus and sat for an hour or so. The bus dropped us off in Atlántida. Then we walked home and went to sleep after a big day.