She started crying the minute we landed.

Ok. So maybe that’s not totally accurate. She waited at least until we pulled up to the guest house in the quiet little neighborhood on Guemes, and it started to rain on her while I was inside booking the room.

We left Sunny Buenos Aires, cosmopolitan, noisy, sultry, sweaty, intoxicating, Buenos Aires for Bariloche, a lakeside mountain town of towering pines and succulent flowers bursting from every windowsill and every yard-side. A cold, windy, damp, cold, green, quiet, cold, wet, and did I mention cold little corner of Argentina and perhaps the outdoor sports capitol of South America.

Needless to say, I thought I died and went to Vancouver (with almost as many Canadians but with a way better exchange rate), the same place I have been visiting annually with dreams of returning on a far more permanent basis since my first vacation to Canada in 1999.

She also thought she died and went to Vancouver (only the price of the ticket was a helluvalot more), the same place she sprinted away from so many years ago and just started to cry.

Where I was walking around in the cold drizzle of a Friday afternoon just amazed at the hundreds of different flowers blooming psychedelic amongst all the green and gray, she walked with a frown, and in a depressed monotone recited the names of all the flora as I pointed them out like a five-year-old in his own private Disneyland. “That’s a snapdragon, that’s a monkey tree, that’s a thistle, that’s a forget me not, that’s a rainstorm and that’s exactly why I left this godforsaken mud puddle of a life for San Diego.”

I, on the other hand, after nearly ten years of climbing (or trekking or biking or carousing) in different parts of the world and after four years of living in the social crossroads and alpine paradise of Flagstaff, was able to identify most of the fauna in Bariloche without difficulty. “That’s a bearded mountain goat, that’s a wooly rock hound, that’s a smoke-eyed dirt hippy, that’s a brown-footed river rat.”

Needless to say, I was amongst my people. Sure, you all know me as a flaming metrosexual and corporate monkey, but kids, there’s a lot of dirt under these fingernails. I might look good in polyester, but I feel good in Polartec.

Despite the tears and the light that comes across her face whenever I mention the words either Buenos or Aires, she has graciously pulled it together and has forced a smile as she has seen just how much I have been smiling since I arrived. I am doing my part to ensure that this smile remains on her lips with plenty of hot cups of cafe con leche and the more than occasional cuddle. It seems to be working for the time being, but I am pretty sure that if weather hadn’t turned today I would have woke up bound and gagged and strapped into the middle seat of the next available flight to someplace tropical and warm.

She is also doing her part to see that she remains sufficiently distracted from the damp chill of Bariloche by keeping herself occupied. However I’m not sure stripping down to our skivvies, pulling on damp neoprene and jumping into a 48-degree river of glacial run-off was an ideal first choice for an outdoor activity. I am still convinced the best tag line for the outfitter’s promotional brochure would be “Rafting! Fun through hypothermia!”

Of course, after we made our reservations, I realized that the pants and tee I was wearing were the only clothing I had as the rest were in mid-cycle at the local lavanteria, and I wouldn’t be able to pick them up until at least nine the following morning – the same time we were scheduled to leave for the river. This I assumed would have left me either pulling neoprene over my one pair of pants and subsequently frozen for the rest of the afternoon or, alternatively, stripping down to the barest essentials of The Mighty Jimbo in front of all of Argentina. And let me assure you, in that weather, Jimbo definitely doesn’t appear so mighty.

Thankfully for all those nice people around me, tour operators in South America are anything but punctual, and I had plenty of time to procure my laundry and preserve the precious little left of my dignity.

Despite those little setbacks and the cold and it being our first attempt at river rafting, we both had an amazing time. I have not been able to find my testicles for several days as a result, but I’m sure eventually they’ll turn up somewhere.

The Rio Manso even had some exciting sections of Class Four rapids (as defined by the number of letters in the word you will use upon first encountering them), ensuring both smiles and grimaces as waves of near frozen white water washed over our boat. The things we are willing to endure for a good time. It’s an interesting experience, doing something that might possibly kill you with a guide who doesn’t speak English. It doesn’t take too many smacks to the back of your head with the business end of a paddle before you learn the Spanish words for “forward,” “backward,” and “I said FORWARD, gringo!”

