Waves

Here are a few of the waves I´ve been lucky enough to surf the past couple of years.

Between Waves

Here are a few of the moments between waves from the past two years of travel. It's not always a vacation. Not that I'm complaining....

Tarabuco - Bolivia

, originally uploaded by m_hagen.

This lovely small town in the hills near Sucre has a great Sunday market with people from all over the surrounding area coming by bus, car, truck and donkey. Seriously, they had a donkey parking area just on the outskirts of town. The locals are amazing to watch as they buy and sell what they need. Everyone wore a hat. Some wore leather versions in the style of the conquistadors who came though 500 years ago. Others wore knitted beanies, precariously perched upon their heads. But the hat of choice was a fedora-like version made of felt that was bent, twisted and worked into whatever stylish shape the owner was in the mood for that day. We had some fried chicken in the central market, walked all the lanes and appreciated the authentic traditions still being lived today. Not much Castellano spoken here. Nearly everyone spoke in Quechua.

Salar de Uyuni, Bolivia

Driving across the Salar de Uyuni is mesmerizing. The landscape goes on and on in a never ending blue and white horizon. The scale is difficult to describe. Islands of coral and cactus rise up out of the expansive white horizon far in the distance. I lent Jorge my shades so he wouldn´t suffer from the snow blindness and fall asleep at the wheel.

Altiplano lake, Bolivia

This was the final lake we visited on day 2 during the trip to the Salar de Uyuni. The lakes are filled with different micro organism´s that the Flamingo´s live on. The micro organism´s also give the various lakes their unique colors as well. Hedda has some great photos of the lakes here.

North by Bus - Chile

, originally uploaded by m_hagen.

This may be a little mundane, but I thought I´d write this to remind myself later about how this sometime´s works. I haven´t had any hassles the past few months loading my boardbag into the storage areas of any south bound buses. As soon as I started heading north, the gringo taxes began... Leaving Valparaiso I was asked for 2,000 pesos. Then 3,000 pesos. I got off the bus and went into the office and was told by the manager, the bus driver, the luggage assistant, the ticket taker, even the guy selling hot dogs on the street that I had to pay extra for the boards. I kinda have a problem with this since everyone else is bringing wide screen TV´s, Ice chests with frozen shrimp, dried seaweed snacks and all kinds of other crap without being charged anything anything extra. So with the silence of the other passengers giving me strength, I maintained my position of not paying extra. I held out till the bus was pulling out of the terminal. We were already ten minutes late because of my stink. Well they asked once again if I was going to pay. I said, "no." They actually reversed the bus at which point I caved in and paid them 2,000. $4 bucks isn´t really worth missing the bus for....

Next up was La Serena. They wanted 2,000 straight up. I held firm with my desire not to pay. I was told we were going to the Policia and laughed at em. "OK, lets go". I´ll pay them before I pay you! Well I was a little nervous when we pulled up to the Policia checkpoint. Will they drop me and my boards here in the middle of nowhere? Is all this really worth $4??? In the end the bus inspector got off. The driver took the wheel and the ticket guy came over and quietly asked how much I´d be willing to pay. I gave him a buck and the rest of the 12 hour trip he was my best friend. He even played "Resident Evil" for me in English. Ummm, thanks. I guess. The photo is of a police checkpoint in the Atacama.

Mamalluca Observatory - Chile

, originally uploaded by m_hagen.

The place where it never rains. You don´t have to be a genius to understand why most major countries interested in Astronomy have observatories built here in the southern reaches of the Atacama desert. Mamalluca was purposefully built for tourists so, unlike the professional observatories where you can look but not touch, here you can use small telescopes with a guide to see all kinds of cool places far, far away.... I was able to see Saturn and its rings, Mars, Alpha Centuri nebuli and a few others whose names I´ve already forgotten. Something like CRG-1224. I can also pick out at least half a dozen constellations in the southern hemisphere so whenever you´re down here with me next I´ll show em to you. Saw heaps of shooting stars as well.

What I found most interesting was finding out what the Mapuche and Inka´s thought when they looked up at the stars. European´s always focused on the bright stars to create their constellations and create their myths and legends. The South American indigenous people instead found images in the dark areas between the light. These dark area´s are called carbon nebula. They block out much of the light in some corners of the night sky. When our guide pointed these images out they seemed so obvious. A large Inkan snake winding through the sky. A huge llama just below the Southern Cross. The last image we saw was a Nandu, a large flightless bird from South American. Aboriginal´s in Australia called the same shape an Emu, a relative of the Nandu. I love that thousands of years ago, people half way across the world shared the same celestial aesthetic.

