Yang it!!

We were so excited to see our good friends, Pete & Ginny and their little guy, Bodhi who were down visiting in October and November.
Pete, Ginny, and Bodhi kicked around town for a few days while Brett and I were working. They did all kinds of fun things (many of which Brett and I have not done yet), like dressing up Bodhi in typical cowboy, or Huaso, attire and getting his photo taken on a giant stuffed toy horse. I have no idea who first came up with the concept of a nearly life-sized stuffed horse for photo ops, but my new mission is to take Brett out for a few cocktails, then convince him that it would be a good idea to get his photo taken on it.

On Halloween we all took off for a long weekend in the Lakes District, which is an incredible place. The entire region is one little farm after another. Each farm has a few sheep, a handful of pigs, some chickens strutting around, and a milking cow(complete with a bell around its neck). It felt like we were driving right through a children's storybook. I attempted, of course, to capture the cute factor by taking a ridiculous amount of photos of the farm friends. I spared you the detailed photos and posted only one.

Pucon is known for being the town that is nestled at the bottom of a still-active volcano. We had grand visions of taking Bodhi on his first volcano ascent with a peek down to the lava below, but we were greeted in Pucon with some gray, drizzly weather. This ended up being a great thing, as we spent the days soaking in several of the nearby hot springs. There is an eerie beauty to the Termas Geometricas (their locker rooms on the river are pictured above). We lazily soaked the day away in their pools. Despite the weather, we managed to get out on a good hike that led us to a nearby waterfall. Pucon is packed with great restaurants, many of which have (gasp!) vegetarian food! We bunked up at a the Hostel Ecole, which was an cozy, homey little spot. The only drawback of the trip was when Bodhi managed to graze his finger on the wood burning stove, giving himself a little blister. He warned us all weekend, "fi-yuh...'ot!"

After a super fun 4 days together, we said goodbye and headed back to school in Santiago, while those guys continued their month long South American journey.