The bruises on my skull and my missing genitalia notwithstanding, the experience was certainly worthwhile. The river was clear and green, with shining granite boulders intricately carved by the water lining the banks and splashing waterfalls cascading through the lush green of the forest. Glacier capped mountains loomed overhead as we floated through this verdant if chilly corner of heaven, until we finally ended our excursion at a hillside pasture on the border of Chile, and watched as wool clad caballeros led horses down to the bank of the river to retrieve our boats. For the first time I understood why my friends love kayaking so, and now I am wondering if I have found yet another reason to shop at REI and one more way with which I can waste my weekends and worry my already neurotic mother.

Bariloche offers plenty of other opportunities to send my mother into conniptions. It’s a picturesque community set amongst the trees at about 800 meters. It is next to one of Argentina’s largest national parks and against the shore of the 90-kilometer long, sapphire-blue Lake Huapi. Surrounded by what appears to be dozens of Patagonian peaks, Bariloche is the epicenter of Argentina’s alpine resorts, and is a bustling ski town during the winter. Within a short drive of Bariloche I can find climbing, biking, rafting, kayaking, skiing, snowboarding, wind surfing, kiteboarding, wakeboarding, water skiing, alpine trekking, ice climbing, and paragliding.

Sounds a lot like my garage.

Basically, it’s Lake Tahoe, only with an average home price of about $75,000.

The town is crawling with tourists, but as Bariloche is also filled with interesting little restaurants and cafes, including two Mexican places (Chips! Salsa! Arriba!), about fifty chocolate stores, and literally dozens of cheap hosterias and guest houses, I’m not about to bitch about the crowds of bug-eyed window gazers.

Perhaps most importantly however, nearly all of the tourists are like me – dirty, booted, and marsupial. Thankfully, the spine-bending, overstuffed packs hampering the postures of the Bariloche locals are usually countered by the panoramas that lift the eyes and frequently drop the jaws.

We’re staying in a tiny hosteria just a few blocks from downtown with a large comfortable common area owned by a warm, grandfatherly gentleman whose name I believe is Cholo, but seriously, don’t quote me on that. The property has at least dozen different flowers blooming around the yard. I don’t have high speed internet – hell, I don’t even have an power outlet in the room, but we have views from all the windows, at least four peregrine falcons zipping around the trees in the yard, and both a vegetarian restaurant and a Mexican restaurant only a block away.

We took advantage of the sunshine today and spent the afternoon perched high up on a hillside climbing steep and pocketed cliffs with Martin (pronounced Marteen), a young, local guide who blessedly happened to have a pair of shoes that fit the battleships I call feet. The cliffs overlooked the carpet of evergreens leading to yet another shockingly blue alpine lake in a quiet valley between at three separate peaks. We ate a late lunch of fresh pastries and strawberry tea, and I climbed up and over craggy roofs, pulling on deep pockets of rock until my forearms were so leaden I could hardly close my hands. Weather permitting, I’ll climb again with Martin on Thursday, and still hope to fill a week with several treks and perhaps a single-track ride somewhere in these hills before leaving first for El Bolson, and eventually on to Calafate, and El Chalten in Chile on my way deeper into Patagonia and closer to my date with a penguin.

Bariloche and the Lake District has made me remember why I loved Flagstaff so much and why I continue to visit Vancouver despite the number of my trips cut short by weather. I’d be a liar if I said I wasn’t tempted to look seriously at purchasing one of those cottages around town, something with a view and a big fireplace and a lawn, buying a dog that speaks more Spanish than I do, and moving to Patagonia at least semi-permanently. But life is full of trades. And the comfort and convenience and opportunity of Southern California is a hard hand to fold. I would consider a vacation home, but a seventeen-hour trek seems daunting for a long weekend in Patagonia. Then again, to afford this lifestyle in America I would need work seventeen-hour days, so perhaps that trek isn’t so daunting after all.

Again, hasta.