Valparaiso ascensor´s

, originally uploaded by m_hagen.

We had a bit of fun and saved our legs from destruction by using the ascensors whenever we could. There are about fifteen scattered throughout the hills to help you gain some elevation around the really steep spots. Most were built about 100 years ago and I believe they´re still the original parts. The wood box car creaks and shakes violently as it´s quickly yanked upwards a few hundred feet.

Valparaiso - Chile

, originally uploaded by m_hagen.

Valparaiso is a city suffused with history and art. It breathes an inspiring cityscape of paint, sculpture and music at every turn. Our hotel is next door to an Academie de Musica so we breakfast with the sounds of classical music and opera filtering in through the windows. Tiny, windy streets twist, climb and sharply drop. They criss-cross and weave their way over the countless ridges and canyons the city has grown into over the many years. I feel at home with the many precariously placed homes that teeter on the edges of the hillsides. So much like the Canyon in Sierra Madre.

Grafitti is everywhere. Mosaics of tile and mirror glass cover street embankments. Peering into alleys you may see paintings of fang toothed kittens attacking bunny eared girls, or a couple of people kicking back on a non-existent back porch. Rich and I wandered the city for hours soaking it all in, tripping out on how extensive and fine the qualityof art was wherever you looked. This is no town for a tagger.

Pablo Neruda´s House - Valparaiso

, originally uploaded by m_hagen.

Pablo Neruda´s home is a condensed version of the city itself. His eclectic tastes are laid out as if he just wandered down the street to pick up some knick-nack in one of the cool antique stores downtown. The four storied house is simply one modest room stacked upon another. The top room was his study and has stunning views of the city and harbor. The stuffed Penguin in the bar was my favorite. Don´t think you can pick those up too easily these days...

Valparaiso ghosts

, originally uploaded by m_hagen.

Rich and I were sitting in a little cafe sipping on a beer and resting our legs after trucking up and down hills all day when Rich notices this guy pulling out cans of spray paint from his satchel. We´re thinking he might start tagging at rush hour. Since there´s so much graf everywhere, maybe no one cares what or when you spray down here... So we watch for awhile and this guy is jumping on and off buses, sticking his head into taxi´s and bumping into people on the street. Seems he´s a spray paint dealer. Instead of chicklets and bad watches though, he´s making sure the youth of Valparaiso can get their tools for the weekend assault on the cities walls. We watched as he made a couple of sales, pulled more stock out of his bag, and then drifted off into the night.

Parrilla down south

The fellow surfers we ran into down south were a good crew. Some good international surf cross-pollination going on in the photo above. On this night Larry somehow convinced everyone to jump into the back of a pickup truck and head 20 minutes up the road to the local discotecque. We arrived to find a raging party for a 90 year old lady. She´d blown her candles and headed home a couple of hours before, but her younger friends in their 80´s were keeping the karaoke singer in business. We had a few piscola´s, danced to Chile´s top 10 dance songs of all time and ruined ourselves for the next morning´s surf.

Down south in Chile

, originally uploaded by m_hagen.

The pace of life is moves a little slower down here. The chilly mornings and the vino tinto being consumed most nights might be part of the reason. When we arrived Rich and I ran into Ian who said it´d be a miracle if he got into the surf before 10am. Rarely have I ever been so lazy but here, there´s just no need to rush. The left points are protected from the south wind that blows, and there´s no one here. This is a fishing village at heart. Eating a dinner of Paila Marina with the locals watching the futbol. No menu here. If you want to eat you´re served a beautiful seafood stew out of a huge steaming pot. A few pieces of buttered bread and beer. What else do you need???

One afternoon Rich and I walked out to surf the point in town. The fishermen were keeping busy folding nets and checking out their boats. As the sun began to drop to the horizon we were having a blast catching wave after wave, running back up the beach and jumping back in at the top of the point. After one wave dropped me off halfway down the point, I noticed the fishermen towing one of their boats out to the shorebreak with a team of oxen. It was crazy as they managed to coax the oxen into the shorebreak and through breaking waves to launch their boat. They launched about 20 boats with the oxen as Rich and I stopped surfing and watched. There is no harbor here. No breakwall. They go right through the surf. These guys are truly hardcore watermen!